BLAST Early Learning

Teacher Spotlight

PA Keys Professional Development Opportunities
The Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh offers various professional development opportunities for child care practitioners throughout the year. Find out how to sign up and what's being offered.

Local Thematic Unit
Local early educators of Pittsburgh submitted their favorite lessons plans for your enjoyment.

Additonal Information for:

• Phonological Awareness
  Phonological Awareness is the ability to hear and play with the smaller sounds in words. It includes activities that work with rhyme, words, syllables, and initial sounds.
• Vocabulary Fluency
  Infants learn vocabulary quickly, especially when their parents converse with them and a child with a large listening and speaking vocabulary has an enormous advantage in learning to read.
• Print Motivation
  Print Motivation is having an interest in and an enjoyment of books. Children who are more fluent and positive about reading tend to come from parent-child pairs who view reading as fun.
• Narrative Skill
  Narrative skill is the ability to describe things and events and to tell stories.
• Letter Knowledge
  Letter knowledge is knowing that letters are different from each other, that the same letter can look different, and that each letter has a name and is related to specific sounds.
• Print Awareness
  Print Awareness is noticing print in the environment, knowing how to handle a book, and understanding how to follow the words on a page.
• Research Points
  Early learning has been studied for many years and here are some important findings.