Connecting School and Home to Support New Readers
Learning happens everywhere, all the time, for children ages three to seven. The Let’s Learn digital collection of free videos and resources helps make important connections between classroom and home-based learning, especially for beginning readers. This edWebinar focuses on early literacy pedagogy anchored in reading science.
See Video! Connecting School and Home to Support New Readers
Using Let’s Learn Literacy Lessons
How to Video on Using Let’s Learn Literacy Lessons
THE LITTLE CAR ASL
Maria Begg-Roberson and her son read THE LITTLE CAR by Xu Han. During the reading, they count the number of hills the little car climbs over. Afterwards they show how to construct a little car with recycled paper.
RAINING ASL
Darlene Thomas reads RAINING by Pingping Xu with illustrations by Graca Lima. The book explores how animals like cats, frogs, mice, and birds shelter in their homes when it rains. Then, using a photo as a reference, Darlene shows how to draw one of her favorite plants.
CITY FEET ASL
Carlton Ellen reads the picture book City Feet, by Aixa Perez-Prado. The book explores the different kinds of shoes different people wear. After the reading, Carlton prompts viewers to consider what type of shoes are appropriate for varied occasions and environments.
ALL THAT I AM ASL
Katherine Rodriguez reads ALL THAT I AM by M.H. Clark, illustrated by Laura Carlin. A child reflects on how she is strong like a sea, bold like a tree, and bright like the sun. Then the family creates self-portraits and uses adjectives to describe themselves.
LOVE ON A PLATE ASL
Darlene Thomas reads LOVE ON A PLATE by Kashin Kheiriyeh. A family uses food to create images — like sailboat and train – on a dinner plate.
MY FRIEND EARTH ASL
Carlton Ellen reads MY FRIEND EARTH by Patricia MacLaughlin, illustrated by Francesca Sanna. This picture book explores the seasons and Earth’s landscape. Then Carlton draws a picture of a tree he sees out his window, and prompts children to make observations about the trees they see in their community.
ONE SUMMER NIGHT ASL
How can baby sea turtle hatchlings make their way to the water on a dark summer night? Join Katherine Rodriquez and Genevieve as they read ONE SUMMER NIGHT by author Tammi Salzano and illustrated by Rob Savegh Jr. Then draw a sea turtle or make one from a paper bowl.
MY HANDS TELL A STORY ASL
MY HANDS TELL A STORY, by Kelly Starling Lyons with illustrations by Tonya Engel, is about a girl and her grandmother making meaning from the lines on their hands. Each line represents a story from the past. With two young friends, Shana Davis reads the picture book and then creates scented paintings with glue, gelatin power, and paper.
ONE SUMMER NIGHT
How can baby sea turtle hatchlings make their way to the water on a dark summer night? Join Katherine Rodriquez and Genevieve as they read ONE SUMMER NIGHT by author Tammi Salzano and illustrated by Rob Savegh Jr. Then draw a sea turtle or make one from a paper bowl.
SEASONAL ADVENTURES ASL
Learn about spring, summer, winter, and fall with Darlene Thomas while reading SEASONAL ADVENTURES, written by Johnny Ray Moore and illustrated by Cbabi Bayoc. Then create a seasonal collage using materials from nature and around the house.
SOUP DAY ASL
Carlton Ellen reads SOUP DAY by Melissa Iwai & shows how ingredients transform into soup.
VOWEL TEAMS EW AND UE
Isabel Simmons builds words with vowel teams ew and ue, including chew and true.
FEEL YOUR BEST SELF BY HELPING OTHERS
Helping others can help you feel your best self. Puppet friends model how to lend a hand with putting away groceries and completing a puzzle.
HOME
Carlton Ellen reads HOME by Lian-En Lin and then draws a picture of his room at home.
WHERE ANIMALS LIVE
Devon Ritter from the Memphis Zoo explores animal habitats. She explains how the natural resources of the savannah, wetlands, rainforest, desert, tundra, and ocean provide food and shelter for different animals.
SINGING ABOUT WHERE WE LIVE
Arielle Lewis from Education Through Music sings about different languages and cultures from around the world.
