Early Literacy Around the House: The Kitchen

Parents of small children spend a lot of time in the kitchen, often with kids at our heels fussing because the food isn't ready yet, or wanting to explore the garbage can, refrigerator, or hot oven. Add a little structure to these times of the day with some simple early literacy activities.

• Read cereal boxes. Ever since I could read, I have always read the cereal box while I eat my cereal. Sometimes, they have puzzles and activities printed on the outside, which make them naturally appealing to kids, but even if they are just plain boxes, it is still fun to check out all the different fonts and styles of writing, as well as the interesting scientific words that appear in the ingredients. With pre-readers, the cereal box becomes an instant opportunity for a scavenger hunt. Assign each child a box and a letter of the alphabet, and see how long it takes them to find it somewhere on the box. With very young kids, take a moment to show them the letters of their name, or a letter they have just started being able to identify. 
• Put on a cooking show. When a toddler is waiting impatiently for her breakfast, it can be fun to turn your preparation into a little cooking show where you are the star and your child is the viewer at home. Explain every step you take, no matter how small and then make a big show of completing each task. Your child will become so interested in learning the words for objects like "plate," "measuring cup" and "spoon" that she might forget to be upset that she has to wait two minutes to eat. 
• Follow a recipe together. Kids who are more verbal and have decent motor skills can join you in your cooking adventures by helping you to follow a recipe. If you have time, this can be a more elaborate project - baking cookies or cake, marinating chicken, mixing up spaghetti sauce - but you can also create recipe cards for the simple everyday meals you make all the time, and allow your child to help identify each ingredient required. 
• Take out interesting gadgets and teach your child their names. There are so many random gadgets in the kitchen, most of which we use without thinking much about their names. For young kids, though, these fun items - spatula, whisk, tongs, etc. - present opportunities for learning new vocabulary they will want to hear and repeat again and again. They also provide you with the chance to talk about other concepts, such as  sizes, colors, and shapes. 

Early Literacy Around the House: The Bedroom

For many families, bedtime is the traditional time of day for reading stories, singing songs, and engaging in other quiet early literacy activities together. Here are some suggestions to add to your own evening repertoire.

• Have a special bedtime poem. When my daughter was still less than six months old, we borrowed Here's a Little Poem from the library. In it were several bedtime poems, and I read them to her every night before bed until the book went back to the library. When it was due, I made sure to memorize my favorite one of the poems - "Silverly" by Dennis Lee - so I could continue to share it with her every night. Not only is poetry a great way to introduce language to young babies, it is also a perfect way to signal that it's time to go to sleep. We have gotten out of the habit of saying the poem as regularly now, as toddler bedtime is so much more boisterous than baby bedtime, but when we do have a moment, we still share that poem. I hope to continue the same practice with baby #2!
• Say prayers. As Little Miss Muffet has entered toddlerhood, we have started to include prayers as part of her bedtime routine every night. She has several board books (My First Prayers with Mary, My First Bedtime Prayers and A Small Child's Book of Prayers) which contain kid-friendly prayers accompanied by illustrations, and each night after her teeth are brushed, she has the opportunity to choose the one we will say. Like poems, prayers introduce rhythm, rhyme, and vocabulary, and, if you are hoping your child will eventually memorize certain prayers, saying them at bedtime also helps with that learning process. (For more Christian-themed early literacy activities, see my post about Church.)
• Share a book with a stuffed animal. A stuffed monkey and a baby doll are Little Miss Muffet's two bedtime loveys. Sometimes, we will snuggle with them and read a favorite board book before bed. (For some kids, this activity might be too stimulating to settle them, in which case it is also fun to do first thing in the morning!) 
• Review the day. As Little Miss Muffet gets ready for bed, I often review with her what she has done that day. I start with the morning, and just list a few of the highlights - where we went, who we played with, what toys we enjoyed, and what we did when Daddy got home. This gives her the language to hopefully express her own thoughts about the day as she becomes more verbal, and it also calms her down so that she is in the right frame of mind for drifting off to sleep.

Early Literacy Around the House: The Bathroom

Between hand washing, bath time, and potty training, little kids spend a lot of time in the bathroom. Make these experiences a bit more fun - and educational! - with these early literacy activities.

