Books, books and more books! For every topic that you want to learn about, you
can find a book on it. I love to introduce and review concepts with any books that
I can get my hands on! Every year when I introduced new books into our day, I
never gave wordless books much thought. It wasn’t until later on in my career
that I realized how powerful they were. Now I’m on a hunt to add even more of
them to my library! They lend themselves to multiple skills. So why should you
include them in your classroom? Keep reading on to find out!
Building Confidence
Entering school for the first time can be a vivid experience. Once you add in
everything that we ask students to do these days it can be completely
overwhelming. I have found that wordless books can build up the confidence
in each and every student in so many ways. A lot of times emergent readers
will shut down when they encounter words, and I always hear “I don’t know how
to read”.
Comprehension
Comprehension skills are extremely important and every reader needs the chance
to practice their skills. Wordless books give students the opportunity to do this.
They can actually focus on the story that is unfolding, as opposed to focusing on
the words. This is what students need when we are beginning to teach
comprehension. Students can sequence the events of a story, recall what has
already happened and they can practice their inferring skills.
Children can also practice their storytelling skills, because we all know that they have active imaginations!
Writing
When they are ready, another mini-lesson includes writing a sentence for what’s happening on the
page. Once you model new skills during writer’s workshop, then pretty soon you’ll have students
who are trying to incorporate it into their own writing!
