TSBVI Coffee Hour: Literacy for Little Ones 04/12/2021 >> Welcome, he everyone. While we wait, some of you know the drill. Go to your chat box and there is a little drop menu that says all panelists or attendees or actually we want it to say all panelists and attendees and that's not the default so you will need to change it. That way as you make comment or ask a question, everybody can see you, what you have to say. We would like to be as interactive as possible in the chat so please make sure it says all panelists and attend gleez the little drop down menu. If you would like to in the chat, let us know where you are joining from, that is always fun to see. Albuquerque, Illinois, okay, Nova Scotia,. >> Texas. We have a few people from Illinois today. Welcome, Illinois. >> Arizona, Kansas. >> Amarillo. >> >> Start thinking about which one of these people you want to connect with for vacation, okay? >> Okay. >> I was going to say Jessica in Ruidoso, I have like ancestors there. My great, great grandfather built the mill that actually burned down a few years ago. >> Yeah. >> I am pretty wild about any part of New Mexico. >> Wow. >> -- rancho, New Mexico. >> We just talked to somebody today in Rio rancho, New Mexico, what a small world. All right. Let's go ahead and get started. We have got some announcements for all of you. I will turn you over to Kathi and Deb I can't, Debra, again, welcome everyone, we are excited to share the next hour with you. As I was saying as you all came in, if you have a question or comment during the presentation, please go ahead and post that in the chat box. Make sure that that little dropdown menu says all panelists and attendees. Your microphones and cameras are automatically muted so you don't need to worry about that. The handout for today's session will be shared in the chat for immediate viewing and will also be available for later viewing, along with the recording of this and past coffee hour sessions. And you can find that on our coffee hour web page at .TSBVI.edu-coffee hour, once there on the 0 page you can scroll down and it will tell you how to get to the archives. To obtain your CEOs, CEU or professional development credit you will respond to evaluation that will be sent to you from our registration website, ESC works and enter the codely give you at the end of today's session. And then that certificate will automatically generate upon completion of that evaluation. >> There is no opening code, just the cloading code. We will stop the presentation at 355, five minutes to the hour to give you that code as well as some announcements. So really, happy to introduce today's presenters. >> We have Kathi Garza and Debra style, both here from .TSBVI to talk to us about literacy for little ones. >> Ready? >> Ready. >> Let's do it. >> Hey. >> Hi. I am Debra Sewell. I am the curriculum director at Texas school for the blind and visually impaired. And Kathi Garza is with our outreach program early childhood infant outreach teacher. >> The other two people who typically do this presentation with us are not here today, so you are just going to have to put up with me and Kathi. >> The -- one of those persons is CYRAL Miller .. who is an outreach teacher and Rene Ellis, and early childhood teacher without reach as well .. RENEE Ellis. So we are so happy to have all of you here. >> Thank you so much for attending. And we will give you a little background information about the literacy for little ones program training that we have been doing? That first bullet says reading does not come naturally and I would like to clarify that. >> For many of our students who are blind and visually impaired reading doesn't come naturally. >> All of our cited students are seeing print everywhere they go. So our tactical learners need specifically designed instruction and intention malstrategies for early, early reading. >> Reading success, especially for tactile reading is the culmination of many, many, many experiences and lots and lots of skill development. Stakeholders several years ago saw a feed for early literacy training and we decided we would try to step in and fill that gap just a little bit. >> Because we have recognized as a field that a lot of times our tactile learners are expected to have gotten all of that wealth of knowledge and information as their sighted peers by the time they come to prekindergarten and kindergarten and as we know that is not often the case so we are hoping that this training will fill in some of those gaps >> This is a training training we have been doing. Serial and I have been doing this in my new position in outreach. So hopefully in this session you will find out about the program and kind of how it is structured and why, but also you will get some little nuggets about early literacy and why it is important and how you can support it on your own. But again, you know, this is coming from a training that we typically do, which covers motor skills, it covers several different areas in the training. And one of the big ones is motor skills, gross and fine motor skills and tactile skills which are all important in early literacy development and so that is something that we typically cover of. This training is for you know, teachers and their family and families and so we talk a lot about that there concept development is probably Debra and I are boxing back and forth about who gets to talk about this because we both really like this topic. And so that is also infused into the programming when people have the literacy for little ones training. Language acquisition has now kind of been -- is being infused into all of these other areas as well. Because it is really applicable in -- it really is intertwined with motor skills and concept development becoming aware of oral and written language and how they can support and facilitate the development of literacy skills. The other area that we focus on in this training is emergent reading. It is emergent writing and reading skills. So what can you do to help develop those skills in young children. So early