Based on a weekly newspaper column intended to encourage parents to become involved in their children's education, this book provides encouragement and specific suggestions, in 16 chapters, for parents who want to help their children learn from everyday experiences. The chapters are: (1) "Who, Me? A Teacher?" (2) "Your Child's Self…

Literacy development was studied among 40 kindergarten students at Lummi Tribal School (Washington). Data consisted of observations during weekly classroom visits throughout the school year, student writing samples, records of "pretend reading," responses to environmental print, and teacher checklists concerning literacy experiences in…

To determine how children develop schema for text that include increasing sensitivity to text types, text categories, orthographic conventions in words, conventional story beginnings and endings, and text cohesive ties, a study examined the writing of four kindergarten children. The kindergarten had adopted a process-conference approach to writing…

Focusing on children's developmental use of written language in kindergarten and first grade, this report looks at connections between the social and academic dimensions of classroom life. The first section examines literacy as an aspect of growing up and becoming a member of society. By highlighting the social and academic divisiveness schooling…

Intended as a guide to help parents of children from birth to age 5 teach their children the skills needed to make kindergarten a experience, this book consists of an introduction and seven chapters on various aspects of preparing young children for kindergarten. Checklists for parents are included in each chapter. The Introduction discusses what…

Using data collected from kindergarten and second grade children in a study of young children's concepts about writing as reflected in their school writing behaviors, this report focuses on information gathered from second grade children. The introductory chapter restates the research questions guiding the study and briefly reviews the major…

Stressing the importance of understanding child development, this paper first describes the writing of several children in a kindergarten class who represent various levels of emerging literacy. Based on the descriptions of classroom activities, the paper argues that with a developmental perspective the teacher can build instruction on what the…

An extensive resource manual and teaching guide is presented for the kindergarten teacher in the early French immersion program. The first three chapters contain introductory material discussing the kindergarten child, this particular program, language development in kindergarten, and the role of the kindergarten teacher which is analagous to that…