Building Vocabulary

Vocabulary ~ vocabulary ~ vocabulary…many research studies have been conducted that tell us the importance of a large base of words to the future literacy success of children. We know that children, who have been exposed to a wider variety of words, comprehend what they read, write with greater ease, and need less literacy remediation than do children who have not been exposed to what we like to call “juicy” words.   Click here to read more about these studies.

But how to we go about developing a preschooler’s vocabulary? One thing to avoid is flashcards with pictures and words on them. These do little more than make learning new words a chore for young children.  New words need to be a natural part of a child’s world. With our guidance, children can develop a passion for learning new ways to describe their world.

Talking to children about what they are doing and observing is one of the best ways to develop a “juicy” vocabulary. When taking a walk with children, demonstrate different ways to walk. For example, you can show plod or scamper. Have children imitate you while saying the new word in a squeaky or growling voice.

This child played with different words like scurry, for the way he moved and used the word clover rather than flowers to more accurately describe his prized possessions.

Continue saying some of these words the rest of the day. Let children be the guide as to which “juicy” words are appealing to them. If children giggle in delight when you use and demonstrate the word, scurry, encourage children to scurry on the playground, when cleaning up, or ask them to find a picture in a book showing scurry.

Encourage parents to use these words at home. Why not post a white board outside your room and write the words children loved that day? This is a wonderful way to get parents in the habit of using fascinating words with their preschoolers. Children can even draw a picture next to the word showing their interpretation of the “juicy” word.

It doesn't matter if the illustration accurately depicts the word, if it does this in the child's mind, that is what is important.

When children learn to play with words, embrace new words, and find juicy ways to describe an experience or observation, it makes for a lifelong love of vocabulary.

Questions Matter!

Questions are important! They help develop critical thinking skills, problem solving skills, and creative thought. But what kinds of questions help our preschoolers develop these life skills?  We like to think of questions as being divided into two main categories: those that help children remember and those that guide children to think for themselves.We are thinking of questions as recall questions and deep thinking questions.

You might ask a child to recall in what kind of house the first little pig lived in the story, "The Three Little Pigs.” This type of question helps children remember details and encourages them to listen for facts. We don’t want to minimize the importance of this type of question. Asking children to recall information does help prepare them for many aspects of formal school.  

But we believe it is another kind of question that really develops young minds. These are the types of questions that guide children to supply their own answers. They require children to stretch their thinking and rely on their background knowledge. Questions like the following help children think deeply about a book or experience:

What do you think would have happened if the third pig had not made his house of bricks?

What would have happened if all the pigs had worked together?

Should the pig have made his house of sticks? Why do you think he did?

These are just a few examples of ways questions can be posed to encourage deeper thought. Below is a general list of ways we can think about recall questions versus deep thinking questions:

We feel these are necessary questions not just when reading books but when out enjoying the natural world, too. Developing inquiring minds sets the stage for scientific thought. For example, when blowing bubbles children may encounter situations such as one child’s bubbles are larger or travel farther than another child’s bubbles. This is a wonderful opportunity to both pose questions and encourage children to ask questions. For example, you may say, “What do you notice about our bubbles?”

Children may note the difference in size. The adult can then use this observation to ask, “What questions do you have about this?” This open-ended question allows children to guide the resulting observations and to form their answers. They may notice that someone blows slowly and waits for the bubble to emerge on the wand while other children swing their bubble wands in the wand. This leads to experimentation. 

All generations can help children ask questions and then test answers as this grandparent shows.

There are different kinds of questions! While it is important to ask children what they remember about a book or an experience, it is also helpful to ask children questions that require them to think for themselves, use knowledge, or form an opinion.

Letter or Number?

Young children love to mimic adults, older brothers and sisters, or even scenes they see on television shows as they are learning to write. Many point to letters in fun ways.  

Using fun fingernails from Halloween encourages children to play with letters.

