Our youngest students graduated from Picture Stretch to Word Stretch in the early part of the year. In Word Stretch the children number sections on their page from 1 – 6, and then one student is called upon for a topic or theme for all the words they are going to write. For example if the child selects “animals,” we then go around the room with each child selecting a favorite animal, until we have 6 animals. Children are encouraged to write down as many sounds as they hear in each animal. Giraffe could be written GF, GIF, GIRF and so on. The object of this exercise is for each child to record as many sounds as they hear, to write the letters on the lines and to be able to read the words back when finished. We do not expect the words to be spelled correctly. Nor do we expect each child to hear all the same sounds. After we have written 6 words the children then read them and choose two animals to illustrate.