For family literacy night, one of my topics would be early literacy. The reason I have chosen early literacy is because its development begins early in life and is highly related with school achievement. If a child get limited exposure to literacy at an early age, the more likely he or she will have difficulty learning to read. Certain factors play a big part in a child’s early literacy such as, teacher knowledge, respect and support for the diversity of the child’s family, cultures, and linguistic backgrounds. Also according to Petrova and Zapotocna, 2018, this may be because teachers strongly believe that literacy falls purely within the responsibility of primary education, and that this belief is deeply embedded in the thinking and attitudes of teachers. The first activity is Twister twisting for sounds (early literacy). Players start by removing their shoes. The teacher will act as the referee. The teacher is not a player but will be in control of the spinner. The teacher will call out the moves the spinner stops on and call out errors the players make.
The spinner will contain words and the mat will contain the rhyming words. I will start with four players. The players will be separated into two teams of two players each. Players start side-by-side opposite of the other team with all four circles occupied by feet on both sides of the mat. The rules are the same for both teams except teammates can share a circle with one hand or foot each. The teacher spins the spinner and calls out hand or foot and on the word that the spinner stops. Each player then attempts to place that part onto an open space for the word that rhymes with the spinner word. If there are no open spaces then the teacher must spin again. If a foot or hand is already on the word assigned to the word, then you must move it to a different open spot of that same rhyming word. The game is won by being the last one standing. Student will lose twister by falling or letting a knee or elbow touch the mat.
How this will encourage family involvement This activity will encourage family involvement and support the needs of the students in building their literacy to become better readers and struggle less in their academics. According to Hindman and Morrison (2011), families are children’s first teachers and there is ample theoretical and empirical evidence that children benefit when families remain involved in children’s learning after school entry. This activity will help parents be a part of their child’s literacy in a fun and exciting manner. How this will support your proposed students This will give the students more exposure to literacy with meaning and kinesthetic learning style.
Would also support our school population of English Language Learners by increasing their English language acquisition through phonemic awareness. Literacy Topic and why you picked that one The other topic I have chosen is vocabulary. The reason I chose this topic is that learning, as a language-based activity, is essentially and strongly reliant on vocabulary knowledge. Students must have access to the meaning of words that teachers and parent use to guide the child to learning new things. There are usually four steps in learning vocabulary; provide opportunities for reading wide and reading volume with accountability, preview the text to determine which words to teach, pre-teach meaningful words and phrases, and provide direct instruction and multiple exposures of the vocabulary in reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Vocabulary instruction can be given in different forms by, explicit instruction (constructing definitions, analyzing word structure, exploring word relationships), multiple exposures and examples, high reading volume and language volume, and school language (teacher talk) .
Activity DETAILS The second activity is jeopardy (vocabulary). This exciting game can be done using the different creations, such as Smartboard, PowerPoint, or on the blackboard. To begin, I create categories and vocabulary words associated with those categories worth a specific amount of points. Separate the students into two teams and have each team choose a number of points. Under the category students, pick amount of points. Once chosen a scrambled vocabulary word will appear and the students have to unscramble the word in order to get the amount of points specified. Once the student gives the answer, correct or not, the other team would be next. The game continues until all amounts under each category have been chosen and words have been correctly identified.
How this will encourage family involvement I believe this activity will encourage family involvement and support the needs of the students in a fun filled manner. Students will be able to remember vocabulary associated to categories studied in class. By families, getting involved in activities such experiences often encourages the family to stay involved throughout their child’s school career, providing crucial support for school reform and increasing the chances that their children will succeed (Family Involvement, n.d.). How this will support your proposed students It will help my proposed students by increasing their English language acquisition, proficiency, and to obtain cognitive academic language proficiency (CALP). Cognitive academic language proficiency (CALP) is the language ability required for academic achievement in a context-reduced environment.