They love to “play office” and stamp documents.  

Children can use a variety of fun stamps to find letters. 

This is all part of the learning process. In a past blog post we showed you the process of moving from scribbling to symbol salad to writing that looks like real words.  Click here for more information about the Continuum of Writing. These are all important and necessary steps.

One of the ways you can help children become writers is to talk about your own writing and signs you see in grocery stores, mailers you receive at home, or even street signs as you drive. Help children to point out letters they recognize as they move from thinking random lines on a page are letters or numbers to seeing a B or E.

Most children confuse letters and numbers as they are learning. Even children who count items up to ten do not have a clear identification that B is a letter and 5 is a number. You can help prepare preschoolers for school by talking about the difference between letters and numbers.

When children count, you can write down the number. If a child counts four turtles, write the number 4. Keep repeating over and over that this is a number. It shows how many. Children can even keep this slip of paper all day and talk about it using the word, number.

You can also reinforce the idea of letters. When children see letters on a stamp, in a book, or even on a balloon, say, these are letters. They make words. Help children find letters, like the letter that begins their name by pointing to the letter whenever you see it.

Children love to ask YOU questions. Have a child ask, "Is this a letter or a number? Next, children can ask, "What letter is this?"

This constant talk about the difference between a letter and a number helps children understand basic writing differences.

Technology Tip:

One of our favorite Apps for helping children to trace letters using the correct direction is Letter Quiz by Tantrum Apps. We know many parents who save this App for when a child is waiting in a doctor’s office, bored with a shopping trip, or needs calming. You can even change from upper case to lower case letters.

Learning to Use Scissors

We all know it - many children have difficulty when learning to use scissors. One of the first steps in helping our preschoolers to master this skill is to build the muscles necessary for it and to practice the motion of bring together the thumb on top and the forefinger (and middle finger in many cases) together.

One fun way to do this is to let children explore with clothespins. Have them pinch the clips and put them on various papers or other materials. We'll be offering more fun suggestions on this in future posts. 

Children can have fun clipping a clothespin to different items.

Get children in the habit of seeing the creative possibilities of repurposing ordinary items. Save tops from milk cartons or juice bottles. Use painter's tape or Wiki-Stix to create little finger cymbals as shown. 

Wrap a Wiki-stick around a bottle top to make a repurposed musical instrument. 

 Encourage children to tap their thumb and forefinger together as they sing, using these “cymbals.” The movement mimics the motions of cutting with scissors!

Make sure children are making the motion of cutting as they tap their thumb and fingers together. 

Once you are ready for actual cutting, be sure children are holding the scissors correctly, with the thumb on top. It is helpful if an adult holds both sides of the paper and encourages the child to cut in a straight line - no circular motions yet!

Always be sure to hold the paper for children in the beginning. Encourage straight line cutting. 

Finally children are ready to cut in straight lines by themselves!

Fireworks + Fine Motor = Fun!

Celebrating the Fourth of July with its family time, picnics, and parades is exciting for children in the United States. But wherever you live, fireworks are sure to be a part of one of your holiday experiences. They are sure to be seen and heard in places all over the U.S. These bursts of color can be wonderful shows for some children while others may be a bit afraid of the noise. You can help prepare children for the excitement by talking about the streams of color in the sky and the loud booms that will be heard. Follow up this discussion by having children create their own pictures showing a fireworks display. And you can help develop fine motor skills at the same time!

To make a fireworks painting, put away the paintbrushes and get out eyedroppers. Why? Using eyedroppers allows children to make streams of color to mimic the falling lights of the fireworks. But the best part of using eyedroppers? By having children use their thumb and forefinger to squeeze the eyedropper bulb and then sweeping the paint across the page, mimics the finger control children need for using scissors. This is an excellent way to prepare young hands for the difficult task of cutting.

Help children squeeze the paint into the eyedropper using the bulb. We find children need assistance with this.

