You don’t have to dedicate much time studying the syllabus. Children of this age tend to have little attention capacity and learn more through games and pragmatic activities. Arrange to devote a little time every day for learning, for physical exercises, and also for activities related to music and art. The most important thing is to diminish the time spent in front of the TV or the computer.

Read to your children on a daily basis or teaching new adjectives, like adjectives that start with a. Go through the books several times, this will help the child to start memorizing the stories and, step by step, he will make progress in the recognition of words, and consequently, in reading. Choose simple books which use and repeat short words that the child can quickly learn how to read. Then read bigger, more complex books, to teach the child to focus on longer stories.

Each day, pick a letter from the alphabet on which to focus, for your child to practice his observational skills. Select the aliments, books and activities that start with the chosen letter, so that your child will see and hear that sound for the entire day. Watch how many things –starting with this letter– he can find or think of.

Choose a number a day, that your child must learn. Start by counting up to that number, and jot down the symbol and the word for that number. For breakfast, count as many pieces of cereal as the chosen number requests, propose him to run around the yard that many times, or take a walk and pick that number of flowers or leaves.

Make these exercises part of his normal daily activities. Teach your child the colors when you’re sorting clothes for washing, teach him mathematics (units of measurement) while you are cooking, money and nutrition when doing shopping at the grocery store. You have to involve him in everything you do, because kindergarten children love to do activities specific for the adults, like cooking or shopping.

Ask him questions. While you are taking a walk with your child, ask him what he thinks about the animals he sees, where they live and what they eat. Ask about the weather and the seasons of the year, and what things are necessary for different periods throughout a year. Talk to him about the holidays in every season, so he will learn what to expect at different times of the year.

Do practical lessons with your child. Make experiments by putting ice cubes in a bowl, and explain how the melting time depends on the temperature. Pick a cube of ice with a piece of string, by pouring salt on it. Let him mix watercolors by himself, and see how many nuances he can create; this way, he learns about how colors work. Mix a drop of vinegar with food coloring, then try to blend it with oil in a white or transparent container. First, ask him questions about the results he thinks you would obtain. Then perform the experiment and explain to him what really happened: this is the process of scientific experiments.

Try out different art projects, like pages that can be colored, or handicrafts that your child can create. Talk about the colors, shapes and lines. Offer him a variety of materials, including construction paper, finger paint, watercolors and clay. Show him pieces of art wherever you go.

Make music a part of his daily life, as much as possible, by combining it with other activities. Play CDs as often as you can, and exercise singing and dancing on the songs. Choose different types of music and ask your child how each one of them makes him feel. Get the children instruments like drums, xylophones, keyboards, bells or a tape recorder that they can play with whenever they want.

1. Read to your child:

You have to start reading stories to your child from the time he/she is a newborn: it will become a moment of special bonding for both of you, and it will develop his/her love for books. If children don’t appreciate reading from an early age, their capacity for this activity will be lower in the future.

Everybody can decide what to read to their children, but we recommend reading them three or four books a day when they are small. After they grow up, I advise reading for about twenty minutes a day.

2. Ask them questions:

Asking questions to children (when they are two or three years old) while reading them a book, stimulates them and is very helpful in the development of their comprehension. Actually, there are many children who can read very fluidly but don’t understand what they are reading; and if they don’t, their reading is neither genuine, nor productive. The questions during reading should enrich their vocabulary and make the children interact with the book.

3. Offer a good example by reading yourself:

Even though your child may be fascinated by books from a very early age, his/her enthusiasm will decrease when realizing that nobody else reads in the house. If you don’t read regularly, you have to make an effort and read more often so that your son or daughter see that reading is something really important. Children need to see that their parents do read, otherwise they won’t pick up a book.

4. Teach them to identify the letters in natural ways:

By this, we refer, for instance, to wooden letters that are often hung on the walls of the children’s rooms. Many mothers and fathers explain that due to those letters, their child has learnt to spell his name, or his sibling’s. Using this visual and attentional memory, they can learn many other things, like reading time on the clock (which is much easier to do if there is a clock on the wall, for him/her to watch every day), or the numbers.

The fact that the child is learning the alphabet is very important, but we consider that the learning method that he/she uses to achieve this knowledge is even more important.

5. Combine different areas of development:

Children manage to learn better when they have many reasons to make an effort in this direction. This is why learning through practice and not so much through theory results in better and prolonged retentiveness. Once the child is familiarized with the alphabet, we must keep in mind that learning is less important than phonetics, that is, the way he/she sounds. We consider that it is necessary for the child to be involved in activities and games that exercise his/her gross motor skills. Other things that children enjoy as well are poems, songs and rhymes. We recommend that parents make a list of all the activities or games that their child likes most, in order to perform activities that suit them.

6. Organize books according to genre:

When the child is around 5 years old and can make the difference between reality and fiction, we can help him/her discern between different book types: reality-based stories, fantasy, science-fiction, music books, poetry books. When a child classifies a book to a certain literary category, he will start to remember its details, will make an effort to categorize it, and will have to remember other books that he had read, pertaining to the same genre. After having read the book, this won’t take the child more than ten seconds.

7. Word families:

Word families are composed of words that rhyme. Teaching children rhyming words is a phonological activity that helps them discern between different word patterns, which we consider is very important. Apart from learning about rhyming words, the children will also learn about language itself.

