Early Literacy Aside--Explain: We are going to have fun playing with sounds today, reading stories with sound words. Playing with sounds helps develop phonological awareness which will help your child learn to hear the smaller sounds in words.Read book emphasizing sound words like crunch and munch. Then I go back to some pages and have the children say the words with me, again emphasizing different sounds. Early Literacy Aside--Example: Hearing and learning sound words like splish-splash is an enjoyable way of learning phonlogical awareness and will help your children later hear smaller sounds in words. Early Literacy Aside--Empower: At home, play with sound words, like splish-splash in the bath, crunch-munch at snack, and exaggerate how you are saying words to practice hearing their parts.

Submitted by Carrie Burrier, Akron-Summit County (OH) Public Library