Letter to Mr. and Mrs. Johnson

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Johnson,

I am writing this letter to discuss the literacy needs of Becky. First of all, I would like to say that Becky has a wonderful attitude towards reading and writing. She is very motivated to read and write, which is not a quality that all students have. There are a few things, though, that Becky needs to work on to become a more effective reader. She has problems with decoding unknown words and comprehending the books she is reading. On some ways, these issues are related to each other. Increasing her ability to decode words will increase her reading comprehension. In order to help her become a better reader, I am planning on changing some of the instruction that she receives. To help with her decoding, Becky will be learning 100 of the most frequently used words for first graders. By doing this, she will be able to recognize more of the words in the stories she is reading, so she will not have to spend her time trying to decode them. Becky will also try to increase her letter-sound knowledge. She will be doing some sorting of pictures and objects according to different letter sounds and also play some different phonics games. Ensuring that she knows which letters make which sounds will help her to better decode words. As Becky becomes more familiar with more words and increases her vocabulary, her ability to comprehend the stories she reads should also increase. However, she is also going to be working on her ability to retell a story. By doing this, Becky will have to recall the events and important details of the story. Sometimes, I will read the book aloud to her and other times she will be doing the reading herself. The main goal is to just make sure Becky understands what is happening within the book. By implementing these different instruction techniques and strategies, I believe Becky will become a more effective reader. She has much potential to become a great reader; I just want to make sure we take the right steps to get her up to a first grade reading level. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me. I am more than happy to discuss Becky’s reading progress with you.

Thank you,

Ms. Wilcox