8. Phonic awareness:

Phonetics involve the skill of spelling the sound of each letter, as well as learning the rules of the language, and it is an important component of literacy (although it should never become the main point of interest). Learning phonetic rules has to be a tool through which the child learns to decipher and spell words, on his/her way to reading.

9. Decoding:

When we talk about decoding, we generally refer to “the uttered sound”. It is an important element in teaching children to read, although not the most important. Once the child knows all the sounds of every letter in the alphabet, he/she has to learn to put words together (from the shortest to the longest ones). This activity can sometimes be difficult, but it is important to teach them in a creative way, so that they will find the activity more enjoyable and less strenuous.

1. Frequent words:

The most frequently-used words in our language must be memorized by the child, so that he/she will become a good reader. Experts say that it benefits the child to make a list of such popular words for him/her to memorize.

 

The entire general information about APA format will be in accordance to the latest revised 6^th edition of the APA manual as prescribed by the American Psychological Association. It will feature all the important aspects that would be needed when writing a research paper. You will be provided with the overall format that a research paper should look like when utilizing APA format, as well as, guidelines in formatting a reference page, an APA title page, in-text citations, and footnotes/endnotes. Naturally, when you want to have an in-depth know-how on the APA writing style, you should check out the 6^th edition, second printing of APA’s Publication Manual.

General Instructions

The paper should be typed in a standard paper size which has an 11’ by 8.5’ measurement. It should have a 1’ margin on all sides. Also, it is important to utilize a font style that can be easily read. APA’s ideal font requirement is Times New Roman font style and 12 font size. In addition, your paper should have a Running Head, which should be included on top of each page. Running head or page header consists of the page number together with the paper’s title. The title should be written in capital letters. However, the running head should not go over 50 characters which include punctuations and spaces used. There are four major sections that comprise an essay paper namely: Title Page, Abstract/Summary, Main Body, and the Reference Page.

APA Title Page

An APA title page should present the following elements: the paper’s title, the name of the writer/author, and the institution where the author is affiliated. Also, the running head should be included in the APA title page as mentioned above. The header should be found in the left side of the paper while the page number is on the right part on the page’s topmost side.

When making your running head, there is a small difference between the header in the title page and the succeeding headers on every page of the paper. The running head for the APA title page should look in this manner:

 

Running head: PAPER’S TITLE

As to the running head of all the succeeding pages, they should look in this manner:

 

PAPER’S TITLE

 

You will notice that the term “Running head” is removed. This is the correct way to do this and this aspect is among the corrected parts of the latest 6^th edition, 2^nd printing APA Manual.

After taking care of the running head, you can now concentrate of the three elements of an APA title page.

 

Use both upper and lower cases when writing the title of the paper. The APA manual suggests that you do not use over 12 words as the title. There should no abbreviations and useless words. You can use one to two lines in writing the title and double-spaced.

Next, enter the writer’s name. It should be typed with the following arrangement: first name, middle initial/s, and the surname. Do not include title like Ph.D. or Dr. With regards to APA title page with multiple authors; arrange them alphabetically using the surname. Lastly, enter the institution’s or school’s name. This would reveal where the research has taken place

If you are required to alphabetically list all the sources you used in writing a paper, essay, article or research paper, then use the APA bibliography format. This is because some instructors would require students to pass an APA bibliography together with the paper. In case, you are not required to submit a bibliography, it is still best to create one for it can assist you in keeping track of all your references.

Basically, a bibliography such as the APA bibliography is somewhat same with a reference section of a paper. However, there are few differences between them. For instance, the reference section presents all the sources that were actually used in the paper while the bibliography page may add some sources that you have though of using but did not due to them being unrelated or obsolete.

So, if you are planning to create a bibliography using the APA format, you can follow the guidelines below:

The Bibliography should be started on a Fresh Page. Remember to separate your APA bibliography from the rest of your manuscript. Start it on a new page with the title “References” placed at the center.

Collect all the sources or references that you have utilized. Every source that you can possibly use in writing your paper should be gathered and compiled. Well, there might be some of them which may appear to be irrelevant while you are writing your paper but, at least in the end, it will be easy for you to make your reference section.

Each source used should have an APA Reference or citation. When using an APA bibliography format, you have to list the author’s last name in an alphabetical order and in double-spaced format. In addition, the first line of each source should be flushed on the left side while the second or third lines should be placed few spaces to the right of the left margin. This is known as hanging indent.

Each source should have an annotation. In the usual manner, a bibliography will just present the details of the references used by the writer. However, there are times when a writer decides to create an annotated bibliography. What is an annotation? Basically, it is a summary or an evaluation of a source.

So, while reading through each of your references, have some time to prepare a short annotation for each source. This annotation can be written in about 150 words and with the following contents: description of the source contents, your evaluation about the source credibility and describe how it is related to your subject matter. This will not only help you in determining which source is important but, it can also be an assessment guide for your instructor.

Finally, if you want to make your research or writing process easier, you should create an APA bibliography with the use of an APA bibliography maker. You will surely be having a hard time figuring out which details to include in your paper without an APA bibliography.

This is how an APA formatted Bibliography would look like:

References

21st century hunting rifle: the ambush 6.8 SPC redefines the “modern sporting rifle” concept. (2012, July 1).Guns Magazine, 5, 12-15

Austen, J., & Johnson, R. B. (1904).The novels of Jane Austen (Hampshire ed.). New York: George E. Croscup & Co..

Fanon, F. (1967). Black skin, white masks. New York: Grove Press.