Select a center Reading the Story Dramatic Play Literacy Science and Math Art Sensory Motor Floor Play Table Play Outdoor Play Snack
	Sensorimotor Level [more on levels] Let the children at the sensorimotor level listen to the tape of the story. Add textured material for or color coding to the buttons to enable children to distinguish the “start” and “stop” buttons. Have a copy of The Kissing Hand taken apart, laminated, and put into a three-ring binder for these children. Add page fluffers (Styrofoam tabs) to the pages to make them easier to turn. This will enable all of the children to enjoy the book and be more independent in looking at the pictures. Write the notes for these children, but model writing the label, “letter for Mommy and Daddy.” Functional Level Everything mentioned for the sensorimotor level applies to children at the functional level as well. Children at the functional level, however, can become more involved in expressing themselves orally and through drawing or “writing.” They are beginning to see that their marks can represent something. Encourage these children to draw pictures or marks of any kind. Label them with their words. Encourage these children to listen to the audiotape. They can practice turning the pages in a sequence (even if the sequence is not matched to the words) as the story is read. Symbolic Level Children at this level are in one of many sublevels of emergent literacy development. You need to observe 1) the children’s level of understanding that the words hold the story and not the pictures, 2) their concepts of wordness and the constancy of words, 3) their discernment of the directionality of print, 4) their awareness that sounds make up words, 5) their grasp that print corresponds to words and sounds, 6) their level of understanding that sounds correspond to letters, and 7) their comprehension that sequence of sounds is important to meaning. You can then assist individual children in listening to sounds and patterns of speech, looking at the relationship of sounds to patterns in print, and practicing making marks that represent the sounds. As the children understand the function of print, they can begin to move into the understanding of the forms of print. Suggest that these children “read” the story into the tape recorder. They can then listen to themselves as they read the book again. Let the children write the letters to the parents, with suggestions from you.