Dear Families,

This is your child’s anthology. We call it an anthology in our classroom because it is a collection of several things: songs, poems, cartoons, news, and short stories.

The anthology is an important part of the children’s reading materials because the items we will be adding to the notebooks will be familiar to them. Typically, the children will add pieces to their anthologies each week. Most of the time we will first read the songs, poems, news, cartoons, and short stories during our shared reading time so that the children have some experience reading them. I then type and prepare the items for the children’s notebooks.

You will discover that most of the items don’t have "prepared pictures" and that the children will be doing the illustrations themselves. I prefer that the children do their own artwork so that their pages become "theirs." We generally remember better and have a sense that something is "ours" when we have a personal connection to our work.

The children will bring home their anthologies once a week to share with you as part of their nightly reading. Of course they are welcome to take them home more often if you and they would enjoy having it home more. I ask that you please remind your child to tuck it into his or her book bag after you finish reading so that is comes back to school the next day, as the children enjoy their anthologies during daily quiet reading also.

If you notice that your child is having difficulty reading, please help in these ways:

• Read or sing the entire piece to or with your child, then encourage your child to read it independently.
• Echo read with your child: you read a line, your child repeats after. Again, encourage independent reading practice after this.

If you notice that your child is having difficulty with a word, please help problem solve in one or more of the following ways:

• Show your child how to "take another run at the reading": reread starting at the beginning of the sentence or line and see if that helps with the problem word.
• Cover all but the beginning letter or letters of the problem word, and drawing your finger back, help your child sound out the word. Once the word problem is solved, remind your child to go back and reread the entire sentence or line so that she or he "holds the meaning together."
• Tell your child to skip it and come back to it. If this doesn’t help, then help him or her figure out the problem word another way.
• Remind your child to look at the pictures she or he has drawn, as that may help.
• Give the word!

My rule of thumb with all word problem solving is to help the children figure out the problem the quickest way possible. I don’t belabor it. Sometimes it really is best just to tell them the problem word and let them move on with their reading. Let your best "reading instinct" guide you as you help your child.

A last word. Keep the reading pleasurable for both you and your child. Learning how to read is a process and it’s important for your young reader to view this process with good feelings. If or when it ever becomes frustrating, it’s time to put everything away and get some fresh air instead.

I hope you enjoy the collection the children and I put together this year in the course of our days of reading and learning together.

Best wishes,

Janine Chappell Carr