literacy, in literacy for little ones we talk about how literacy begins at birth and continues as a young child develops. It encompasses ability to communicate, listening to words, communicating your needs and communicating your needs even if it is not verbally. We talk about sensory awareness, giving -- in the sense that we encourage people to give the child rich experiences that will give meaning to language that is heard and maybe later read, you know, in text. We talk about variable and/or tactile discrimination skills. Those are things you can work on as a part of early literacy. Not just specifically visual or tactile discrimination skills related to print or pictures but -- or print or Braille but also even just using your have vision and tactile skills in other areas. In those sensory rich hands on experiences. And then an awareness of books, print or Braille and their purpose. So that's all of that emergent reading early literacy book awareness, print a wairnts is important in those early stages as well. So going into emergent literacy it is definitely a journey. And, again, you know, it starts at birth, and so emergent literacy refers to the period in a child's life from birth until formal reading and writing begin. So it is all of this stuff they get to do before you give them a Braille writer or a pencil and paper or a flare marker and paper. Young children develop knowledge and skills gradually and so they emerge into literacy. And then you know, we like to talk about on this slide is think about all of the literacy skills you have already used today. Maybe even just logging into this coffee hour session. But you know, it covers related knowledge and skills of literacy, sensory experiences of all kinds, concepts and relate possible electrocab layer so when they start reading words and communication symbols they can be linked with the meaning. And access to a variety of materials is really important as well. So what does a child need to become literate to read and write with meaning? They need access and exposure to a wide variety of meaningful experiences which I think we already talked about in the last two slides as well. Those sensory rich experiences that are -- where you have infused purposeful and intentional language. To help them build concept awareness about objects in their world. Opportunities to explore their world and experiences that link words to meaning. We talked about that. Man, I said all of these bullets after just talking about the first bullet. I am seeing some re-- so I am repeating myself here. But knowledge about language and how language works and the turn taking involved in language. And this enalso for our kids they also need really purposeful and intentional instruction about letters and maybe even letter sounds as well. Because it is not going to be as readily available, especially if the child is using Braille because Braille is not always everywhere. Okay so now we are going to dive into all of those topics in a little more detail. The first topic that we typically cover in literacy for little ones training is motor development and as Cathy said earlier, one of the earlier -- one of the early foundations of literacy is the motor skills and they include gross motor. Fine motor and tactile discrimination. What we go back one more. >> Yes. >> That's okay. When we think of literacy. We typically think of reading and writing, but for our kids, it is so much more than just reading and writing. And we wanted to make sure that motor development, the motor skills developed was included in this training. Because, again, that is not always, oh, yeah, motor skills. That's what we are going to think about when we think about literacy. Motor skills follow a typical sequential development. And they build on each other to provide a very solid and strong foundation for literacy for our low vision and blind students. And we also want to emphasize here on this slide that it is a perfect, perfect opportunity for you to consult with and collaborate with your motor people. With your OTs and your PTs and your APEs. So don't forget to do that as well. Okay. The next slide is again a little bit more about motor skills. And the importance of motor skills related to literacy development. In general, movement is a critical foundation of learning. Think about those kids who are just learning to roll over. You know, they develop their arm a, their arm, trunk and leg control, develop their head control, and now they are starting to roll over so they -- that is critical foundation for them to then develop and build on those motor skills. The second bullet says that movement builds muscle memory and promotes motivation, curiosity and exploration. And that is oh so very true. I really love the third bullet too because it says moving with others develops social skills. And I know this is not about the development of social skills. This is about early literacy, but is that just huge? Because when we connect with others 0 and move with others and understand that movement is a critical foundation of learning it really and truly does develop those social skills. And as part of this we have got to evaluate their motor skills. You know, we want you to be able to have activities that encourage movement but those activities are going to vary based on the child's evaluation and current level of functioning. So it is not on this slide but I really want to talk about the importance of evaluation because we can't provide activities if we don't know where students are functioning. And some of the things that we talk about, some of the evaluation tools we talk about when we talk about. Literacy for little ones is the -- project is one of those. There is a seventh edition of the orc project coming out this summer which is mostly online. But there is a great motor skill section in the organ -- Oregon project. There is a motor skills section in the prebraille evaluation from the eval kit. It is fine motor skills and tactile skills. One of the really wonderful things to evaluate motor skills now, as