• Sing "This is the way we wash..." As you wash your child in the bathtub, sing a little verse about each of his parts. (Here We Go 'Round the Mulberry Bush is the perfect tune for this game.) Pay special attention to the words you may not say as much in everyday conversation, such as elbow, eyebrow, thigh, shin, and wrist. If your child already knows some body vocabulary, ask him to tell you which part to sing about next. 
• Draw letters on your child’s back with a washcloth and have her guess them. Preschoolers who are beginning to write letters will have fun with this game as they try to visualize each letter you draw on their skin. Get your child in on the game by hiding your eyes and letting her trace a letter on your hand or arm so you also have a chance to guess. 
• Write in the fog on the mirror. Kids can't resist a mirror that has steamed up after a hot shower. Indulge their fascination and allow them to write and draw in the fog. For added fun, play a game of Win, Lose, or Draw, where you and your child take turns drawing and guessing what has been drawn. 
• Time your hand washing with the ABC song. It can be hard for a young child to take time out of his busy day of play and exploration to wash his hands properly. Make the time go by a little faster by singing the alphabet - or any other favorite children's song - while your child lathers his hands. 
• Sing a tooth brushing song. Many young children, especially toddlers, hate to have their teeth brushed. Ease their anxiety and discomfort by singing them through the experience. Suggested songs include: 

• Teeth are for Brushing (last verse of Hands Are For Clapping from 
Jim Gill Sings the Sneezing Song and Other Contagious Tunes)
• Brush Your Teeth by Raffi or Marylee 
• I've Got All These Teeth in My Mouth from Growing Book by Book 

For more household early literacy activities, see my other Early Literacy Around the House posts. 

Early Literacy Around the House: The Living Room

Your living room (or family room, or den, or whatever you prefer to call it) is a great place to engage the entire family in fun early literacy activities and habits. Today's post provides a few suggestions.

• Read aloud as a family. My husband and I began a practice of reading aloud together before we were even married, and it is a tradition we continue now that we have children. Though our kids are small, we don't just read picture books, but poetry, articles, essays, interesting quotations, as well as children's novels, classics, and anything else we think is worth hearing. Sometimes our audience is our daughter (age 2), but other times, we are reading just for the sake of it, knowing that some of it goes over her head, but that some of it sinks in too. By reading aloud as a family in full hearing of all family members you demonstrate very strongly that reading is an important part of your family life.  
• Look at magazines and point out familiar objects, words and letters. Little Miss Muffet is obsessed with magazines. She does often prefer to rip them, but she has also learned a variety of vocabulary from pointing out different things to me in Parents magazine, or in catalogs we receive in the mail. When she was really little, she liked to look at pictures of babies, but more and more, she is interested in knowing the names of household objects, or of letters in different typefaces. If you have a basket of magazines near your couch, or a stack on your coffee table, don't hesitate to let your kids enjoy them. As long as there isn't any objectionable content, these can be a great way to incorporate novel language into your everyday lives.
• Tell stories about family photos on the wall and in albums. Kids love hearing stories about the people in their family. Use family photos as jumping off points for telling tales about your own life before your kids were born, and your kids' own experiences at ages they were too little to remember. If you have long-distance relatives, a photo album is also a great way to teach kids their names so they won't be total strangers each time you get together. Older photographs of grandparents or great-grandparents are also often very interesting to kids, for whom the 20th century feels like ancient history.
• Put together an alphabet puzzle. A table or space on the living room floor is a perfect place to put together an alphabet puzzle. Make it an interactive family experience by dividing up the letters so that everyone is responsible for a certain few. Have your children figure out whose turn it is based on which letter comes next. 

Will you have a Christmas tree in your living room this holiday season? If so, you might also enjoy this post!

Early Literacy Around the House: The Washing Machine

One of the best ways to promote literacy skills in young kids, even before they can talk, is to narrate what you do as you go about your ordinary everyday activities. Whether you wash clothes at home or at the laundromat, the work you do at the washing machine lends itself nicely to many opportunities to introduce novel vocabulary and reinforce important concepts that lead to strong reading skills in older children. Here are some suggestions for ways to focus on early literacy when doing the laundry.

