Kindergarten Comprehension

        My unit was built on comprehension for a kindergarten classroom.  At the beginning of each language arts time I would show the children a book and we would first discuss concepts of print.  Through assessments it was found many children in my classroom had very little understanding in this area.  We would discuss the definition of author, illustrator, title, cover, spine, back of the book and text.  I found that this often led into my discussion of comprehension by starting with the cover.  We would focus on what was shown on the cover, what we thought the illustrator was trying to tell the reader.  By stating what they saw this then led into whether or not they thought this story was going to be make-believe or real.

       Without even planning on going so in depth on illustrations it quickly became one of the main focuses of my unit.  I found that children would ask me questions about the illustrations wondering why the book was the way it was.  For example, the story, Animal Mother's, has an illustration of a mother fox and baby on the cover, yet in the story it never mentions the fox.  When I concluded the story multiple children immediately asked where the fox was or began telling me that I skipped the page about the fox.  I was caught off guard and wondered if I did miss this page...so we did a picture walk through of the story leading to the answer that their was no fox in the story, but we could draw a conclusion of the fox mother based on the illustration.  We knew from our picture walk that the illustrations in the story showed how mother animals cared for their babies.  At this time I was excited to see that the children were really engaged in the details of the illustration to draw meaning from the text.  It also helped me to understand that informal assessment really does work when listening to conversations during pair-share as well as by making sure there is time for children to answer and ask questions.

       During my unit I also focused on beginning letter sounds to make sure children are continually learning their phonemic sounds.  On these days we would do a worksheet that had different pictures on it and would look for words that began with a specific letter.  I found that stating the letter and letter sound aloud then stating what the picture was worked, but it was helpful to also state the letter sound again after the picture.  For example, m, /m/, cat, /m/.  For the first worksheet I was having children state yes or no aloud, but then found not everyone was participating because the more advanced children were completing the worksheet instead.  Therefore I found that by having the children place their hands on their head if it was the right letter or hands on their table if it was incorrect.  I found that this was also a great informal assessment.

        Throughout my unit I found different ways to do informal assessments throughout the day.  I learned that since we complete all of our task together over the elmo and then students complete it, it wasn't really assessing their skills.  It was assess if they could copy work basically.  I did however notice that children who were given the work to take home because of absences filled out worksheets very clear (help at home) or majority did not turn them in at all.  I have since been having absent children do their work during center time or other opportunities throughout the day since it was not being turned in when sent home.