–Tip by Jan P., Preschool/Childcare Liaison

My Beak,Your Beak by Melanie Walsh explores sameness and differences—concepts that will help your child get ready to read. Knowing that letters look similar but are different from each other is part of the early literacy skill of letter knowledge. Gaining knowledge about letters is important long before your child actually learns the letters of the alphabet. Letter knowledge also includes knowing that letters relate to sounds. Focus on the first letter in your child’s name—talk about its shape, how it looks in upper and lower case, and what sound(s) it makes. And remember to have fun!

–Tip by Brad J., Youth Technology Librarian

Some books incorporate the text into the pictures, which is a good way to help children become aware of the words on the page. This helps build the early literacy skill of print awareness. In the book, Poof! by John O’Brien, sometimes characters have speech bubbles showing what sound they are making. Also, the word, “Poof!” is shown in a cloud on many of the pages throughout the story. So when you see this word, you can wave your pretend magic wand in the air and say, “Poof!” And then turn the page and see what happens!

–Tip by Erin E., Youth Programming Coordinator

Talk about your day with your child. Discuss what you did first, next, and last, leading up to bedtime. Stories, like daily life, have a sequence of events. This discussion helps to foster narrative skills as well as comprehension and sequencing skills.

–Tip by Carol C., Youth Programming Assistant

–Tip by Julie D., Elementary School Liaison

–Tip by Keary B., Youth Collection Specialist

Make learning new vocabulary words fun by creating finger puppets your child can use with rhymes. Click here to learn how to make a butterfly finger puppet! Then sing this song and make your butterfly flutter to different parts of your or your child's body. You can make the butterfly land on all kinds of things; help your child name them!

Butterfly, Butterfly (tune of Jingle Bells)

Butterfly, butterfly,
Landing on my nose,
Butterfly, butterfly,
Now he’s on my toes.
On my arm, on my leg,
On my elbow,
Butterfly, oh butterfly
He lands, and then he goes.

–Tip by Barb M., Youth Programming and Outreach Assistant

Look for a couple of same-shaped items that are familiar to baby. Use various words to compare how the items differ from each other. You might say “Look at these crackers. This one is a square cracker. This one is square but it is brown. Look how this square cracker has little holes in it. Here is one with a bite out of it!” These introductory experiences with differences in objects may help your child later as they discover what is the same and what is different about letters. All of this adds to their letter knowledge, which is part of early literacy.
 

–Tip by Jan P., Preschool/Childcare Liaison