the pretty new publication called Texas two steps and I know that it is an O and M curriculum and evaluation. But it is really critical and has wonderful, wonderful objectives in the evaluation tool for gross motor skills. So we also have to help families understand the importance of motor skills and give them you know, the activity ideas and coach them through those ideas. And we also need to help them to understand the importance of getting their kiddos moving. So the next slide is truly about gross motor skills. And the importance of gross motor skills to literacy development. So you know, why should we be working on gross motor skills you ask yourself as a TVI. That is the O and M's job. That's the OTE's job, that's the PT's job. And yes, it is those other people we have to work with. But gross motor skills also contribute to the VI skills kids need, not just the VI skills as well. Because there is that, as that first bullet states, gross motor development is crucial to knowing where we are in space. And gross motor development provides for the stability that kids need for sitting and for movement. So just imagine a child being able you know, concentrating on maintaining their poor stability and using all of all of their energy to maintain their core stability. So learning is difficult at best, if not you know, completely impossible. So I just want you to think, just imagine for a moment that you are going to close your eyes. You are going to stand on one foot and you are going to concentrate on learning a new skill while you are doing that. I don't think I can even close my eyes and stand on one foot. But think about that because that is kind of what our kids are going through. You know, they are maintaining, they are trying to maintain their core stability. And then we are saying, okay, now, here let's read this Braille. Or you know, here, let's ran pass this and you are going to have all of the fine motor skills to do that. So I think we have to really make sure we as TVIs and COMMs know these gross motor skills are really a crucial part of our can kiddos' lives. And fine motor skill. Fine motor expwils is the next slide. And it talks about the importance of fine motor skills to literacy development. And that is pretty much of a given. That is not quite as big of a stretch in my opinion as the gross motor development but the development of fine motor skills is find to the development of gross motor skills. We always learn first gross motor skills and then fine motor skills. So in is just sort of our reiterate -- reiteration of that in this training. And also developing the second bullet says developing and refining finger strength and dexterity that may be needed for Braille writing and reading. What we do in this training is we take them through a lot of. We take them through a lot of finger strength activities and how those things can also be found, evaluations and activities for fine motor skills, it can be found again in the Oregon project and in the prebraille evaluation from the evals kit from the Texas two steps curriculum. Also from the Perkins activity and resource guide and from a new product that is being created and developed at the school for blind right now called the tactile learning profile:there is a group called the progression of tactile learning committee. And we are creating a tactile learning profile. There will be a coffee chat on Texas two steps on the 15th of this month and a coffee chat on the 22nd of this month to discuss the tactile learning profile. So you all make sure that you tune in to those two to have a little more information about those. >> Okay. Next slide. So basically, connecting motor to literacy. Experiences with movement, develop and expand concepts and develop and expand those motor skills. Concepts support understanding of the world and an increased -- and an increased understanding of the world makes reading and writing a lot more fun. It makes literacy a ton of fun. We are going to talk before we go on to concepts a little something we call the hierarchy of tactile skills. And basically, what reiterates is that object and graphic recognition should develop from concrete to abstract. First of all, you really need to work with real object, real objects, real objects, and only after they have gained informs and are able to function and understand concepts with real objects do you go on to the next step which is optic representations. And again you have got to have enough experiences with real objects before you go on to the object representations. So let's just talk about spoons, because there is a graphic on your PowerPoint that is from the kit setting the stage for APH, a sound there is a spoon and then there is a graphic representation of spoon and then there is the word spoon written in Braille with a raised S. So let's think about teaching kids about spoons. If you want to start teaching them about spoons, use real spoons. Use metal spoons, wood spoons, plastic spoons. So they get the idea of spoonness and -- so once they have that idea of spoonness, they need to know what it feels like. They need to know what it is made out of, the different parts of it and how -- and the really important thing is you know, I think a lot of times what I did in my early career is I thought, thoughtness intoly label there spoon and talk about this spoon. And I didn't really always talk about the function of the spoon. You know, we have got it is metal and smooth, it is smooth and hard but now what do we do with the spoon? So that is part of creating those tactile skills and that spoonness. You know, what do you do with the spoon? You eat with the spoon. You stir with the spoon. You bang on the table with a spoon. You might hit your little brother with pa spoon but we don't really want to promote that. But you also have to though what you do with a spoon. And so that again is all part of that hierarchy with the real spoons and then you can go to the object representations of a spoon. Then and only then do you go to the graphic anticipations. So you have