The lessons in Book 1, implemented within the first weeks of the P/K/1 school year, provide children with the foundation and background they need to successfully pursue a literate life in your classroom. Children learn, through immersion and guided participation in these lessons, the routines and expectations for the different kinds of literacy instruction they will experience in the classroom. For example, they learn what is expected from them at circle time; they try out shared reading, whole-class read-alouds, and a writing workshop; and they are walked through techniques for making smart use of the core centers in your classroom.

The kidwatching tools in Book 1 are designed to help you get to know your students and to help you make beginning decisions about how to teach them best. These tools should be used selectively, as they meet your particular students' needs, within your particular curriculum.

Lesson 1: The Morning Circle Routine: Focusing on What Matters
Discuss the routines and expectations for the daily circle gathering: song, greeting, calendar review, shared reading, teacher read-aloud.

Lesson 2: Shared Reading:An Assessment-Based Approach
Teach the specific procedures and patterns for the shared reading portion of circle time-after children have been familiarized with basic circle routines (Lesson 1).

Lesson 3: Read-Aloud: Procedures and Early Comprehension Strategy Instruction
Teach the specific procedures and patterns for the read-aloud portion of circle time-after children have been familiarized with basic circle routines (Lesson 1).

Lesson 4: Writing Workshop: Building a Foundation from which Writers Can Grow
Introduce students to the routines and expectations for your writing workshop.

Lesson 5: Re-envisioning the Alphabet Curriculum
These lessons are designed to support children's recognition and beginning use of the letters of the alphabet.

Lesson 6: Energizing the Writing Center
Introduce and show children how to use and take care of classroom writing materials; discuss how different materials may be used for writing in different genres.

Lesson 7: Re-imagining the Library Center.
Introduce the organization of the books in the classroom library; discuss expectations for how children will use and handle the materials

Lesson 8: Taking Full Advantage of the Listening Center
Introduce the listening center and teach different ways of using it throughout the year.

Lesson 9: Building Reading and Writing Skill at the Easel Center
Introduce the easel center and get children started with ideas they might try there.

Lesson 10: Using the Play Center to Facilitate
Introduce literacy materials to the sociodramatic play area in the classroom, and work with children to enhance their literacy exploration in this area.

Lesson 11: Interactive Writing: Focus on Spelling
Support children in using invented spelling and, throughout the year, many other strategies.

Lesson 12: Using names as a Tool for Literacy
This lesson involves children in a study of their own and others' names-as a route to developing many insights into written language.