Dear Gaila, My daughter will be learning to read next year in kindergarten. What exercises and games can I do in preparation? Sincerely, Excited Mother of an almost Kindergartener Dear Excited Mother, Last week I wrote about developing phonemic awareness of beginning sounds. Now that your daughter has pranced around the house singing "I like c-c-c-c-cake and c-c-c-c-cookies with c-c-c-c-cream", we need to develop awareness of ending sounds. First make sure that your ch

Dear Gaila, My daughter will be learning to read next year in kindergarten. What exercises and games can I do in preparation? Sincerely, Excited Mother of an almost Kindergartener Dear Excited Mother, This is definitely a three column answer. This week we'll talk about the first step of phonemic awareness – awareness of sounds. Only after being aware of the individual sounds that comprise a word, can children begin to attach sounds to symbols and string them togethe

Dear Gaila, One of my private tutoring students desperately needs to improve her reading skills, but is very disinterested in reading. It is too much of a chore for her. Prizes and enthusiastic praise works only so much. Any tips and ideas? Tired Teacher Dear Tired Teacher, Rewards and praise are always good steps in encouraging students to work on challenging tasks, but can be exhausting and tedious. I recently came up with an idea that had my first grade student, Boaz, rea

This week, instead of answering a question, I want to share a Hannukah project a 3rd-6th grade class did. The results were amazing and inspiring! The students drew hannukiyot and had to think of 9 things that bring light into their lives. Here are the results: I was blown away by the values these kids chose. They put a lot of thought into their choices. This project shows how a simple, fun class project can be inspiring and thought provoking. May we all have lots of light in

Dear Gaila, I've always loved reading and I really want to share my love of reading with my children. However, my 2nd grade daughter is not interested in books at all. How can I encourage her to read more? Sincerely, Mother of a non-bookworm Dear MoaN-B, Your daughter needs to catch the magic of reading. The best way is to read to her. Be sure to read about topics, adventures, ideas, or people that interest her and are on her intellectual level. (A good librarian can he