KAVEH PLAYS “MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB”!
Kaveh plays “Mary Had a Little Lamb.”
FINDING SHAPES IN EGYPT
Omar Etman finds all kinds of shapes when visiting his family in Cairo, Egypt. The pyramids are a highlight.
Do You Hear the Long “u” in Blue?
LET’S LEARN about where we live! Explore animal habitats. Read HOME and words with long u.Sing about New York City. See pyramids in Egypt. One-hour programs help children ages 3-7 learn in school and at home. Content provided by Education Through Music and Memphis Zoo.
Do You Hear the Long “i” in “Flight”?
LET’S LEARN about water! Play speedy numbers with shells. Sing about the weather. Learn why animals need water. Read DAN DAN’S DREAM and words with long. One-hour programs help children ages 3-7 learn in school and at home. Content provided by Education Through Music and Memphis Zoo.
SHELL GAME
Omar Etman and Lily Fincher play a shell game. They demonstrate how to subitize — recognize a number of objects at a glance without counting them.
LONG I VOWEL SOUND
Anna Scretching-Cole explores the long i vowel sound spelling words with y and igh.
Do You Hear the Long “o” in “Grow”
LET’S LEARN about transportation! Use movement maps. Explore how animals move. Learn how women marched to get the right to vote. Read THE LITTLE CAR and words with long o. One-hour programs help children ages 3-7 learn in school and at home. Content provided by Memphis Zoo and New York Historical Society.
DANDAN’S DREAM
Shana Davis and a young friend read DANDAN’s DREAM by Xiaowen Zhu and illustrated by Yanling Gong. During the story, Dandan dreams sending herself by mail to the South Pole. Afterwards Shana and her friend use art supplies to create an imaginative stamp.
WEATHER SONGS
Arielle Lewis from Education Through Music sing sabout different types of weather — sunny, rainy, cloudy, and stormy. She prompts viewers to clap, tap, and blow to imitate the sound of rain.
FEEL YOUR BEST SELF BY MANAGING BIG EMOTIONS
Managing big emotions can help you feel your best self. Puppet friends model how to do that.
HOW ANIMALS USE WATER
Graceson Lawrence from the Memphis Zoo explores the ways animals use fresh water and salt water.
CAMILA PLAYS “RAIN, RAIN, GO AWAY”!
Camila plays “Rain, Rain, Go Away”!
LEARNING NEW THINGS
Brenda Salazar introduces Spanish vocabulary as she discusses the joys and challenges of learning new things. She explores how the Spanish and English alphabets are similar. Then she talks about exercising our brains and the feelings that come along with learning something new.
Do You Hear the Long “e” in Sweet?
LET’S LEARN about plants! Make trees and flowers with tangrams. Do an experiment with fruits and vegetables. Draw a picture of a plant. Sing a song in Spanish about the seasons. Read RAINING and words with long e. One-hour programs help children ages 3-7 learn in school and at home. Content provided by Studio in a School.
NO MAS MONOS
Diane Sanlatte teaches a version of the song “No More Monkeys” in Spanish using animal finger puppets.
TIBERIUS SHOWS HOW TO RIDE A SCOOTER!
Tiberius shows how to ride a scooter.
MAPPING A BIKE RIDE
Omar Etman takes a bike ride and then makes a movement map of his journey that he shares with Lily Fincher.
HOW ANIMALS MOVE
Devon Ritter from the Memphis Zoo explores how animals move by running, slithering, flying, and hopping.
THE LITTLE CAR
Maria Begg-Roberson and her son read THE LITTLE CAR by Xu Han. During the reading, they count the number of hills the little car climbs over. Afterwards they show how to construct a little car with recycled paper.
SEASONS IN SPANISH
Diane Sanlatte teaches a song about the four seasons in Spanish — verano, otono, invierno, and primavera.
HOUSEPLANT DRAWINGS
Join Lia Zuilivia from Studio in a School in a demonstration on drawing a houseplant. Observe the lines and shapes of the plant to sketch the drawing.