got do representations. You have a to spend must have time in the object representation statements before the graphic representations of two-dimensional, solid embossed shapes, outlines of objects and raised lines will make any sense to students in their path to literacy. All right. Now we are going move on to talk a little bit about the concept development. Another area that we cover extensively in literacy for little ones. And this is -- I love this graphic, it comes from the like on old fable story about the elephant. It is an elephant and it has got several people at different parts of the elephant exploring different parts of the elephant trying to understand what it is. And so, you know, the guide at the tusk is saying it is a spear and at the guy at the trunk saying it is a snake and the guy at the tail is like it is a rope. And so they are all trying to understand what it is, which is exactly what our students typically experience that part too whole, part 0 to whole learning because they don't have, maybe they don't have the visual skills to see things that are incidental in nature. Or learn things incidentally. So this kind of connects to what Debra was talking about. She talked about this idea of concrete to abstract. So you 0 have a picture of a little guy here and she holding a, holding a fish he presumably caught. So he is understanding -- you know, he knows what it feels like. He knows how it -- maybe how it moves, maybe he experienced it moving at a time and now it is maybe not moving. I don't know. But he can explore the different parts of the fish. He knows what it smells like, how big it is. But you know, there is so much you learn about -- we joke like that spoonness and fishness, you know. Because there are obviously fish that are bigger, fish that smaller, and if you have vision you can see all of that very readily in books and on TV or even maybe experience it if you go on a fishing trip. And so we want to make -- we always want to make sure we are using really sensory rich hands on experiences for our students, because this is how they develop the -- those concepts of this is what a fish is before you show them a picture of a fish. Then when they see that picture or they maybe touch that tactile symbol or whatever, they can -- their brain can activate all of that prior knowledge about their experiences with the fish. And then of course you -- it is easier do love on to the word fish. We have a picture of a word fish here, because they have all of that prior knowledge and understanding about that concept. But a lot of times we, you know -- I know this program -- this training series focuses on you know, very little young children, but as I am sure you guys have experienced you get students who are -- it is that component of literacy where you 0 are talking about vocabulary and you know, you are expecting them to read the word, this word or that word and maybe you find that they really don't have the concepts behind it to understand what it is. So I always am interested when people are doing reading inventories on their students, and the stories about a soccer game or about a bite or about a rocket ship. Or maybe some things our students have not had the opportunity to appearance or to see and really understand. You know, I had a kid tell me one time, oh, well I didn't know that because I didn't even know what a kite was. So it is kind of like you know, just paying attention and not taking for wanted they are going to just know, understand the picture or the word. You know, obviously, in an ideal world you are teaching from concrete to abstract. But it is also really nice if people can figure out what abstract concept it is kiddos don't have when they see a word or a picture. And then kind of bridge back to help them gain that. >> Cathy, could I break in here for just a second? Someone in the chat asked about what would be an example of an object representation of a spoon versus a graphic. So back on that other slide, you can tell that that graphic would be the raised line graphic or maybe an outline of it. You know, spoons are probably a little bit harder to do an object representation of because they are all attached -- You know, the circular part is attached to the handle part. So that would be a little bit more difficult to come up with an object representation of a spoon. But you could probably he use like a spoon from a kids tea set would kind of be a representation. Probably a better example, silverware is going to be all attached. So a piece of that object is going to be harder for silverware but like for a towel a piece of a towel or a piece of a washcloth would be an object representation. So I hope that answer made a little bit of sense. >> And Sally garlic commented, hi, Sally, I haven't seen Gloucester a long time. About the gross motor skills, sorry, the -- we always think about gross motor skills for multiple my impaired kids but it is nice to widen that consideration to all of our 0 students as well. So thanks for that comment. Okay. Sorry. >> And totally, because I you know, I was an academic student with a visual impiermt and let me tell you, maybe I am just uncoordinated, but I had some difficulties with some gross motor skills you know, too. And my mom used to say I should have made your middle name grace, maybe you wouldn't be tripping and falling so much. So, yeah, I think everybody. And even the fine motor, you know, I think it is not uncommon for us to have students you know, and I am sure you guys do too, students who are in middle to upper elementary and can't open packages or you know, or manipulate bread ties or things like that. And it is just I think a lot of it is a lack of exposure. And as a parent, I am always trying to tell myself for my own kid, just let him do it. Let him struggle with it for a while because he will figure it out. This feeds into typical learning or typically sighted child, I don't know if there is a typical can child but a typically sighted child, this is a graphic of a triangle. And the majority of the triangle, you