Then show them how to squeeze the paint out of the eyedropper by using their thumb and pointer finger. Most children easily understand this and delight in streaming the “fireworks” across the night sky paper.

Children can practice sweeping the eyedropper across the paper. 

Note that the child is using the finger muscles needed for successful cutting. 

Talk about the colors children can expect to see during a holiday celebration.

Ask children to explain their paintings when they are finished and dry. Verbalizing the sights and sounds of fireworks may result in fewer fears during a celebration. Your child has also practiced key movements for handling a scissors.

Talking about what could be a scary experience for children helps prepare them to enjoy the celebration instead. It also helps increase vocabulary. 

I See You!

Taking a walk, looking out of a classroom window, or even riding in a car can be exciting for a preschooler. Take these "natural" opportunities to get children excited about nature! Encourage lots of talk about what can be seen. Point out birds in the sky, a rabbit in the grass, or a cloud in the sky that might resemble an animal. To make these observations more fun and to develop key school readiness skills, work with your child (children) to make a pair of binoculars.

You may want to show your children actual binoculars or photos of people using binoculars. Tell children that these help people see animals, birds, or faraway places. We like to tell children that binoculars can help us focus in on certain things about nature.

Once children are excited about binoculars, show them how to take a paper towel roll and cut it in half. This simple instruction and demonstration develops an understanding of fractions!

Take any opportunity to use math words in conversation.

We like to use simple painter's tape rather than yarn or string, which can be a bit difficult for young children to handle. Some children may even be able to tear (or begin to tear) the tape themselves which is a wonderful way to develop hand muscles for fine motor control.

Children can tear their own pieces of tape.

Put together the paper towel roll as shown below:

Ready for observing nature!

Then enjoy a walk. Talk about the birds in the sky. Compare them. What colors did you see? How big is one bird compared to another? Take a look in the grass. Do you see a bunny rabbit?

Study your own backyard - talk about what you see!

While these binoculars will not really "work," of course, they will help guide children's eyes to all the wonders of the natural world!

Our favorite part of this activity? Listening to children say the word, binoculars!

Sorting: Developing Creative Thought

We love to encourage creative thought along with helping children to express their understanding of various animals. Sorting is a wonderful way to help children describe the attributes of objects or pictures. The best part is there is no right or wrong answer! Children can explain their thoughts and if they make sense, then the sort is correct!

To help children think more about animals, we cut out several pictures from magazines. We avoided cutting them in perfect squares or circles to model that any shape was fine as children often avoid cutting something out because they think it must look perfect.  

A variety of pictures were cut out. The caregiver did not know how the child would sort them.

Ask children to look at all of the pictures and to talk about what they see. You may be surprised at what children notice. Some children may talk about an animal’s coloring while others may describe features such as number of legs, if it has fur, or can fly. These are important and can lead to many questions such as, “How does this animal get from place to place?” You can even introduce scientific vocabulary such as migrate to talk about animals that move, depending upon the weather and food supply.

Give children various papers and have them place the pictures in groups. You will see below that this child first started placing animals that had a pattern together. Then he changed his mind. Asking children to explain this is a good way to develop expressive language.

The child began to sort by pattern.

After some thinking time, which is what we at Maggie’s Big Home love to encourage for anyone, the child decided to arrange (or sort) his animals according to where they lived.  He chose to put all the animals that lived on land together and those that lived in the water together, as shown below.

The child talked about his choices as he glued the pictures.

The child explained why each animal belonged in the category (habitat).

He thought very carefully about the duck and had a difficult time placing it as living on land or in water. He finally was able to say, “I think he sleeps on land.” That is where the duck was glued in his sort. 

Some choices don't fit "easily" into a sort. Giving children time to consider their choices helps them to discover the power of their own thoughts.

One final note, while this activity helps children think about animal attributes, it also develops expressive language not to mention that gluing is sure to strengthen hand muscles to aid in fine motor development.