Building Letter Recognition Skills

Building letter recognition skills is a critical pre-literacy skill that early education teachers will use to evaluate the competency of your child. This skill is also considered when placing students in instructional groups, where the kids that know all of their letter names entering kindergarten go to the top reading group while the kids that don't know any will end up in the bottom group. If the school your child attends does not place students in different instructional groups based on objective literacy or pre-literacy skills, you should definitely consider finding a better instructional setting.

By the end of kindergarten (age 6-7), kids are supposed to know all of the upper-case and lower-case letter names. However, with a relatively small amount of consistent practice, almost all children can mastery the skill by the time they turn 3 years old. I started practicing letter names with my daughter when she was 20 months old. She is currently 22 months old and can name 13 upper case letters. We practice this skill for about 5-10min a day, 3-5 times per week.

Practice occurs during Anika's coloring time. We always start by practicing three new letters first.  I will usually draw one letter on the paper, point to it, and tell her the letter name 2-3 times. Mastering a new letter name requires her to do two things - memorize the label for the letter and physically pronounce the letter name. Therefore, it's important for her to hear the letter name while looking at it. It's also important for her to see my mouth pronouncing the letter. After we practice naming the three new letters, we review about 5-9 letters she already knows. The amount of practice depends on her level of focus and interest at the time. Next I give her crayons to color independently for a few minutes while asking her if she wants certain colors. Then I ask her if she wants me to help her draw some letters. She almost always says yes. So we spend a couple of minutes drawing letters - beginning with the 3 new letters we are working on. After, we practice drawing 2 shapes and 2-3 objects that I want her to learn to name. Today for instance, she practiced saying and writing 3 new letters (M, G, C), we reviewed a few letter names (K, P, U, Y), drew two shapes (circle and triangle) and then practiced drawing the sun and clouds. After, I started cleaning the kitchen while she colored independently. The whole exercise only lasts about 10-15 min. Today we practiced with crayons on white paper, but other times we use the iPad application kids doodle. One of the keys to maintaining good practice routines is stopping while it is still fun.

Building Puzzle Skills

Puzzles can be used to support the development of a variety of important skills including:

* Hand - Eye Coordination + Fine Motor Skills
The child sees the various puzzle pieces and attempts to manipulate the pieces to construct the complete picture. Wooden puzzles with little pegs in each piece require children to grasp, reach, flip, turn, slide, place, and release pieces of the puzzle. In this way, puzzles provide the opportunity to build hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills.

* Visual Perception
The term visual perception refers to the brain's ability to understand and interpret what the eyes see. In the case of puzzles, the brain learns to look for correspondences between the puzzle piece in hand and the potential places for the piece on the board.

* Memory
Memory is defined as the ability to store past events and be able to retrieve the information when needed. When children practice building the same puzzle repeatedly, they are developing memory skills.

* Problem Solving Skills
As the child evaluates if a piece does or does not fit, they are engaging problem solving skills.


Learning Sequence for Anika introduced at 19-21 months:

(1) 1-step wooden puzzle with 8 pieces
The puzzle has eight pieces with eight animals including a lion, bird, elephant, dog, cat, turtle, fish. Anika was ecstatic to learn this puzzle. I followed the instructional method of Model - Lead - Test, otherwise stated as I Do It - We Do It - You Do It. First I removed all the pieces, and then would pick up a piece, say the name of the animal, and try fitting it into various places while talking aloud through the problem solving process (ex: No, it doesn't fit there / Yes, that fits!). Next, I would hand Anika a piece, say the name of the animal, and guide her hand to place the pieces using the problem solving language. I timed these efforts. Every time she finished, I would ask, "Do you want to do it again?" She would almost always scream "Yes!" with great enthusiasm. We practiced this puzzle 1-2 times per day for almost two weeks. She began to imitate my problem solving language while trying to fit pieces. In the beginning it took her about 4 minutes to complete the puzzle. By the end, she could complete the puzzle in 33 seconds.

