Early Years’ Homework
The Early Years students will be expected to complete homework
each school day. We will not be sending home a weekly homework packet. Each child
is at a different stage of development so we would like them to work each day for
about 15 minutes on an activity that will help them progress to the next stage of
reading, writing, or math development. We are providing you with a list of stages
to help your child progress academically along with some examples of activities to
teach the skill. Once they have mastered a skill, you can begin working on the next
one. The activities your child completes at home should be recorded in the
homework composition book and turned in on Fridays.
Skills
Suggested Activities/Examples
Reading
Phonemic Awareness- Phonemic awareness is the ability to notice, think
about, and work with the individual sounds in words.
1. Rhyming Word Activities Children identify words that
rhyme in a series of activities.
Rhyming Word Activities


"Put your thumbs up if these two
words rhyme--pail-tail or cowpig?" or "Finish this rhyme, red,
bed, blue,__(two)______."
Rhyming words in songs, poems, and
books. As you do shared reading with your
child, pause at the end of phrases and
have your child supply the rhyming words.
2. Syllable Segmentation - Children
participate in a series of
activities that help them realize
that words are made up of
syllables.
Syllable Segmentation



3. Sound Isolation - Children
identify the beginning, middle,
and ending sounds in words.
4. Blending- Say the sounds of a
word and have your child blend
the sounds to guess the word.
"Can you count the syllables or
the word parts in football?" (2)
Have children clap for each
syllable you say.
Begin with two or three syllable
words and build up to longer
words with more syllables:
airplane
air
plane
2
table
ta
ble
2
porcupine
por
cu
pine
3
Sound Isolation

"What is the beginning sound in
nose?" "What is the ending sound
in pig? "What is the sound you
hear in the middle of cat?"
Blending

"I Say It Slowly, You Say It Fast"
Game. Explain that you will say
the sounds in a word slowly. Child
says it fast.
Example: Parent says "/c/-/a//t/” slowly, child says "cat.".

Play “Guess My Mystery Word”
game. Parent slowly says sounds
to a mystery word and the child
has to blend the sounds to guess
the word.
5. Segmentation – Tell your child a
word and have them separate the
sounds they hear. For example
you say bat and your child should
say “/b/ /a/ /t/”.
Letter sounds – The students should
know what sound each letter makes.
Segmentation

Rubber Band Stretch
1. Parent models with a large rubber
band (or a pretend rubber band)
how to stretch out a word as the
word is said. /mmmmmmmm/aaaaaaaaaaaa-/nnnnnnnnn/
2. Parent models with stretched out
band how to bring rubber band
back to original length and says
the word fast: /man/.
3. Children pretend to stretch
rubber bands as they say the
sounds in different words.

Have the child play the role of
the parent in “Guess My Mystery
Word” game. This time the child
slowly says sounds to a mystery
word and the parent has to guess.

Use the phonics song to help
teach your child the letter sound.

Letter names - The students should
know the name of each letter.



You can create flash cards with
the letters to help your child
learn the letter names.
Create two sets of alphabet
letters and play “Go Fish”.
While reading books, point to a
letter and ask your child to say
the letter name.
CVC words – The students should be
able to read CVC (consonant-vowelconsonant) words such as dog, cat, beg.


High Frequency Words –
Kindergartners should know 30 High
Frequency Words and the First graders
should know 100 High Frequency Words.
With the alphabet flash
cards, make a CVC word.
Then switch the beginning,
middle or ending sound to
create a new word. For
example, start with mat,
then switch the m to b to
spell bat.
While reading to your child,
stop at the CVC words and
have them sound out the
word.
A list of the words and creative ways to
practice words is attached to the
packet.
Digraphs- The students readwords with
digraphs: sh, ch, th, ng, wh. (Fish, chin,
that, song, when).

Go on a “digraph search” in
magazines or books. Have
them find the digraph, read
the word and then record it
in their homework book.
Consonant Blends -The students read
words with consonant blends such as
flip, trip, crab.

Go on a “consonant blend
search” in magazines or
books. Have them find the
digraph, read the word and
then record it in their
homework book.
Along with focusing on strategies to develop phonics skills,
we encourage students to read or be read to each night.
Writing
1. Have your child draw a picture.
2. Draw a picture and write beginning sound. For example, if your child drew a
cat they should try writing a “c”.
3. Draw a picture and write beginning and ending sound. For example, if your
child drew a cat they should try writing a “ct”.
4. Draw a picture and write beginning, middle, and ending sound. For example,
if your child drew a cat they should try writing a “cat”.
5. Draw a picture and write a sentence. Try to incorporate High Frequency
Words, spaces, capital letters and ending punctuation. For example, if your
child drew a cat they should try writing “I see a cat”.
6. Write multiple sentences using descriptive words, High Frequency Words,
spaces, capital letters and ending punctuation, “I see a cat. The cat is orange
and white. My cat likes to run.”
Math
By the end of the year the students should be able to:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Count from 1-30 (K) or 1-100(1st)
Recognize numbers 1-30 (K) or 1-100 (1st)
Write numbers 1-30 (K) or 1-100 (1st)
Numeral Dictation- Write numbers out of order when dictated
Use concrete objects to determine the answers to addition and subtraction
problems (for two numbers that are each less than 10). (K)
6. Know the addition facts (sums to 20) and the corresponding subtraction
facts and commit them to memory. (1st)
Here are some suggestions that can be adapted to teach
math at home:

Look around your home for
numbers of things. Find a
number between 10 and
100. Write the number.
Draw a picture that shows
where you found it, or
explain it in words.

Create three different
patterns. Extension:
Describe the pattern (red
blue red blue =ABAB, red
blue green red blue green =
ABCABC)

Gather a small handful of
pebbles, beans, rice grains,
or any other small common
objects. Sort them and
compare quantities. Then,
gather a few of each pile
and put them together.
How many do you have in
your new pile? Do this 5
times.

Go on a hunt. Find three
things that are longer than
your foot. Find three
things that are shorter
than your foot. Use the
attached sheet to record

Print a worksheet from the
website: www.mathdrills.com. You can practice
addition or subtraction.

Count the letters in the
names of people at home.
Talk about whose name has
the least or most letters.
Extension: First grade
students might include
first and last names, street
names, city/country names,
etc.

Take a handful of coins.
Sort them into groups
based on their size.
Extension: Draw a picture
and write how many coins
are in each group. First
grade write a complete
sentence.

Write 2 numbers between 1
and 50. Circle the number
that is less than. Repeat
this 10 times using two
different numbers each
time.
what you found.

Find a few small objects
around the house. On a
blank piece of paper, draw
the objects and label how
many you counted.
Extension: Make two piles
with your objects. Count
how many are in each pile
and compare them using <,
greater than >, less than <,
or equal to =.


Phonemic awareness activities are from: http://teams.lacoe.edu/
Write four addition number
stories. Draw pictures
and/or write the number
sentence to solve your
number stories.
Ex: There are 10 birds in
the tree. Five came. How
many birds are in the tree?
10 + 5 = 15