Developing a Concept of Word with Emergent Readers

Hello from Comprehension Connection!  Today's post is aimed at the Emergent Reader and will hopefully provide some help and guidance for the Pre-Kindergarten and Kindergarten teacher.  The specific topic is how to develop a concept of word (COW) in young readers. I chose this topic after requesting input from my Facebook readers on the types of activities that are used in the regular classroom to work on this skill and how much time is devoted to it.  Interestingly, there were misunderstandings on exactly what Concept of Word meant.  Many understood it to be matching speech to print or being able to track.  However, Concept of Word is a bit more than this, and it is *the* sign that an emergent reader has become a beginning reader.  

What is a Concept of Word?

A Concept of Word (COW) is the culmination of a student's automatic knowledge of letter sounds, his/her ability to isolate the beginning consonant sound, match spoken word to the print and realizing that words are separated by space, and remember words in isolation that have been previously taught. A student's COW develops in stages.  

Developing Concept of Word

The student shows following at each stage:
1.  Has left to right directionality, but no word awareness. Writing looks like squiggles across page.
2.  Points along with stressed units (syllables or words, but does not differentiate).  Writing begins to include some letters, but they are random.
3.  Points to words and says syllables. Writing begins to include beginning sounds of words.

Rudimentary Concept of Word Development

The student is approaching the beginning reader stage when he/she:
4.  Points to words and begins to self correct when he/she gets off track. Writing now includes beginning and ending sounds, but may not include vowels.

Firm Development of a Concept of Word

The student has reached the beginning reader stage when he/she
5.  Demonstrates accurate tracking of print.  Writing includes space between words and short vowel words include beginning, middle, and ending sounds. The reader in the video below is not completely  firm, but very close.

How Can Teachers Work to Develop COW With Students?

The first step with Concept of Word Instruction is to teach the poem to the students.  They need to have the poem memorized, so that they can accurately match the memorized words to the print they see. Teachers can use pictures that represent the text or hand motions with common nursery rhymes and finger plays.

What follows is the fun part for me!  The best way to develop COW is by playing with words, sentences, and a large assortment of pointers.  I mean really...don't we all love swinging around a light saber once in a while??  The pointers in the greatest demand in my room are most definitely my light sabers, but magic wands are very popular too. I also recommend flyswatters of various designs. They are perfect for boxing individual letters or for finding sightwords.

When working with my kinders on pointing, I place a touch point under each word.  I discovered this tip when I downloaded freebies from Sparklebox.co.uk .  I downloaded short vowel word cards for a game that included a dot under each sound.  (perfect for blending, but that's for another post).  Anyway, I transferred that technique to developing COW.  As we continue to develop COW, I put my students more and more into leveled books.  I continue to use this strategy with projected books on Reading A to Z and with other powerpoint resources I've made.  If you are a primary teacher, Reading A to Z is a subscription that is well worth the price.   The projectable feature has been very beneficial to my students for modeling and practice, but there are many other resources for beginning readers available on the site.  You can explore that further {here}.


Matching words in isolation to words in context is another activity that fosters an understanding of print. Teachers can use different fonts with the word cards.  Using Dolch words with various games helps students to identify them in context too and helps students recognize when their tracking is off.

Marie Clay refers to Concept of Word as "Reading the White Space", and this activity has helped my students recognize this.  I model how to separate words by cutting between them like pulling apart puzzle pieces.  In fact, we often take the pieces, mix them up, and reorganize them to make the individual words become the line of the poem.

After we have worked a few days with the sentences strips and words in isolation, I transfer my students to the book form.  With the book form of the poems, I spend time on letter identification, sighword identification, using picture clues, and even comprehension.  The children enjoy highlighting, boxing, underlining, and marking with mini stickies features I ask.  In the pictures below, you can see where we highlighted sightwords (I normally call it, "I Spy" which means it's a game).  We also mark by boxing around the letters by name and sound.

Even though comprehension is the focus with instructional readers, emergent and beginning readers need modeling of comprehension skills too.  After all, as students begin to read, they need to understand the meaning in order to cross check their accuracy.  For beginning readers, the picture clues provide a support to this understanding.  Teachers can have students "read" the text and decide what is missing in the picture. Above, you can see the apple before coloring and after.  The apple in the picture needed to be colored in order to accurately match the print.  

For this picture, teachers might ask,
 "How can you tell she loves to eat apples?"

For this picture, the teacher might ask students
 to connect the picture to the words that describe it.

With my students, I typically work with a poem for a 3-5 days depending on the poem's difficulty. The last thing I do with my students is give them the poem on a single sheet.  We practice reading without the aid of touch points, highlights, boxes, etc.  I have them prepare the poetry page for their keepsake book, and as the year goes, the poems we use increase in difficulty.  Our kindergarten teachers use thematic teaching, so the poems I choose to use with my groups typically parallel what is happening in the regular classroom.  I do not use the same poems in my room though because I try to provide them with new experiences to build upon skills that are developing in the classroom.  Plus, new poems keep the learning fresh and fun.

If you'd like to add this poem to your COW collection, feel free to download your own copy using the image below which shows what is included.  I also have a yearly bundle for $20.00 that includes 39 COW sets.

Pin for Later:

Now, readers, it is your turn.  Please share the clever ways you work on these skills or any observations you have made with your students.  Have a great start to the school year, and thanks for visiting today.