Young children don't wake up one morning suddenly ready to read. The foundations develop over time as children talk, listen, play with sounds, encounter books and print, notice letters, connect sounds with letters, tell stories, draw, dictate, and experiment with writing.

This session translates research on early literacy development into engaging, developmentally appropriate practice for children ages 3–5. Participants explore the progression from oral language to sound awareness, from sound awareness to increasingly precise attention to speech sounds, from noticing print to understanding its purposes, and from drawing and mark-making to increasingly recognizable writing.