October has arrived
along with crisp rustling leaves, mounds of pumpkins, and requests for
Halloween stories in the speech room. One repeated request is especially
pleasing, “Read the ghost story. The one with a g -
g - g ghost!”
Today, when I turned the last page, several children said, “read it again!” I
haven’t told them I’m the author. After all, I want unbiased reactions to my
work and I’m thrilled with the ones I’m getting.
Since this book has
been so popular with my students, I wanted to share it with you. I’ve created an
eBook that’s available for free on Amazon for a limited time.
 |
| Click to go to Amazon for your free book |
I wrote the story to
give my students an engaging way to practice their “g” sounds but it’s
also a good fit for Halloween.
In THE GHOSTLY NIGHT Kristy can’t sleep.
“The wind rattled her
window. The full moon threw grasping shadows across her bedroom wall. They
swayed with the rhythm of the wind.”
“Mom!”
she cried. “There’s a g - g -
g ghost in my room!”
Kristy calls again
when the wind howls, when a branch scrapes her bedroom window, and when she
sees her curtains move. Each time, the kids join in “reading” the repeated
line, “There’s a g - g -
g ghost in my room.” They can’t seem to help themselves. That makes
for a lot of practice with the “g” sound. It also gives them an understanding
of the sound the letter represents, a phonemic awareness skill that fits right
in with the Common Core State Standards (especially RF.K.3a where students are
expected to “Demonstrate basic knowledge of letter-sound correspondences by
producing the primary or most frequent sound for each consonant.”)
One teacher told me
her whole class erupted in clapping when the tables turned on the Mother at the
end of the story. You can imagine how pleased I was to hear that report—almost
as pleased as I was when I breathed in the autumn-crisp air this morning and poured
a cup of cinnamon-spiced tea.
I hope you’re
enjoying the season as much as I am and I hope you’ve found a good supply of
autumn books to share with the children in your lives, and several more for
yourself!
