This week marked my first parent participation workshop in reading. With minimal guidelines, I invited parents to share a Halloween text with us on Oct. 31st. Only requirements:the reading should be appropriately developmental in terms of context and length and parents' ticket in was to be dressed in a full costume of their choice. We had 12 out of 19 parents arrive at a doorway at a prearranged schedule. The children had no idea that this event was even planned.Some chose to arrive in teams others braved it alone. As in years passed, the parents were exceptional in their book choice, costume and presentation. I suggested that they come with a prepared rhyme that might tip the kids to their identity. I also asked that the rhyme be written on large chart paper. As the kids tried to guess the identity of our guest I kept referring to the strategies they were using to figure out who was behind the mask and made analogies as to how these very same strategies could be applied to reading unfamiliar words or any learning for that matter. (visual clues, background knowledge, auditory cues and the like) We also examined the rhymes not only for identity clues but for notices much like a morning message noting vowel patterns, letter formation, punctuation ... you name it..... the kids had a hilarious time guessing... the parents got a birds' eye view of a constructivist approach to learning and the whole time we were fostering a learning community with mentors who were kids, parents, and teacher. Activities like this remind me to activate learning as a cooperative effort and to expedite understanding by using minimal paper and pencil tasks _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org.
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