A RED CABBAGE TEST
What color will red cabbage water turn when mixed with fruit juice? Cassondra Easterling and her children conduct an experiment to explore if a lemon, apple, and tomato are more acidic or basic.
LONG E SOUNDS SPELLED EE AND EA
Anna Scretching-Cole explores long e vowel sounds spelled with ee and ea.
USING TANGRAMS TO MAKE FLOWERS AND TREES
Omar Etman and Lily Fincher show how to use triangles, a square, and a parallelogram from a tangram puzzle to make flowers and trees.
ZURI SHOWS HOW TO DRAW A FLOWER!
Zuri shows how to draw a flower.
SUFFRAGIST MOVEMENT
Cheyney McKnight from the New-York Historical Society explores the strategies women used to get the right to vote.
RAINING
Darlene Thomas reads RAINING by Pingping Xu with illustrations by Graca Lima. The book explores how animals like cats, frogs, mice, and birds shelter in their homes when it rains. Then, using a photo as a reference, Darlene shows how to draw one of her favorite plants.
LONG O AND OW VOWEL SOUND
Isabel Simmons explores how to blend, read, and write words with long o and ow, including snow, grow, and coach.
Do You Hear the Long “a” in Play?
LET’S LEARN about loving learning! Play a math memory game. Learn Spanish words and step dance steps. Read DINOSAUR RAP and words with long a. One-hour programs help children ages 3-7 learn in school and at home. Content provided by Education Through Music, Memphis Zoo, New Victory Theater.
JUNE SHOWS HOW TO DO A SOMERSAULT!
JUNE SHOWS HOW TO DO A SOMERSAULT!
A MATH MEMORY GAME
Lily Fincher and Omar Etman show how to play a math memory game. They make two sets of cards depicting something they’ve learned recently on pieces of paper. Then they arrange the cards in a two-row grid with the illustrations face down on a game board and try to make matches quickly.
VOWEL TEAMS AI AND AY
Isabel Simmons decodes, builds, reads, and writes words with the vowel teams ai and ay. Isabel explains that ai is in the middle of a word and ay is at the end of a word.
DINOSAUR RAP
With a young friend, Shana Davis reads DINOSAUR RAP by John Foster, illustrated by Debbie Harter. In this story, characters dance, sing, and roar along with a dinosaur. Then Shana shows how to make a dinosaur mask with a paper plate.
JUNE SHOWS HOW TO DO A SOMERSAULT!
June shows how to do a somersault.
HOW ANIMALS LEARN
Jess Nystrom from the Memphis Zoo explains how animals learn through training. This helps them to thrive in their zoo habitats and enables some of them to serve as animal ambassadors.
STEP UP
Asha John and two friends from the New Victory Theater show how to do a step dancing routine to music from different cultures.
“PEAS AND CARROTS”
Flor Bromley and Paul Saul sing “Peas and Carrots,” which explores how people have similar and different tastes.
PERFECT PARTNERS
Maria Begg-Roberson reads PERFECT PARTNERS by Mary Amato, illustrated by Rashin Kheiriyeh. The story is about a cat who makes friends at a painting class. Afterwards Maria and her son make a painting of the cat.
Let’s Have a Letter “e” Party!
LET’S LEARN about babies! Meet baby animals. Learn how human babies change as they grow. Subtract as baby birds leave their nest. Read CHICK, CHICK, PEEP, PEEP, PEEP and words with long e. Sing a song in Spanish. One-hour programs help children ages 3-7 learn in school and at home. Content provided by Memphis Zoo.
CHICK, CHICK, PEEP, PEEP, PEEP
With her daughter Katherine Rodriguez reads CHICK, CHICK, PEEP, PEEP, PEEP by Xiao Mao and illustrated by Hisana Sawada. A momma hen counts as her baby chicks ascend a set of stairs. Afterwards, Katherine and Genevieve count household objects.
There’s a Long “u” in Flute!
LET’S LEARN about light! Find out how animals use light. Read A RAY OF LIGHT. Make light patterns. Do a light switch dance. Learn about the long u vowel sound. One-hour programs help children ages 3-7 learn in school and at home. Content provided by Education Through Music, Memphis Zoo.
