Dinosaur Dinner (pages 26 and 27)
- After reading the poem, hunt for the D's in the spread.
- Encourage older children to find the hidden D's and count the lowercase and uppercase D's in the poem.
Looking for letters in an illustration is a great way to help children begin to recognize and name letters. Older children can also begin to link the sound that is associated with the letter. Ask children to name words that begin with the D sound.
What's Big? What's Small? (pages 32 and 33)
- Help your children answer the questions. If children are confused by the question about the windows, explain that these windows are made of smaller windowpanes. There are only three windows in the picture.
- When you discuss the last question, you could talk about the relative sizes of things on these two pages. The kitchen island is probably the biggest and one of the eggshells is probably the smallest thing on these pages.
You could also count the sets of three: drawers, cupboards, canisters, rugs, windows, plants, pictures, cups, chairs, critters, and bowls. There are a few sets of two: animals, water taps, doors, eggshells.
Snow Day! (bonus pages)
- After making the book, ask your child to talk about the pictures before you read the text.
- After reading the text, you might point out that the words in this book are almost all action words (verbs).
Making a book helps children learn that books have a front and a back and that there is a particular order to the pages. As you read the book you've made, point to the words. It will help your child begin to recognize that words are different from the pictures and are made up of groups of letters. These are all aspects of print awareness—an important early literacy skill.