can look at the handout where I filled out the percentages. Because it is hot direct, easy percentages, but I made a guess. But the majority of this triangle is shaded in a color that represents incidental learning. So for 10cally sighted, typically sighted kids .. much of what they learn comes from learning or acting on their world 0. Or observing their world around them or being able to act on something they have observed in their world. Little of what they are learning you know, direct learning, like we see in schools and secondary learning is important. But the majority of what they learn answer incidentally. In their days. And for a child with a visual impairment on this slide the graphic has been slipped basically displipped upside down. And the flipped upside down. And the majority of what our students learn comes from their exposure to direct instruction or direct learning. Because visually they can't access a lot of incident things. They don't see people -- maybe even people with low vision, you know, seeing those facial expressions or social cues or sometimes I can't see if people's eyes are glazed over so I have no idea if they are bored with my conversation or not. But you know, a lot of it for our kiddos comes from direct instruction, which is why it is so important to have no. Sensory rich hand a on meaningful, purposeful experience force our kids so -- because they are at a disadvantage for not being able to learn incidentally. And having to learn things in a part to whole way like an elephant. There is, being able to understand the concept of a car or a plane or things that are too big to bring into the classroom. You know, they are learning about those things in bits and pieces. And sometimes they need a lot of support to kind of put them together to have a complete understanding. And then you know, the last part of this is just that concepts are everywhere. You teach about concepts even just transitioning from the classroom to your little supply closet. You might have to teach them in or in the home, families can teach about concepts. And so the picture on this slide is of some young toddlers who are walking, going through a walk of where they are stepping into tubs. That are lined up with different objects and materials and items in them:and they are experiencing what those things are and they are having the opportunity to learn at. Learn about maybe warm and cool and soft and scratchy and rough and all of the different kind of textures in there. And so here we have this stair step graphic again where we are talking about connecting concept cans to literacy. So with experiences that help develop and expand the concepts that our kids have access to. And then understanding about concept accounts support an understanding of your world and like Debra said when you understand. Your world when you have an increased understanding it make reading and writing a lot more fun. >> Cathy can I at one comment real quick? >> Always. >> When we think of concepts. When I taught years and years ago it was like oh concepts, we are going to teach concepts that means big little, up down, in, out, it is more than the spatial concepts as Cathy is saying. Kathy. It is all of to temporal concepts. It is qualify if the, the comparative concepts and quantitative. The concepts for amounts. So it is not just up, down, in, out, big, lit. Concepts is a huge, huge area. >> And so then we also, as mentioned we also cover in this training we talk a lot about language. And we you know, ask, are language and communication the same thing? So we talk to people about you know, the difference between language and what is actually communication. And we get down into the specifics of using meaningful and purposeful language so that we are not giving kids a lot of empty language. That they are really capable of repeating back but maybe don't have those underlying concepts for like the fish door spoon. Fish or the spoon. It is interesting, even typically sighted or typically developing children, my son uses words all the time that I am like. Sometimes I am super impressed and then he is like, what does that mean? I don't know. He heard it in context somewhere and repeated it back so our kids can be similar to that. Especially students who maybe have echo laically a and repeating the script that's have heard .. So languge acquisition is super critical for young children's development and it is a essential key for learning not just literacy but in any subjects:it is important for communication and for building language, relationships and, you know, we talk about language acquisition in terms of their receptive and expressive language. So -- which is kind of what I was just saying. What do they understand and what can they give back out to you. >> and then it is a tool to help children make sense of the world around them. So by having you know, good reliable language they can start to explain what is going on around them and understand that. And also to inquire about it,, you know. Debra. >> So, we have in this training, we talk about those motor skills and the importance of those motor skills. And how to evaluate them and how to find activities to support the motor skills and the concept development and the language acquisition. And the last topic that we discussed typically in this training is the emergent reading and writing piece. And as you can see on the slide there are -- there is a box for a book bag. For real objects to be put into that box to talk about an activity. And there is also a book that has real objects in it. And again, when you are thinking about this he her subsequent reading and writing think about, refer back to the hierarchy and think about the real object pieces before you go on to the object representationations. And then to the graphic reputations so a lot of times our kids don't always have real object books and so we need make sure. All of our people that are working with our students, our families and our OTs and our PTs understanding that they need those real. Object books and book bags