MUSICAL LIGHT GAME
David Martinez from Education Through Music sings a welcome song in Portuguese. Introducing the musical terms piano and forte, he prompts viewers to sing loudly and softly using colored lights.
ANIMALS AND LIGHT
Devon Ritter from the Memphis Zoo explores the relationship animals have to light. She explains how nocturnal animals – like a porcupine – depend on senses other than sight to navigate in the dark. She discusses how animals absorb sunlight for energy, and how sunlight helps create the food animals eat. Devon also introduces bioluminescent animals, like fireflies, that make their own light.
A RAY OF LIGHT
Katherine Rodriguez models how to paraphrase the non-fiction book A RAY OF LIGHT by Walter Wick so her daughter can understand. They learn about sources of light, observe how light can bend, and explore the color spectrum. Then they watch what happens when they shine a flashlight through cups of colored water.
DAHLIA SHOWS HOW TO FINGER KNIT!
Dahlia shows how to finger knit.
COLORED LIGHT PATTERNS
Zoe Kleinmann and a student explore patterns. First they create units of two connected plastic cubes to create an AB pattern. Then they make patterns by shining a flashlight through translucent cups of different colors.
LONG U
Anna Scretching-Cole explores the long u vowel sound. Long u appears in the middle of words that end in e like cube, tube, or flute.
LIGHT SWITCH TAP DANCE
Aaron Umsted demonstrates a tap dance movement called a toe drop. He prompts children to move their feet up and down like a light switch.
Do You Hear Long Vowels in Hero?
LET’S LEARN about the five senses! See how animals use them. Learn Spanish words for sight, sound, touch, smell, hearing. Use touch to identify shapes. Sing about peas and carrots. Do a dance using sight, touch, and hearing. Hear long vowel sounds. Read HOW TO WAKE UP PIGGY. One-hour programs help children ages 3-7 learn in school and at home. Content provided by Flor Bromley, Memphis Zoo.
LONG VOWELS
Anna Scretching-Cole reviews long vowel a, e, i, o, and u. Then she explores how to blend open syllables to make words like hero and focus.
MI CUERPO
Diane Sanlatte teaches the Spanish song “Mi Cuerpo.”
9-1-1 EMERGENCY OPERATOR
A 9-1-1 emergency operator describes how she helps people on the phone.
CARING FOR BABIES
With pictures and baby dolls, Maria Begg-Roberson and her daughter explore how adults care for babies to help them grow up.
USING SENSES TO PRACTICE MINDFULNESS
Brenda Salazar introduces Spanish words for the five senses while using her senses to practice mindfulness. She feels the texture of objects, listens to surrounding noises, imagines the smell of different environments and the tastes of different foods, and watches birds.
USING SENSES TO DANCE
Aaron Umsted as he uses his senses of sight, touch, and hearing to clap and march while dancing.
BABY ANIMALS
Jo Olson from the Memphis Zoo talks about baby animals. She explains that some babies hatch from eggs, like snakes. Other animals give birth to live babies, like kangaroos. She points out that many baby animals depend on the help of their parents to survive.
ANIMAL SENSES
Devon Ritter from the Memphis Zoo explores how animals use their senses of touch, hearing, sight, and smell to survive in different environments.
MATH SENSE
Priya Chandrashaker uses her sense of touch to identify the shapes of objects in a mystery box. Then she uses sight to identify triangles and rectangles.
CAMILA PLAYS “FÜR ELISE”!
Camila plays “Für Elise.”
HOW TO WAKE UP PIGGY
Darlene Thomas read HOW TO WAKE UP PIGGY by Pingjoing Xu and illustrated by Ying Haung. When Piggy falls asleep, other characters try making different noises to wake him up. After showing how to make a pig stick puppet, Darlene prompts viewers to figure out ways to wake up Piggy.
SUBTRACTING FROM 10 WITH BABY BIRDS
Zoe Kleinmann and two students explore subtracting from 10 with toy baby birds that fly from a nest.
AYANFEOLUWA SHOWS SOME MATH TRICKS!
Ayanfeoluwa shows some math tricks!
E PARTY!
