Monday, November 1, 2010

G is for GRAPES

Singing "5 Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed" during Music Time.

We also learned a new "G" song today:

Green Grapes
Five green grapes growing on a vine (Hold up five fingers.)
I picked one cause it looked so fin (fold down one finger)
Four green grapes growing on a vine (Hold up four fingers.)
I picked another for my Valentine (fold down one finger)
Three green grapes growing on a vine. (Hold up three fingers.)
I ate another, I couldn't decline (fold down one finger)
Two green grapes growing on a vine (Hold two fingers up.)
I ate another in the sunshine (fold down one finger)
One green grape growing on a vine (Hold up one finger)
I ate it too, cause they were all mine (Fold down last finger)




We did a Worksheet today, where you had to color Uppercase G's purple & Lowercase g's green. Most of the kids caught on to the concept with some help and then we practiced handwriting. Everyone seems to be on track, since this entire class still has another year of preschool before kindergarten. Don't feel panicked if your child shows no interested in handwriting. This is a skill that typically develops closer to 5 years old.
We talked about things that start with G & the different sounds G makes. One of the words was GREEN & we sang a song about the kids in the class that were wearing Green!
G is a difficult letter, some might call it an "unreliable letter".


" It makes the "guh" (hard g - /g/ sound) as in garden or dog or the "juh" (soft g - /j/ sound) as in giraffe.

When combined with the letter "d", a grapheme is formed which sounds like /j/  (as in ledger)

G is part of the 'gh' digraph which can make the /g/ sound as in ghost or the /f/ sound as in cough.

G is part of the 'ng' digraph which can make the hard sound as in finger, the soft sound as in change.

G is sometimes silent as in gnat or gnaw."


Talk about the different sounds G can make this week and see if your children can point out things that start with the letter G.  At this age, they may only understand the hard g sound as in garden or dog, which is perfectly normal. If you explain that G can also sound like "juh" as in giraffe...they will often start naming words that begin with J, not understanding the difference. This will come in time and is tricky part of the English Language:) But the more you talk about the different sounds that certain letters make, the more they will understand!