Understanding Pictures
Understanding pictures provides more information for everyone. Pictures help us understand information by having it presented in a simple and direct manner. Pictures include maps, drawings, photos, graphs, symbols, icons, charts, and diagrams. You can help your child understand pictures by talking aloud when you are looking at pictures. Provide your child with paper and writing/ colouring utensils so that they can create pictures. This aids in their visualization. This is an essential lifelong skill such as reading signs, maps, and cautions on cleaning products. Pictures are read in a different part of our brain than text but they help us get a more complete picture of a concept

General Concepts Needed for Reading
Opposites – up/down, high/low, big/small. Show the parents a book of opposites. A nursery rhyme that illustrates this concept is “The Grand Old Duke of York.” In junior kindergarten (JK), these are the words that children are expected to understand or that they will learn: “greater than, less than, bigger than, smaller than, faster than, slower than, taller than, shorter than.”

Colours – Children will need to have a sense of colours for JK/SK. How can you help your children learn their colours ? Make it fun for them, not rote learning. Ask for suggestions from them as to what they enjoy.

Right/left- How can they learn left and right? Use the words all the time and introduce the concept as soon as possible – setting the table, how do they hold their crayon, etc.

Literacy Activity

• Dixie Cup Comparisons. Present the parent groups with two different kinds of cereal. Give two Dixie Cups of cereal to each group member. Ask them to compare and contrast them using observation skills. The parents will love this activity. Then we repeat it during PACT with two new Dixie Cups of cereal.