• Read washing instructions on clothing tags. By reading aloud the instructions for washing given articles of clothing, you show your kids that print has significance to even the simplest jobs. Show your kids the connection between what is recommended on the label and how you actually sort, wash, and dry your clothes. 
• Teach vocabulary for different wash and rinse cycles. Wash and rinse cycles usually have both speeds and sizes. What better way to make these concepts more concrete for your kids than to show the differences between a small and extra large load, or to take note of how much more slowly the agitator moves in the gentle versus regular cycles. 
• Identify detergents by their labels. Even before they know their letter names and sounds, kids can begin to associate particular symbols with their meanings. Save old detergent bottles and cut off the labels from fabric softener boxes and allow your child to play with them. Soon, the images on the packages will become so familiar, your child will be able to hand you the item you need on request. 
• Sort clothing into given categories. Young kids love to play in baskets of clothing. Make this fascination work to your advantage by showing your child how to separate out different types of clothing - socks, underwear, pants, etc.  For an added challenge for slightly older kids, have them sort the clothing by color before you wash, or sort clean clothing according to the family member who owns it. 

Bonus idea! Hesitant to let your kids near the actual washing machine? With a printer, paper, and a few baskets, you can make a simple Silly Sentence Sort set that allows kids to have fun with words and laundry without messing up your housework. 

Early Literacy Around the House: The Backyard

It truly is possible to have fun and learn something at the same time right in your own backyard. Next time you're in the backyard (or at a park with a big yard or field) with your preschoolers and beginning readers, try some of these simple literacy activities.

• Act out verbs. I always use a "bag of verbs" in my beginning reader story times. Each child takes a turn selecting a word from the bag (or basket, or jar, or whatever) and we all act it out together as a group. Doing this activity outside expands the possibilities. Kids can not only sit, stand, and turn around; they can also do a somersault, hop on one foot, run like a rabbit, or kick like a ninja (without hurting anyone else.)
• Put on a skit.  Backyards (and back porches, and front stoops, and driveways...) make excellent stages. Help your kids write or memorize a short skit, and then have them perform it for your family or even some of the neighbors. If you're feeling especially fancy, add costumes, scenery and props made from household objects. 
• Play with a “Magic Ball.” In this game, the leader names an adjective (heavy, sticky, cold, hot, light, etc.) then the children pass a ball around a circle, acting as though that adjective applies to the ball. This is a great way to expand kids' vocabularies to include more interesting describing words. (Credit for this idea goes to Mass Literacy.)
• Play yard games with a verbal component.  Games which involve giving and following directions and asking questions help kids to develop speaking and listening skills, which in turn lead to better reading skills. Here are just a few suggestions, with links to instructions on how to play. 
• Red Rover
• The Farmer in the Dell
• Mother May I?
• Fishy Fishy Cross My Ocean
• What Time is it, Mr. Fox?
• Witch in the Well
• Pies

Early Literacy Around the House: The Christmas Tree

I normally post about early literacy in everyday places, and I will continue to do so into the new year. Today, however, I'm sharing some early literacy ideas that stick a little bit closer to home and are perfect for families celebrating Christmas this time of year. These are literacy activities inspired by Christmas trees!

• Talk about colors.My one-year-old is completely enthralled with the pre-strung colored lights on our artificial Christmas tree. She points at them all the time, looking for someone to label them for her. I use this as an opportunity to introduce color words. Each time she points to a light, I tell her what color it is, and name some other things that are also that color. She doesn't have many words yet, but she pays such close attention, I can tell she is filing information away for later. 
• Sing Christmas tree songs. There are lots of Christmas tree songs, but the three that come to my mind most often are the traditional O Christmas Tree (or O Tannenbaum), Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree, and My Christmas Tree (by John Williams, from the Home Alone 2 Soundtrack). Teach your children to sing these songs as you decorate and enjoy your tree.  
• Tell the stories behind your Christmas ornaments.As you add ornaments to your tree, or even as you admire the ones you have already hung, tell your child the history behind them. I have lots of ornaments I made as a child or received as gifts from family members, and this is a great way to pass some of that history down to the next generation.
• Play ornament I Spy. With preschoolers and older kids, you can practice using adjectives by playing a game of I Spy. Describe an ornament on the tree and have the kids guess which one it is, then ask them to describe an ornament for you to guess. This game also works on public Christmas trees, such as the ones you might see while standing in line to meet Santa, or in places where kids get easily bored, like banks and doctor's offices.