before they can go on to the tactile representations of those things, so I think we have time that I would like for you all to. In the chat, let's just say what would be some real objects that you would put into a book bag or a real object book for bath time? So just, you know, just put 02 or three things in the chat, a duck, yes, I love it. A little rubber ducky. A washcloth. You are too fast. I can't real it all. A towel. A and speaking of the towel, shampoo, cup. Yes. Would you butt a whole towel in there or would you had put an object representation of a towel? >> You probably aren't going have room in your book for an entire towel, so that would probably make sure you have all -- that that kid knows what a towel is. Maybe a hand towel. That's a good idea, Julie. Make sure that child knows what a towel is before you put the object representation in your book, though. You all are great. That looks so good. A brush, a toothbrush, shampoo, a shampoo cap, top of a shampoo bottle. Yes. I like that too, Sally. It depends toon age of the student and how pared down you need it. Good job, this is where we know we need to start with object books, with become bans. One of you said earlier that you made a book bag or I think it was a book bag for the seasons and you put something that represented each season in that book bag. That was a great idea too. Thank you for putting that in the chat. >> So the component of reading, when we start down the path of teaching kiddos reading. To become a competent reader we know children have to have the following things. Phonemic awareness, which is auditory, auditory things, the auditory sounds of letters and blends. Awareness of gone mix. And phonics is when we start correcting the .. so they can they hoe they see the letter B and it says B. They see the word ball and they know it starts with a B. So the awareness of phonics is also important. Vocabulary. And the way to work on vocabulary, we are going 0 talk a little bit more about that on the next slide. But it is just to emphasize and explain the new or unfamiliar words that kids are coming across. Fluency is the fourth thing in that list of things that we need for reading and fluency you are not going really work on whether little bitty guys. But that will come into play as they progress in reading. And comprehension. So those are sort of the big five things that research tells us that competent readers must have. At the no Mick awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency and -- and let's talk about Joe cab layer and comprehension too, because the ultimate .. goal of reading is understanding what you are reading. So comprehension, you can't have, you know, you talk about vocabulary all day long .. you need -- you need to know what the story is about, so you need to make sure they have the comprehension of that. That's bottom line, why we are reading for understanding. So as children learn language, they are building vocabulary. You know, that's what Cathy was saying earlier. When you are going to the bathroom, or when you are going to the kitchen, you know, talk about those things. Talk about the language, talk about where are the pots and pans in the kitchen? Are they in the lower cabinet, the upper cabinet? Are they down low or up high? So talk about that vocabulary and infuse as much vocabulary as you instead of just saying, oh, it is up or it is down, up hire than something, down lower than something, so they are learning that vocabulary as they are doing the activity. You know,, they -- you need to make sure we infuse vocabulary as we are touching and tasting and doing what we are teaching them. They learn that words stand for people, that words stand for words stand for things and actions and concepts. And they learn that words are used in sequence and sequenced in sentences in a specific order. Kids come to school, post kids sighted kids come to school with a rich and varied language experience that they have had and if we can provide that same rich and varied language experience for our kids they are going to be you know, ahead. Ahead in life and they are not -- we are not going to have to spend a lot of time trying to make up lost time. So give themselves lots and lots and lots of hands on experiences. And explain you know, do the connections, explain you know, explain the vocabulary as you are introducing new things. So here is the connection. You have got reading and writing and yes, they are connected. A lot of times you know, when we think about -- when we think about literacy we only thing about reading. Or possibly we only thing about writing, but young children need reading to help them learn about writing. Young children need writing to help them learn about reading and young children need oral language, so they can learn about both, so we have got do make sure that we give them opportunities for reading and for writing and for oral language expression. I am trying to read the chat. It says I am talking -- I am really sorry. Someone asked, have you said when the more extended training series is? Is it something that will be available beyond. The .TSBVI? You are sharing it now. Typically what we have done with this training is our service centers in the state of Texas have signed up for it. And it is pretty extensive. So you can contact us if you think you might be interested in it. Because I believe Cathy explained in the training series, typically before COVID we had a day with the teachers on motor development and then the next day the families would bring in their aids and we would do activities that teachers had learned the day before with the families and the young kiddos. And then we would have another day of training for the concept development, the same thing, the day for teachers and a day for families. So we did that for all four of the -- three and four of the topics and so it was -- it is a pretty extensive training. So if you interested then you can contact us and we will see -- we will see what we can do about that. You can send me to Nova Scotia. Anyway, okay. So