Using concrete images when presenting abstract concepts

My September goal has been to use concrete images when presenting abstract facts.

How have I been able to use this recently?

• Heggerty Phonemic Awareness practice- using hand gestures to show the position of the target sounds has been very helpful for students. Positional words can be tricky and confusing for young learners, so having the hand gestures is very helpful.
• SIPPS- When practicing oral blending and segmenting it is really helpful for the students to use the graphic organizers of sound placeholders in the program.

How the Brain Learns to Read- Chapter 1

How the Brain Learns to Read by David A. Sousa, chapter 1 Learning Spoken Language

David Sousa lays the foundation of learning to read in chapter 1 with how children learn spoken language. Here are a few take-aways from this chapter.

• Most language is activated in the left hemisphere, but the emotional content of language is held in the right hemisphere. p 13  What can we do to connect the two hemispheres to anchor student learning.
• Infants' brains are wired for all the language sounds, but at about age 1 they start pruning out/off the sounds not found in the language they hear. p. 15 Another reason why it is important for dual languages to be spoken in the home if that is available. Also, this is another reason why it is so important for young children to have lots of experiences with conversations in the home.
• Image-loaded words and verbal (abstract) words are activated in different parts of the brain. Teachers should use concrete images when presenting an abstract concept. p. 16-17
• Building vocabulary in young children (ages birth-3) is very important. Have conversations with young children. The impact continues past age 3. p. 18