All Modules B6-Development Matters in the early years | Page 30

Playing and Exploring, Active Learning, and Creating and Thinking Critically support children’s learning across all areas

5 Literacy: Reading
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30-50 months

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Positive Relationships:

Enabling Environments:

what adults could do

what adults could provide

Enjoys rhyming and rhythmic activities.
Shows awareness of rhyme and alliteration.
Recognizes rhythm in spoken words.
Listens to and joins in with stories and poems, one-toone and also in small groups.
Joins in with repeated refrains and anticipates key events
and phrases in rhymes and stories.
Beginning to be aware of the way stories are structured.
Suggests how the story might end.
Listens to stories with increasing attention and recall.
Describes main story settings, events and principal characters.
Shows interest in illustrations and print in books and print
in the environment.
Recognizes familiar words and signs such as own name
and advertising logos.
Looks at books independently.
Handles books carefully.
Knows information can be relayed in the form of print.
Holds books the correct way up and turns pages.
• Knows that print carries meaning and, in English, is read
from left to right and top to bottom.
Demonstrates beginning phonological awareness
playing rhyming games
Uses pictorial and visual cues to convey meaning
Recognizes own name in print
Is focused on expressing the meaning of the story rather
than on reading words accurately
Knows print goes from left to right
Begins to show awareness of literacy language: “long,
long time ago…”
Uses prior knowledge of context and personal
experiences to make meaning
Recognizes some personal significant words in context
Recognizes some letters of the alphabet and name them
See self as a reader
Select books to read for pleasure

• Focus on meaningful print such as a child’s name,
words on a cereal packet or a book title, in order to
discuss similarities and differences between symbols.
• Help children to understand what a word is by using
names and labels and by pointing out words in the
environment and in books.
• Provide dual language books and read them with all
children, to raise awareness of different scripts. Try to
match dual language books to languages spoken by
families in the setting.
• Remember not all languages have written forms and
not all families are literate either in English, or in a
different home language.
• Discuss with children the characters in books being
read.
• Encourage them to predict outcomes, to think of
alternative endings and to compare plots and the
feelings of characters with their own experiences.
• Plan to include home language and bilingual story
sessions by involving qualified bilingual adults, as well
as enlisting the help of parents.

• Provide some simple poetry, song, fiction and non-fiction
books.
• Provide fact and fiction books in all areas, e.g.
construction area as well as the book area.
• Provide books containing photographs of the children
that can be read by adults and that children can begin to
‘read’ by themselves.
• Add child-made books and adult-scribed stories to the
book area and use these for sharing stories with others.
• Create an environment rich in print where children can
learn about words, e.g. using names, signs, posters.
• When children can see the text, e.g. using big books.
model the language of print, such as letter, word, page,
beginning, end, first, last, middle.
• Introduce children to books and other materials that
provide information or instructions. Carry out activities
using instructions, such as reading a recipe to make a
cake.
• Ensure access to stories for all children by using a range
of visual cues and story props.

Literacy: Reading

A Unique Child:
observing what a child is learning