Interactive Fun for Preschool and Kindergarten

My Interactive Readers have been generating a lot of buzz... even DeeDee Wills from Mrs. Wills Kindergarten is raving about them. My kinders love working on these books each week and I recently had a little fun with two of my youngest friends that had the special treat of getting a sneak peek at my newest creations.

Meet My Friends

I'd like to introduce you to Megan and Hannah.
(These are not their real names, I let these two cutie pies select their own pseudonyms for this post. You know how much children love to play pretend - those girls smiled smiled every time I called them by their imaginary names.) 

Anyways, Megan is a student in the full-day Kindergarten class at my school and she creates a new Interactive Sight Word Reader in class each week then takes the book home to read every night. The oldest of 3 girls, Megan is the family trend-setter. Her younger sisters LOVE reading the books after Megan's reading homework is complete and my Interactive Readers are their favorite reading material. I once told Megan a "secret" that I actually wrote those books and created them myself. Her response: "Well, I cut and glued all of the letters into the pages!" Needless to say, Megan was not impressed with my authorship.

An Interactive Reader for Valentine's Day

On this fun day, Megan worked on the word "for" as she completed the book Valentines For Everyone. This Valentine-themed book incorporates cute monsters and reviews color words. Megan jumped right in and was able to read the entire book without any help from me. Then she decorated the cover, unscrambled the letters, and colored the monsters according to the text on each page.

Interactive Alphabet Fun

My preschool friend, Hannah, was in for a VERY special treat. Knowing how much she loved reading her older sister's books, I created an Interactive Alphabet Reader with her in mind. Hannah sampled my very first Interactive Alphabet Reader: My ABC Book. Instead of unscrambling words, the Interactive Alphabet Readers are created to help younger students make letter-sound connections. This 26-page book reviews each letter of the alphabet. The letters were cut out and glued onto the corresponding page in the book. Like all of my Interactive Readers, My ABC Book features predictable text and picture support. The alphabet cutouts are nice and big for students that are still developing fine motor skills.

With 26 pages, My ABC Book requires more time to complete. Hannah started the book in my classroom and took the remaining pages home with her. Hannah was so in love with this book, she insisted on working on it until bedtime that night. The next day, she read the book continuously until her 3 year-old sister started on "reading" the book as well.

(Sounds like I need to create a new book for the youngest of the sisters.)

In the meantime, I am thrilled to offer Interactive Readers that meet the needs of Preschool and Kindergarten students alike!

Shop Interactive Readers

Interactive Sight Word Readers and Interactive Alphabet Readers are available in the Kinder-Craze stores on Teachers Notebook and Teachers Pay Teachers. 

My Newest Obsession

If you stalk Kinder-Craze on a regular basis, you may have noticed that the photo quality in this post has been kicked up a notch. I recently acquired a new-to-me DSLR camera and I have discovered my new obsession: PHOTOGRAPHY!
When I first got my hands on the DSLR, I was proud to figure out how to turn it on, but the rest of the buttons and features were completely unknown to me. Thanks to an Introductory Photography class with the very talented Brian Weitzel from BTW Photography, I am now comfortable (and obsessed) with capturing high-quality images on a wonderful camera.

If you happen to live in the Metro-Detroit area, own a DSLR camera, and only know how to take photos in auto mode, I highly recommend the class. I am so grateful to Brian for all that I learned in my own introductory course.