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Summer Institute 2024

Best Practices for Meeting the Needs of All Learners in Pre-K & K

How to support Social and Emotional Development through books

There are many ways families can support social and emotional development, but picture books can be especially powerful. According to an article by Alison Hooper in Teaching Young Children, as an educator you can encourage families to support social and emotional development by reading and talking about meaningful books.

When families read together, it creates many developmental opportunities. “Topics that can be challenging to talk about, like bullying or jealousy, may be easier to address with a good book as a tool,” says Hooper. Educators can help families by giving them support in how to find and choose appropriate books. Hooper offers three strategies educators can use to “help families turn picture books into tools to prompt rich conversations about expressing feelings, gaining self-esteem, showing perseverance, and many other important skills.”

• Provide a lending library. With lending libraries located within the classroom, families can peruse books to read at home with their children. Educators might also include discussion guides with open-ended questions and brief activities for the families. Books such as Yo! Yes? by Chris Raschka and It’s Okay to be Different, by Todd Parr, are great choices to get started.

• Highlight a book in your communication with families. Highlight a book in weekly newsletters or on a class social media page. “Share the title, a social or emotional skill to highlight, and a few questions families can use when talking to their child about the book.”

• Hold a family literacy event. This is a great strategy to demonstrate the myriad ways reading together can be fun. Perhaps you can hold a workshop focused on conversations about sensitive topics. Families can even try the strategies while at the workshop. These can be held in person or virtually. 

Enjoyable alphabet activities for young children

Learning ABCs is always more fun when educators take the time to make alphabet activities a treat. The staff at We Are Teachers say that educators might even be able to do one activity each day for one year without repeating them-the options are endless! They offer a number of activities that children can learn and play at any time. Here are just a few:

• Play alphabet hide-and-seek. Organize a sensory bin with rice, cornmeal, or sand, and hide plastic alphabet letters inside. Children will love the challenge of finding letters, identifying names and sounds, and keeping track of the letters they find.

• Write letters on dried beans. Large dried white beans have the perfect surfaces on which to write letters. Write all uppercase and lowercase letters using a sharpie, and then put each set in a pile or bag. Challenge children to match them.

• Write letters in shaving cream. It may get somewhat messy, but educators can take arts and crafts time to the next level by squirting shaving cream on a table or tray. Let children use their fingers to write letter in the cream. It is easy to smooth out and do multiple letters.

• Take it outside. Let children write with sidewalk chalk. The sunshine alone will make this activity fun. You might even give students letter cards from which they can work as they write on the ground.

• Play musical alphabet. Place letters in a big circle on the floor. Play music and have children walk around the circle. When the music turns off, children have to call out the letter closest to them. You might even ask them to think of three things (colors, animals, etc.) that begin with the same letter.

Click here to learn about more creative ABC ideas.