Reading the same story more than once to a child is one of the best things you can do for your emerging reader. Why? Why not? When you read the same story to your child three of four times in the same week or over a period of time, you are building upon prior knowledge, sequencing skills, tracking for reading, patterns, recall, character development, and the list goes on!
Two weeks ago our class did just this! We read the story, “The Little Old Lady Who Wasn’t Afraid of Anything”. The children LOVED it!!! We read this story probably sevem times over the course of two weeks. At the end of the two weeks, I had the children begin a simple story picture sequencing activity. We began to lay the foundation for retelling stories through pictures and sequencing them in order as they appear in the story. The children know that sometimes when you see a picture from the story, it can help “trigger” the thought or the idea that the author was telling us. This way when we are telling the same story to a friend without the book, we can look at pictures to help us remember those ideas that the author had wanted us to share!
Here are some pictures from one of our small groups in our AM class enjoying this activity!
Preschool in the City with Mrs. Gabelman 