let's go on with writing. And writing begins with, for all kids, every can kid on the pace of the Earth, writing begins with scribbling and some drawing. And scribbling is just a natural process towards writing. You know, I can't -- I can't even emphasize how important it is. And, yes, yes, yes, yes, you should allow them to scribble on the Braille writer. You know, I might get in trouble for that. But it doesn't give them bad habits. For my students that I had, they just could scribble away on that Braille writer and have a fabulous time and then we would learn, okay. Now this key and this key and this key to make that letter. So scribbling for typical kids does begin with banging on the Braille writers. Do we have a video of this? >> Yes. It is right here and may than can play it whenever, whenever you tell him to. >> Okay. Nathan. Key up the video please. >> Yes of. I will do it right now. >> Thank you, sir yay. >> now what? >> >> Over there. >> Okay. Go. >> Writing, writing. You are such a good writer. Look at that. >> I am writing, kind of a circle. >> Kind of a circle. Good job. >> Uh-oh. >> Okay. I think that is a great idea. Well take it out and see if it is a circle. >> You got it. Good job. Pull it out. >> Almost there. >> Almost. >> Almost. >> Almost. >> I don't know where -- >> Oh, I made a circle! >> You sure did. >> I sure did. >> You sure did. Can you show me? Oh, my gosh, that is beautiful. >> I am going to try it again. >> Can I help you just a little bit? Let's move it up just a bit. Right there. >> Super-duper. >> >> Now you can -- >> Thank you. >> Awesome. Thank you so much. And somebody said, yes, they -- I love allowing my students to scribble with the Brailler. I do too. I do too. So scribbling is you know, the first step of this. And then they can make a letter like forms and shapes or letters and then words and sentences. So there is a progression to writing and it definitely starts with scribbling and it is such a natural process. And it may be that they are going to be in that scribbling stage a long time before moving on to the next stage and that is okay too. And the other really nice thing about scribbling on the Braille writer or scribbling in general is it also works on direction facility, you know, directionality .. you start on one side and go to the -- you start on the left and go to the right. And sometimes the first things kids learn thousand write is their names. So again it emphasizes the importance of that. I have lost my chat here so hang on just one second. I will upon door the chat just a little bit. >> Don't forget to put snrails in the book back as well. Here we go to recap. Connecting the dots. A solid foundation for literacy must include gross motor skills. Fine motor skills, tactile discrimination skills, concept development, language acquisition and. And all of that has to come into play and then we can do the reading and the writing piece of emergent literacy. And we want families to understand these foundations of literacy and have the knowledge and skills to be able to support. Their kiddos in their development in each of these areas. Because, again, a lot of times families just want them to start reading and start writing. We are going to put them in books and we are going to make them -- we are going to make them be excellent readers and writers. And so we need to make sure that the families understand that all of these other things also come into play. And not just the families but the other people that work with our kid can doze too, the SLPs and the ODCTs and you know, those other people who are so critical. >> To our kids instruction as well, and there are references in your PowerPoint and also there are our contact numbers. So you can contact CERAL or me or -- and we get back to you with any questions that you have still as I recall, as I recall as I recall the more you read, the more things you -- the more things -- I love it, love it, love it. So are there any questions that we haven't answered or any comments? You all are doing such a wonderful job of putting them into the chat. And Kathi, do you have anything you want to add. >> oh, I do love the laptops and lulla buy, la lulla buys is a great resource, and that's one of the resources we share when we talk about the .. teachers finding activities to do with the families. Because what we do in the training is we talk about the evaluations and then the next really, really big chunk of the training is having teachers look through lap time and. >> Lulla buys and look through the Oregon concept and find activities they want to share with their families. And now during COVID times when we are not bringing the families in they are doing that as homework and taking the activity into the homes and teaching those families how to work -- how to work coaching those families thousand work with kiddos. So, yes, lap time and lullabies is one of the things -- the things that we use, thank you for mentioning that. Okay. Hannah says we did not answer her question but I don't know what the question was. Debra there is Kay. She said how long do children's average scribble and what age do you start? >> Queue start as soon as they show any interest in it at all. And I don't know that -- I don't know that there is an average time to let children scribble. I know that with my on children and my grandchildren now they probably scribbled for a year at least. And dictate stories and they would scribble them while -- they would scribble while they are dictating stories and/or retelling stories. Sorry. That was not a very clear answer but I don't know that there really is an average time. Kathi, do you have any comment on that? >> Well, I was just going to say my some son is sticks and does writing request his school, but he similar likes to scribble sometimes just to, just to get the feeling out. You know, and so I think it is always a good time to scribble whenever they are ready to either hold a crayon or a marker or a pen or you know, ready to sit up and start pushing on the Braille writer. I think