This week, the children will be using their knowledge of nouns and adjectives to create and write about a monster. To support this learning, we have chosen a monster themed poem to learn.
As well as developing fluency skills, we are teaching the children to add some prosody to their reading too. This simply means to read with expression. Prosody is taught through a variety of texts, not just stories.
On Friday, I (Mrs Freeman) read the text aloud and modelled using prosody and asked the children the following questions.
How have I changed my voice?
Why have I changed my voice and does it help us to understand the poem more?
Am I telling you about the character is an expressive/funny way?
Can you tell who is speaking? The monster or the reader?
Using prosody, gives early readers an insight into what reading for meaning should sound like. More importantly, it shows children how books can speak through readers, and how words on the page can come to life – which our monster poem certainly did!
By modelling this reading skill, children begin to learn how you can change the tone of a sentence simply by stressing different words and phrases.
After listening to me read, the class then echoed my prosody several times.
Help at home
Listen to this recording of the poem and discuss prosody with you child. Let me repeat back each line using expression.
Use prosody in your daily conversations. Emphasise certain words/phrases together.