Did you know that young children can learn to read many words easily just by playing with them and singing about them?  This can easily happen at home or at school- or better yet- in both places!  The more they interact with and talk about or sing about the words, the more easily and quickly this is likely to happen.  The brain of the preschool aged child is often compared to a sponge, and there is a good reason for that:  at this age, their brains are wired to pick up languages and language related activities faster than we would as adults.  Add some visual stimulation into the mix (the printed word), and you may just find that your child is the family genius!

We recently received a letter from Susan, a veteran Kindergarten teacher.  We LOVE receiving feedback letters from parents, grandparents and teachers that have seen the impact Heidi Songs can have on little learners. Susan told us that after she saw how her grandson can read all the words from or Sing and Spell Volume 1 she had to tell us about it. When we read Susan’s letter about how her four year old grandson learned to read 25 sight words, we knew we had to share it!  Notice, they never sat and did any “drill and kill” with flashcards with Jack; in fact, the only reason they made the movie of him reading the words off of the flash cards at all is because I (Heidi) asked them to!  It’s kind of a funny little video; he picks up each word card and then starts singing the related sight word song until he gets to the actual word in the song, and then he stops singing.  So cute!

 

Susan writes:

“As a kindergarten teacher for the past 26 years, I was so lucky to find Heidi’s blog and see her at the SDE conference in Nashua,NH ! Of course, I had to buy more of her DVD’s to use in my classroom and share with my grandsons( now 4 and 16 months). It took no time for them to be hooked on Heidi’s DVD’s- always  singing the Heidi tunes! They love the music, the movements and as a K teacher I couldn’t be more proud to see them singing, dancing along with Heidi and recognizing these words in print! There is no greater way to learn Sight Words than with Heidi’s DVD’s! “

When we asked Susan about how Jack practices his sight words, she had some really great ideas to share.

 

 

 

 

Practicing spelling sight words with refrigerator magnets.

Leave refrigerator letter magnets up all day long so that children can spell and read words throughout the day.

Parents and children can take turns writing words out for the other to find.

Chalkboard writing.

Writing on a chalkboard is a different sensation for little hands. It gives children the opportunity to practice letter formation and is great for on the go learning in the car or on a plane.

Try listening to Heidi Songs in the car and having backseat passengers write out the words on their chalkboards.

Writing words in sand or shaving cream.

For more fun with writing out sight words, try using sand or shaving cream. Pour a little sand or spray a little bit of shaving cream on a plate. Have children use their fingers to write out sight words. This is a little messy and a lot of fun!

Spelling Garage

Jack’s family made him a spelling car game. They took a poster board and created a parking garage for toy cars. Each car has a letter.

Jack plays by,”parking,” each car in the correct letter parking space. He also works on spelling out sight words by driving the cars to their correct position in a sight word.

In the photo above he spelled, “stop”.

Thank you again Susan for sharing Jack’s progress with us!

Here are some videos from our newly animated Sight Word DVDs!!

   

 

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