(2) iPad Puzzle Application: Animal Puzzle
We started with the first one-step puzzle with four animals (lion, panther, hippo, bird). As always, I followed the Model - Lead - Test instructional routine. First, I would do it. Then I would help guide her finger. Then I would let her try on her own. Around day 10 I started thinking the fine motor skills required were too advanced for her. And the next day she could do the puzzle. Once she got to this point, she learned (from watching me), how to slide the ruler at the top of the page to restart the puzzle. She would do it over and over again at that point. She progressed to the next one-step puzzle with 5 pieces. And then  other puzzles on the application.

(3)  iPad Puzzle Application: Tozzle Lite
This provides a good generalization exercise from the animal puzzle application as children need to learn to grab the puzzle piece from the top right corner. Anika practiced the puzzle with the barnyard animals (1-step puzzle with 7 pieces) and the numbers puzzle (1-step puzzle with 12 pieces).
 

(4) iPad Puzzle Application: Endless ABC
I love this application, almost as much as Anika. She would jump on my bed while I was making dinner and play this for an hour straight. This one captivated her for almost two weeks. It's pretty amazing to watch your 19 month year old build the word Hilarious or Gargantuan - and then quickly flip through a stack of words to start the next word puzzle like it was no big deal. This is a great application to teach initial letter recognition skills.

(5) 6-Step Wooden Puzzle
Once she had clearly mastered the concept of one-step puzzles across both mediums, we progressed to a 6-piece wooden puzzle of a dog. Lots of frustration initially. I spent more time in the Model - Lead phases of the instructional sequence while emphasizing the language of pieces (ex: here is the nose, tail, eyes, etc). We practiced 1-2 times per day. 1-3 times per session which depended on her response to my question - "Do you want to do it again?" By the end of week 2, she could complete unassisted.

(6) 9-Step Wooden Puzzle
We just started this train puzzle a few days ago. The learning to learn phenomenon seems to be in effect such that she she seems to be learning to do the puzzle faster with less frustration in the beginning. Will update upon completion.

Developing Sleeping & Feeding Routines for a Newborn

I am a sleep junkie in the sense that I need sleep everyday... at least 7 hours to function well. I can get by with a 4-6 hours for a night or two, but then I need to catch up. The biggest drawback to having babies for me is the initiation into motherhood = sleep deprivation. If your goal is to get your child to sleep through the night as quickly as possible, keep reading for advice on scheduling. If you are one of those moms that either enjoys or otherwise doesn't mind getting up at all hours of the night to feed your baby and thinks the baby should create his or her own schedule that you must cater to, more power to you.. you might not want to read further as the following may offend you.

Both of my kids were sleeping through the night within 6 weeks. I was able to get my second to sleep through the night at 5 weeks old with a little work and the experience gained from baby #1. When I say sleep through the night, at 4 weeks old that mean from about 12am to 7am. By 8 weeks Wyatt was sleeping from 11:30pm to 8:00am. And now at 16 weeks he is sleeping from 11pm to 9am over 95% of the time.

The key for Stage 1 (beginning at week 3) of getting them to sleep through the night consistently is not letting them sleep more than two consecutive hours during the day. Sounds easy enough, but in truth, it's hard work. I was lucky to be living at home with my parents with an Aunt that came over almost every day to visit my kids... and stare with fascination at the little newborn. So I had a team to help me keep Wyatt awake as needed and also to let me nap during the day as I recovered from having the baby and then having to feed him every two hours for a couple of weeks. The trap is that you are so tired, the baby is sleeping so peacefully.. it's hard to motivate yourself to disturb the babies sleep = loud crying = no quiet time or rest for you. Even when you can get yourself past the hump to stir the baby, often times, they do not want to be awake. I would literally submerge Wyatt's body in the kitchen sink while scooping water over his head to wake him up at time... and even that didn't work well at times. Another good trick my sister taught me is to dangle a paper towel around his face - targeting his nose - while intermittently blowing in his face. My poor Aunt Elsie looked like she was in pain when I asked her to help me with this. She would comply while profusely apologizing to Wyatt for not being allowed to let him sleep.

