Teachers who work with English as a Second Language learners will find ESL/ESOL/ELL/EFL reading/writing skill-building children's books, stories, activities, ideas, strategies to help PreK-3, 4-8, and 9-12 students learn to read.
Playing with Words
Is your child already enthusiastic about rhyming games, Scrabble, anagrams, or Pig Latin? Try adding a new kind of word game to your collection: riddles!
What is gray, has four legs, big ears, a tail, and a trunk?
A mouse going on vacation!
Riddles are an excellent way for kids to learn how to really listen to the sounds of words, understand that some words have more than one meaning, and how to manipulate words. Riddles also help build a rich vocabulary and strengthen reading comprehension. And finally, riddles are familiar and fun — a good incentive for thinking about words and reading. Here's how to get started with riddles:
Riddle books
There are lots of wonderful riddle books (see Reading Rockets' booklist). Dive into one and just start reading some of the riddles out loud — the questions and the answers. Talk about the structure of the riddle (question/answer) and why the answers make silly sense if you understand the multiple meanings of the words. Share your thinking about the word play to help your child understand the riddle more clearly. Riddle books are especially entertaining for family trips or long drives, and can inspire original riddle-making by parents and kids alike.
Homonym fun
Homonyms — words that sound the same but have different meanings — provide a great opportunity for word fun. Say a word out loud, and see if your child can generate more than one meaning for the word. For example:
ball: a round object used in games
ball: a fancy partymoose: the animal with antlers
mousse: a chocolate dessert
Word meaning and context
Show your child how to figure out what a word means by thinking about the words around it. For example, the word "school" can refer to your child's classroom or a group of fish. Once your child becomes aware of the double meaning of "school" he can start to appreciate or even invent riddles like this:
Why are fish so smart?
Because they swim in schools!
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Comments and Recommendations
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I am currently working towards my teacher certification by lateral entry and needed information on the Hispanic aspect of education. Our ESL teacher at my elementary school directed me to our school's ELL website. You are a link off that page. What a world of information I found!!! I ended up reading more than I needed to know, saved some of the books for children for my future reference, and kept a few other things as resources for me for later on. I was so impressed that I wanted to complement you on how easy to use yet in-depth your site is. I will check here often just to see what you have; very, very, very impressive!! Thanks so much!
~ Judy
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Colorín Colorado is a free web-based, bilingual service that provides information, activities, and advice for educators and Spanish-speaking families of English language learners (ELLs, also known as students of English as a second language).
Colorín Colorado is produced by Reading Rockets — an educational service of WETA, the flagship public broadcasting station in the nation's capital. Original artwork by Caldecott Award-winning illustrator David Diaz is used with permission.
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Colorín Colorado receives major funding from the American Federation of Teachers. Additional funding is provided by the National Institute for Literacy and the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs.
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