Early Literacy Part 1 - Speaking & Listening

As a teacher and the mother of a pre-schooler, I often get asked how I prepare my child for school. The quick answer would be: "I prepare him by letting him play." There is lots of research showing the benefits of play and how important it is for children to have bountiful time to just play… No setups, no hidden agenda, no goals to be ticked off.

Young boy drawing with kitpas crayons on a window

It is quite a natural development for a 4-ish-year-old child to develop an intrinsic interest in letters and numbers. (and If your child is not – that is fine too. It should really be child-led at this age). I also understand that it is beneficial to have some insider information on how teachers work during those first years at 'big school'. When I explain to parents the outcomes for early kindy, they are often every relieved and realise it's not that scary after all.

In this blog, I will explain how the literacy progression is set up and what type of activities you can do at home if your child is keen to learn more.

The national progression has three elements that reflect the aspects of literacy development to be successful in everyday life. These three elements, which align with the modes of language, are:

Speaking and Listening
Reading and viewing
Writing

Those three elements are broken down into sub-elements. For example, writing has the elements: spelling, grammar, handwriting, etc. Let's not get too technical here; there is absolutely no need for you to know or understand the nitty gritty details of it all.

I have curated some ideas of what you can offer at home if your child asks for literacy-based activities. Below you will find the activities for the element speaking and listening.

If you want to read more about Reading and Viewing click here and for writing here.

Speaking and listening

Speaking and listening skills are the foundation for your child's learning at school. Your child will become increasingly proficient at selecting language to express and share ideas. It is essential to talk a lot with your child; it's interwoven into our daily life. Describe what you see when driving, share ideas of what you think might happen when going to an event, and teach your child their full name, address, and date of birth.

Here are some play-based activities you can set up at home:

Listening

Goal: Your child can distinguish sounds made with musical instruments and those found in the environment.

Activity 1: Place various instruments on a table. Let your child play with all instruments and explore the sounds they make. Now ask them to close their eyes and play one of the instruments. Can they guess which one it is? Make it more challenging by playing multiple instruments or creating a pattern or sequence. Can they copy it?

Activity 2: Create a guessing game with the ABC flashcards. Record the sound of the item shown on the card with the Chameleon Reader. Can they guess the sound they hear? Turn over the card to check if you were right!

Activity 3: Orchard Game Sound Detectives. Listen carefully to the sound clues on the app and when you hear a sound that matches any of your cards, move your detective closer to catching the cheeky thief! The first player to reach the end of their path turns over the end card to reveal their captured thief and win the game!

Sound Detectives board game

Goal: Your child actively listens to short texts and can recall one or two ideas.

Activity 1: When reading books or watching a movie, ask questions about what will happen next. Or ask them to quiz you. Can they create questions to check if you listened well to the story? Can they describe their favourite character in the story or come up with an alternative ending?

Activity 2: Create a treasure hunt. Make little cards with verbal cues using the chameleon pen. If they listen carefully and decipher the clue, they will find the next card. Once they complete the last card, leave a little treasure such as a treat or some stickers.

Goal: Your child can recognise and generate one-syllable rhyming words.

Activity 1: Hide the My Little Set rhyming word coins in sensory rice. Select 10 pairs and discuss what the words are. Dig up two coins and say the words out loud. Is it a match? There are three rhyming words in each category. Can you make sets of three?

Activity 2: Stick 2 of the 3 of the rhyming words with blu-tac on the walls and furniture throughout the house. Leave one word per set upside down on a table. Turn over one coin and say the word out loud. Time to race through the house to find the rhyming words. Once both words are found, you turn over the next coin. Who can find the most coins?

Speaking

Goal: Your child can use connectives to sequence ideas (first, then, next, finally).

Activity 1: Use the Little Agenda or My Day - Story Tellers to discuss what is on for the day. Ask your child to tell you what is happening. What happens first and then? If you ask them which they look forward to the most, you're also working on providing justifications (I'm looking forward to Wednesday because on that day we are visiting Nan).

Activity 2: Ask your child to teach you a procedure. A great one is the Dr Zig bubbles or the Little Potion Kits. They must remember the steps correctly. Can they sequence all those steps? Not only by doing, but by talking you through it?

Goal: Your child can use opinion adjectives (nice, good) and language to compare and contrast (smaller, more)

Activity 1: Set up the wooden weather chart or weather station during breakfast. Ask your child to look outside the window and check the weather forecast. Ask them how the weather compares to yesterday (It was raining yesterday, but today the weather is much better. I prefer it when the sun shines.)

Activity 2: One of the best activities to do with a child to improve speaking and vocabulary is small world play. Set up a scene together and discuss the roles and storyline. You can build on your child's language by teaching them new words during play. When they say, 'this tree is big, you say, "Yes, it's a large tree. The tree is enormous".

As you can see, there are many different ways to work on listening and speaking

at home. It doesn't have to be complicated or tedious! Play, live, and learn!

If you want to read the rest of this series, click here for

Reading and Viewing and click here for writing.

- Written by Lisa from @life.with.moon.and.co

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