The second key is maintaining a pattern of feeding -> awake time -> sleep. This is the principle of scheduling promoted by the book Baby Wise, which is without a doubt one of the most useful books I have ever read. Wyatt is on a 3 hour cycle that begins at 9am. He has a bottle, stays awake (activity map/bouncy chair/etc), and then takes a nap for 1 - 1.5 hours which ends at 12pm. At 12pm, he gets another bottle and the routine starts over. But after 6pm, he tends to stay awake until bedtime at 11pm - sometimes he will take a a one hour nap.  I've found that if he takes a nap for more than an hour after 6pm, he wakes up before 9am. I am a sleep junkie and also a data junkie. I keep track of his eating, feeding (amount), and sleep patterns (including how many minutes Wyatt cried when I put him down for a nap) all day, ever day. That is the behavior scientist in me perhaps. I have a note book that list the patterns down the left side of the paper and then I (or my nanny) fill in the specifics for each day down the vertical columns. 

For us, this scheduling routine enabled him to start sleeping through the night and made my days predictable. I knew when he needs to eat and sleep, so I could schedule my days around the times. And, perhaps most importantly for me, I could start sleeping through the night.

About the Author

I am starting this blog to chronicle the educational development of my children. I recently completed a PhD in what would most appropriately be termed Learning Science in 2010 with an emphasis in Psychometrics (test development and evaluation). I completed my degree at the University of Texas in Austin. My program tied with Harvard for #2 in the country. I needed only only 9 more credit hours to complete a dual PhD (to include psychometrics). We moved to Philadelphia due to my husband's job before I had time to take the additional coursework.

I originally pursued doctoral study to learn the research skills necessary to explore a unique learning model I have been practicing the last 15 years referred to as the Morningside Model of Generative Instruction. With this unique model, students labeled with various mild to moderate "disabilities" will average over two grade level gains in one academic school year with no homework included. Students without any learning constraints typically learn much faster. The model is comprised of evidence-based BEST practices in teaching and learning - no weird gimmicks... just a science-based approach to professional practice similar to the course required by the field of medicine. To follow this example, a doctor's promises that s/he can cure a child's severe illness with a regime focused on enhancing the child's self-concept or having the child do a certain yoga pose isn't good enough. I want the best treatments supported by scientific evidence for my family. The best medical treatments. And the best educational treatments. Period. Life is too short and too precious for anything less.

After completing a Fulbright research grant in Peru, I taught fulltime at Morningside's laboratory school in Seattle for one year. My students carried disabilities that included Aspergers Syndrome, Tourette's Syndrome, ADD/ADHD, Learning Disabled, and Oppositional Defiant. By the end of the school year, my students posted the highest average gains across the elementary and middle school programs in reading (+2.5 grades), math (+2.8 grades), and writing (+4.1 grades) on the Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS). These gains are attributable to the power of the model, rather than any unique feature of my teaching skill set. I'm confident that I could train any teacher or parent with a positive attitude and a decent work ethic to advance the academic proficiency of most kids by at least two grade level gains in a school year. Illiterate adults immersed in the model typically gain one grade level per 10 hours of instruction in a specific subject matter. I have not worked with adult learners yet, but am really looking forward to the opportunity.

I have successfully trained teachers in grades K-12 to apply this model in special and general education settings with tremendous success. Most recently, I worked with a middle school affiliated with the Cornerstone Schools in Detroit. By the end of the school year, the 7th grade students in one of the toughest neighborhoods in inner city Detroit averaged over 3 grade level gains in mathematics on the Test of Mathematical Abilities (TOMA) and tested at the 10th grade level on the Michigan state test called the MEAPS. Surprisingly, despite the incredible power of this model, it is extremely difficult to find educators or administrators that are interested in the outcomes. I've recently decided to take a break from beating my head against the wall and instead focus on working with my own children (20 months & 4 months). Not such a difficult decision given I recently moved to Moscow, Russia. This blog will chronicle my experiences teaching my children for now.. and we will see where it goes from there...