Emergent Readers

I have been reading The Next Step Forward in Guided Reading by Jan Richardson.  It has been such a fantastic book!  I highly recommend this one!  There are so many books out there for guided reading, but what I love about this one is that she gives you step by step exactly what to do during each part of guided reading.  She even includes a site to watch videos of her doing all of the parts of the lesson.  It is soooooo helpful reading it and then seeing it in action. 

Most of our time in Kindergarten is spent with the emergent level readers.  Of course, there are some that are considered Pre-A and others that are Early readers and beyond. 
Jan says that emergent readers at level A can...

-write their first name on their own
-identify at least 40 uppercase and lowercase letters by name
-demonstrate left to right directionality
-follow simple directions
-know at least 8 sounds

Once they get to C level, they can

-knows all the letters and sounds
-match one to one and point to each word as they read
-control left to right directionality with several lines of print
-use meaning, structure, and initial letters to figure out unknown words
-form letters correctly
-hear and record CVC sounds in sequence
-monitor for meaning
-reread a sentence or confim predictions
-read and write about 30 sight words
-discuss a story with teacher prompting
-write a simple message about the book with teacher scaffolding

So, as you can see, there's a great deal learned between level A and level C readers. 

One of the parts of  a lesson is on teaching a new sight word.  She shares several activities to teach the new words.  One is called "What's Missing?"-  I like this one because after having introduced the word, you erase a letter near the end of the word, and ask the students what is missing.  They try to figure out what letter is missing from that word.  You can repeat this several times using a dry erase board. 

She also has a time for Word Study activities.  This can be working on initial consonants, final consanants, and short medial vowels.  Level C can work on all 3. 

An activity for this is using sound boxes which she provides and suggests putting it in a sheet protector so it can be reused.  I tried this working on a tray that I found at the Dollar Tree (who doesn't love anything that is $1??). 

For my students needing to work on initial consonants, I placed 2 letters in the medial and final spot, told them the word, and they had to select the letter that was needed to make a word.  I found it easier with my level A students to use fewer letters to choose from.  The trays are awesome to make CVC words! 


There is SOOOO much in this book!!  Definitely worth buying!!  I can't wait to try it all out and follow her lesson guides!