WBES Literacy Letter
from the Reading Coach
Read-At-Home Plan March 2023
Continuum of Literacy Development from Alabama’s Action Plan for Literacy
In this stage of literacy development, the learner gains familiarity with the language and its sounds and symbols.
What Parents and Family Members Can Do:
• Engage in language activities throughout the day. Have daily conversations with children; listen and encourage them to respond. Use a rich vocabulary when talking with children; speak in complete sentences. Name the people, objects, and activities that are encountered. Expose children to sophisticated vocabulary and share a love of words. Sing or say nursery rhymes, simple songs, and finger plays. Encourage children to retell experiences and describe ideas and events that are important to them.
• Read to children every day, throughout the day. Read, read, read to children for fun and learning throughout the day. Read aloud, discuss, and reread predictable stories: let children join in with rhyming words. Read aloud nursery rhymes, fairy tales, and high quality literature to children. Visit the library with your child regularly. Be a reader: let your children see you reading.
• Provide opportunities for children to draw and print, using markers, crayons, pencils, and technology. Encourage scribbling, pretend writing, and pretend reading of that writing.
Make connections between spoken and written language. Have children describe their drawings and dictate the description to you. Involve children with you in word processing and drawing applications on the computer.
At this stage, the learner becomes aware of the relationship between sounds and letters and begins applying the knowledge to text.
• Engage children in frequent conversations using complete sentences and rich vocabulary.
• Provide opportunities for children to read daily and talk and write about favorite storybooks.
• Read/discuss/reread predictable stories and grade level text.
• Read aloud fairy tales, poems, informational text, and high-quality literature.
• Visit the library with your child regularly.
• Provide opportunities for children to write to friends and relatives, make grocery lists, take food orders, write family members’ names, label household objects, and write stories and poems.
• Become involved in school activities.
At this stage, the learner improves decoding skills to include more complex spelling patterns and expands the number of words recognized by sight to build fluency.
What Parents and Family Members Can Do:
• Engage children in frequent conversations and stimulating discussions.
• Engage children in activities that require reading and writing for information and for pleasure; model your expectations.
• Continue to read to children and encourage them to read to you and discuss what they are reading.
• Provide opportunities for children to write to friends and relatives, make detailed written plans, keep a journal, write stories and poems, and use technology to communicate.
• Visit the library with your child regularly.
• Become increasingly involved in school literacy activities.
At this stage, the reader has enough reading skill to focus on content and learn new information and facts from reading.
What Parents and Family Members Can Do:
• Engage children in frequent conversations.
• Build a love of language in all its forms.
• Support a child’s specific hobby or interest with reading materials and references.
• Stay in regular contact with teachers about progress in reading, writing, speaking, and listening.