Learning Skills

• Phonics Skills
  • Phonics Skills

    Before they can read independently, children must learn the relationship of letters to their sounds and be able to distinguish individual sounds, or phonemes, within words. Phonics skills help children sounds out new words (If I can read "pot", then I can read "hot" and "spot").

• Word Building
  • Word Building

    To read and write, children must understand how individual letter sounds blend together to make words. Experimenting with building words, such as changing mat to cat to rat, helps with reading and spelling.

• Phonological Awareness
  • Phonological Awareness

    Along with learning language and letters, phonological awareness - the ability to pick out and play with sounds in words (such as syllables and rhymes)- is essential for learning to read.

• The Alphabet
  • The Alphabet

    Knowing the letters of the alphabet is one of the first steps toward learning to read and write. Introducing letters to young children helps them learn to recognize the different shapes and names - an early indicator for reading achievement.

• Sight Words and Homophones
  • Sight Words and Homophones

    Sight words are words that can't be sounded out and so must be learned by sight (the, he, she , was, and so on). Homophones are words that sound the same but are pronounced differently, such as to, too, and two.

• Vowels
  • Vowels

    Spelling begins with regular short vowel sounds (cap) and long vowel sounds (with silent e, cap becomes cape). Finally, children learn the rules and patterns of vowel pairs (ee), digraphs (ai in train), dipthongs (oi in boil) and r-controlled vowels (farm, bird).

• Shapes
  • Shapes

    Identifying and manipulating shapes lays the groundwork for geometry by giving children concrete experience with angles, symmetry and relative sizes.

• Early Number Sense
  • Early Number Sense

    As early as 6 months, babies begin to understand the concept of numbers, noticing small groups of one, two or three things. As children develop number sense they learn to count by ones, skip count and count backwards, gaining the foundation for operations. Children who have good number sense find learning operations like addition and subtraction much easier.

• More Than, Less Than
  • More Than, Less Than

    The concept of more than/less than deepens a child's number sense by teaching him to compare numbers. Children begin with informal and approximate comparisons using the terms "more" and "less"; then they learn the terms and symbols for greater than (>), less than (<) and equal to (=).

• Number Recognition
  • Number Recognition

    To begin their study of math, children must distinguish numerals from letters and shapes and understand that numbers are symbols for amounts.

• Sequencing
  • Sequencing

    Even toddlers can often recite number names in order, but the ability to compare and order numbers in sequence indicates a practical application of number concepts.

• Addition
  • Addition

    Once children know that numbers are symbols for objects (2 stands for two cars) they learn to count sets, or groups of objects, to find sums. Finally, sets of objects can be replaced by numerals and added together in equations.

• Subtraction
  • Subtraction

    The inverse of addition is subtraction - to take away objects and tell how many are left. Once children grasp subtraction, sets of objects can be replaced by numerals in equations.