one of the things that I heard a lot is like oh, my student doesn't really have enough finger strength to use a Braille writer. So we are going to move to something a little bit you know, easier new maybe it is distracting because it has auditory. >> Feedback zoo we have talked recently with some coworkers about how you know, sometimes that is the best way for them to build that finger strength is to do it and have practice with it. So even just exposure to scribbling on a Braille writer on paper, you know, I mean, I think you know, as young as or as developmentally early as they can start. >> You know, sitting up and holding on to something that they are not just going to eat, you know what I mean? You know, and you might need to model it. But I think it is always okay to bridge back and if you do some writing and just want to go some scribbling just to -- as a sensory thing to get it out I think it is totally fluid, you know. One of the other things that we used to do. >> In my elementary classroom is we would go on field trips and come back and write stories about the field trips .. for my kids who really worked, weren't capable yet of writing complete you know, stories and sentences, they would dictate to some of the other kids and the other kids would be scribbling on the Braille writer while they were dictating the story and I would try to furiously write it down too so we could really get it written. Get the story dictated story written down. So I think that scribbling is huge and I think we need to encourage it at all you know, like Kathi said, might even need to double back and do scribbling again. And scribbling on the Braille writer again, like Kathi said, as soon as -- as soon as they are capable of holding that pen or pencil in their hand and/or stabilizing. >> Themselves to be able to work on that Braille writer, go for it. One of the things I used to use with my students who had you know, reduced finger strength is we would do wall pushups. We would all line up against the wall and do wall pushups and that kind of loosens them up and helped them get ready for banging on the Braille writers. >> You know, all kinds of, you know -- >> Lot of finger strength. >> I know we are not talking about AT here but I also think even like scribbling on the keyboard. I mean how many of your own personal children do you know that go up to your laptop and start banging on the keys or 0 maybe just Mickeyed. You know, but I think even for our my kid. >> A .. even before you start teaching them to type, you know. Or before you start sitting down with them formally trying to teach them things, I think that scribbling effect behavior is good across Vipirs as well, you know. >> The Braille buzz was also mentioned. Yes, good idea, and something asked if we could encourage kids to a totally blind child to scribble with crayons or pencils. If they want to, absolutely, yes. The other thing someone asked about scribbling with a group of draftsmen, yes, absolutely. Whatever they show an interest in. You know, scribbling on a screen with crayons and paper we used to -- we used to have something like that. I don't know if it is even still created but there would be like a window screen and they could feel it as they were writing with their paper on top of that screen. >> Okay. Don't forget, the shaving cream is cool. >> I used to do that with my early childhood classroom. We would use shaving cream and one day I decided that I would use pudding and we were going scribble with pudding on our tables and I said, you can like your fingers now, and you have been telling us for kids not to like the fingers on the shaving cream and now you are telling me we can? That's fun, but Charlotte Cushman put in some activity, scribbling activities ideas, I believe. Good old Charlotte. >> I told you, yes, cool whip. >> Yes. I think they are edible. Well, Kathi and Debra, thank you so much for this wonderful session. I love -- especially in the chat, seeing the different ideas and what the folks are doing. I always come away with more to put in my toolbox. So thank you, everyone and thanks for contributing. >> Thank you all so much for being here. We appreciate it. >> Let me give you some closing announcements, On Thursday April 15 is Debra said we are going to have Texas two steps with Markey wood and Jill brown. And then on April 18th next Monday we have no car keys, no problem. Independent travel when not driving. So that will be Monday, the 18th. Please go ahead and go to our coffee hour website, .TSBVI.edu/coffee hour for upcoming registration information. Again, to obtain your CEUs or your professional development credit, respond to the evaluation and it will be e-mailed to you from ESC works, you will enter the code. And that is certificate will automatically generate upon completion of the evaluation. Just one thing I wanted to mention 0 on that evaluation. There are a couple of comment boxes. One, any comments you would like to share with Debra and Kathi specifically, and then another comment box where it says additional comments you would like to share with the event planning committee. Please let us know your thoughts about coffee hour for next year. We are really -- we are starting to put things together and look to next year so we want to know, first of all, do you want Koff can fee hour to continue? Second of all, what topics or ideas are you looking for in the coffee hour to talk about again? And finally is twice a week working out? Would you rather have it be once a week or less? And so please let us know. Thank you, everyone. We will see you on Monday -- no. Thursday. We still have a whole week ahead of us. >> It is only Monday. >> Thanks all, again, so much for being here. One of your chat comments was that we would like for these to be -- I would like for this to be so much longer and it is like we would too, but this is a great way to get the coffee -- this is a great way to get the information out there and then if you have other questions or comments, just let us know. >> Thanks, everyone. >> Thank you.