| What is a Morning Message? |
| I have adapted the Morning Message from the Building Blocks program which is the kindergarten version of the Four-Blocks Model by Patricia Cunningham. The morning message always begins and ends the same: (Date) Dear Class, Today is (day of the week). Insert idea here. I love you! Name In the beginning of the year, I model the morning message and it does not contain the idea. I simply write what day it is. In the beginning we are learning that letters form words, words have meaning and print has functions. I begin right away talking about capital letters at the beginning of the sentence and periods at the end, even though the concept is beyond most beginning kindergartners. We use our framing hands and space men to figure out where words begin and end. We learn top to bottom, left to write. We discuss beginning and ending sounds in words. We count how many words we have used and we read what we have written. I continue this daily until I feel the class is comfortable with what I am doing and that they show they are beginning to understand. Next, I will continue to write the message, but an idea is added. I am modeling the writing process as I do this. I "think aloud" as I write and I ask the children to help me. We continue to use our framing hands and space men. We are still counting words. We continue to discuss sounds that we hear. Next, I ask a different child each day to dictate to me what to write in the idea part. By this time, the children pretty much know where a word begins and ends. We are still working on all the above mentioned concepts, only now I begin to identify a few sight words like and, is and the. Each child looks forward to his her day to share something for the morning message. After each child has had a couple of opportunities to dictate the message, I then begin sharing the pen. I make the message an interactive writing process by asking children to write parts of the morning message. At this point we are really listening for beginning and ending sounds and we are practicing developmental writing by stretching what we hear. We begin at this point to also talk about the difference in punctution between asking sentences and telling sentences. At this point we are not counting words anymore because it is a task that we have mastered. When the children eagerly demonstrate enthusiasm for wanting to share the pen, I begin to have each child write their own morning message. Children begin to write their own morning message with me modeling what to do. They write their own ideas. The are really developing a sense of top to bottom, left to right. By now we have had many words of the week and are starting to fill our word wall. We talk about writing strategies, for example, what do you do when you don't know how to spell a word. The children ususally begin with sentences like, "I love Mom" or "I like my friends". When children are feeling comfortable using unlined paper, I ask them to write the message on lined paper. It is at this point each child begins to work individaully at his or her own level. Because they are writing what they want, the writing becomes more meaningful. Once we reach this level of writing, the morning message becomes more of journal writing. We usually finish up the year at this level. We continue to practice developmental writing and I always ask what comes at the beginning and the end on a sentence. I am always supporting every attempt at writing because I know how important it is for children to believe that they are writers. I encourage developmental writing because research has shown that children who write what they hear and are not caught up in spelling, tend to write more creatively and take more risks with the words they use. The morning message is one way I support writing in kindergarten. |