Isabel Simmons has an e party. She demonstrates how an e at the end of a word turns the e in the middle of the word into a long vowel sound. Isabel prompts viewers to practice reading, decoding, and writing words with two e letters like these, theme, and Pete.
BODY PERCUSSION
David Martinez sings a welcome song in Spanish, then transforms his body into a percussion instrument.
TRANSFORMING PRIMARY COLORS INTO SECONDARY COLORS
Lia Zuvilivia from Studio in a School guides students as they mix primary colors of paint — red, blue, and yellow – and transform them into secondary colors.
See Video! TRANSFORMING PRIMARY COLORS INTO SECONDARY COLORS
ADDING LEAVES TO A TREE GAME
Zoe Kleinmann plays an addition game with two students. After rolling dice, the students add the number of dots that come up and add that number of leaves to the tree’s branches.
CHANGING LIQUID TO SOLID AND GAS
Elisa Oviedo and her niece change water from liquid to solid using a freezer.. Then they heat water up on the stove until it turns into gas.
ZURI TRANSFORMS A HANDSTAND INTO A BRIDGE!
Zuri transforms a handstand into a bridge.
CITY FEET
Carlton Ellen reads the picture book City Feet, by Aixa Perez-Prado. The book explores the different kinds of shoes different people wear. After the reading, Carlton prompts viewers to consider what type of shoes are appropriate for varied occasions and environments.
MAGIC E TURNS SHORT O INTO LONG O
Isabel Simmons transforms the short o vowel sound into the long o vowel song by adding magic e to the end of the word.
Hope Has a Silent “e”!
LET’S LEARN about transformation! Turn water into ice and steam. Mix paint to make new colors. See how magic letter e turns short o into long o. Play a game to change the number of leaves on a tree. Read CITY FEET. One-hour programs help children ages 3-7 learn in school and at home. Content provided by Education Through Music, Studio in a School, Sugar Hill Museum Preschool.
JEWEL LOVES TO DANCE!
Jewel loves to dance.
ADDING MAGIC E TO WORDS WITH I
Anna Scretching-Cole= teaches students about the magic e. An e at the end of a word can change the vowel sound of a short I to a long I. Pin becomes pine.
DANCING PATHWAYS
With his dance students, Shawn Bible explores moving in straight, curved and zig-zag pathways.
MAKING BREAD
Cassondra Easterling and her children show how to combine ingredients to make bread dough. After the dough rises, they knead it, bake, and taste the finished loaf.
SELF-PORTRAITS
Katherine Huala and Belinda Blum from Studio in a School create self-portraits. Using a mirror, they notice the shapes and features of their faces, then draw and paint what they see.
ALL ABOUT YOU
As she introduces Spanish vocabulary, Brenda Salazar explains why items from her home represent her and make her unique. She encourages youngsters to contemplate what makes them unique, too.
Perfect Partners
Maria Begg-Roberson reads PERFECT PARTNERS by Mary Amato, illustrated by Rashin Kheiriyeh. The story is about a cat who makes friends at a painting class. Afterwards Maria and her son make a painting of the cat.
MY HANDS TELL A STORY
MY HANDS TELL A STORY, by Kelly Starling Lyons with illustrations by Tonya Engel, is about a girl and her grandmother making meaning from the lines on their hands. Each line represents a story from the past. With two young friends, Shana Davis reads the picture book and then creates scented paintings with glue, gelatin power, and paper.
MY HANDS TELL A STORY
MY HANDS TELL A STORY, by Kelly Starling Lyons with illustrations by Tonya Engel, is about a girl and her grandmother making meaning from the lines on their hands. Each line represents a story from the past. With two young friends, Shana Davis reads the picture book and then creates scented paintings with glue, gelatin power, and paper.
Short e Vowel Sound
Learn about short e with Anna Scretching-Cole. The short e vowel sounds often appear in the middle of words like web and bed. Practice reading and blending letter sounds to make rhyming words with short e sounds.
Senses Count
Lily Fincher and Omar Etman count the ways Dewey the dog uses with his senses. Count along with them as Dewey tastes his food, sniffs other dogs, and plays.
