Welcome to Kindergarten™ - Before starting school, children in the Welcome to Kindergarten program across Canada are given preparatory resources and experiences to position them for school success and lifelong learning. Parents/caregivers are invited to attend a workshop at their neighbourhood school where they receive early literacy resources as part of the Welcome to Kindergarten™ program and learning strategies for using the resources with their child.
Posted by the Welcome to Kindergarten TM team
January Family Activities
Week 1
Play games matching letters of the alphabet. Read alphabet books. Make your own alphabet books
using your child’s suggestions of objects for each letter – e.g. M is for motorboat.
Week 2
Talk with your child about the day’s activities or about plans for the following day – e.g. “What should we do at the park tomorrow?”
Week 3
Play word and sound games – e.g. ”How many words do you know that start with the same sound as your name?”
Week 4
Ask your child to tell you a story about a picture that she/he has made.
Feburary Family Activities
Week 1
Family Activity Calendar 2011 - 2012 www.thelearningpartnership.ca
As you read a storybook with your child, ask your child to predict:
– “What do you think will happen next?”
– “How do you think Baby Bear felt when he saw the porridge was all gone?”
– “What is your favourite part of the story?”
– “Why?”
Week 2
Talk about other ways that the story could end. Make up new endings.
Week 3
As you reread a favourite book together, make your child aware of the letters of the alphabet.
Point out words that begin with the same letter.
Find words that begin with the same letter as the child’s name.
Find rhyming words.
Week 4
Have your child find the magnetic letters that will make favourite words from a book. Put the letters of the word on the refrigerator.
March Family Activities
Week 1
Show your child that you approve of pretend play and encourage imaginative play by joining in.
Week 2
Have a box of props including old clothes, hats, scarves, capes, shoes and other items that encourage your child to dress up and pretend to be a character from a favourite book or TV program.
Week 3
Use puppets to encourage conversation. After reading a story, have puppets available for you and your child to retell the story together.
Week 4
Sing favourite songs and suggest changing the lyrics – e.g. Ten In The Bed – “Maybe we can use another word instead of roll-over?”
April Family Activities
Week 1
Read out loud as you look at road signs, store flyers, posters in windows, the TV guide, post-it notes, recipes.
Week 2
Include your child as you make shopping lists, write notes on a birthday card, print a reminder on a post-it, write an e-mail to a friend.
Week 3
Point out messages on the television screen, logos for programs and products, announcements –
e.g. warnings on the weather network.
Week 4
Play board games that use reading and writing – e.g. Lotto, Bingo, Memory.
