The Literacy Hour What is the Literacy Hour?

The literacy Hour is a special period conducted during the school day and is designed for teaching literacy. During this time an attempt is made t help pupils to become highly competent in reading and writing also in speaking and listening. It is expected that pupils will develop specific skills and be able to gather information, think critically and communicate effectively. Five Big Ideas Phonemic Awareness, Phonics, Fluency, Vocabulary and Comprehension are the five areas of reading instruction that are focused on during the Literacy Hour.
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Phonemic Awareness Phonemic Awareness teaches children to notice, think about and work with sounds in spoken language. This activity helps pupils to understand that words are made up of speech sounds. Activities that can be used to develop this skill are: Recognizing individual sounds in words e.g. What is the first sound in the word man? Recognizing the same sound in different words e.g. What sound is heard in all of the following words - hat, him, hen. Recognizing the odd sound within a set of words e.g. Select the odd sound in the following words bus, bun, rug. Combining phonemes to form words e.g. What word can be formed from combining b/i/g Breaking up a word into separate sounds such as bag to b/a/g. Recognizing the word that remains when a phoneme is removed from another word, such as brake to rake. Adding a phoneme to an existing word to make a new word e.g. from room to broom. Substituting one phoneme for another to make a new word such as bet to let. Phonics Phonics is a method of teaching reading by associating letters and speech sounds. Phonics involves being able to read, pronounce and write words by associating letters and sounds. Teacher should include modeling of sounds and application of sounds learnt. Activities that can be used are: Providing practice with letter sound relationship in a predetermined sequence. Teaching the alphabet Converting letters into sounds and combining sounds to create a word.

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Examining parts of words and exploring letter sound relationship. Listening to stories also factual texts read aloud. Writing letters, words, messages and stories.

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Fluency Fluent reading is reading effortlessly, with speed accuracy and proper expression. Fluent reading helps readers gain meaning from what is read. Fluent readers recognize words and comprehend at the same time. Activities to develop this skill include: Practicing repeated and monitored oral reading or reading passages several times with guidance and feedback from the teacher. Providing children with models of fluent reading. (Teaching and parent should read aloud daily to children.)

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Vocabulary Vocabulary refers to the words that children know so tat they can communicate through speech or recognize words when listening or when these are in print. Vocabulary plays and important part in learning to read. There are four types of vocabulary listening vocabulary, speaking vocabulary, reading vocabulary and writing vocabulary. Activities to develop this skill include: engaging in oral language daily (learning word meanings through conversations with other persons) listening to adults read to them reading extensively on their own.

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Comprehension Comprehension Instruction ensures that pupils can demonstrate what they understand from what they read. Activities to develop this include: reading fluently retelling what is read responding to different kinds of questions about what is read, drawing pictures, stating whether statements are true or false.

Structure of the Literacy Hour The Literacy Hour begins with an Introduction to the days programme. This lasts for 7 minutes. Activities planned for the day and the objectives are discussed during this time. Phonemic Awareness is taught to the whole class for the next 15 minutes. This may include songs and rhymes. Phonics is taught for the following 15 minutes. During this period letter sounds are taught systematically. Small group activities involving guided and shared reading, drawing, tracing, writing and vocabulary development activities are done. The final session of the Literacy Hour is called Reflection. During this time there is teacher/pupil discussion about what was done and what was learnt. The teacher uses this information to improve future lessons.