upper case v lower case . . .

[carpe_diem]

I am trying to make a story for the 3yrs 6mths grandson - and am wondering whether I ought to use upper case letters to start peoples names etc? What do you do?

Do you teach the upper case letters at the same time as the lower case? It struck me that the capital letters are not just a big version of the small ones - so eg 'Daddy' could look very different from 'daddy' and so on.

Do you just use the words without capital letters at the beginning, or do you just start using capitals without comment - alternatively do you teach the upper case alphabet separately - or even teach the upper case alongside the lower case for each letter?

Things have moved on a lot since I was teaching  Though I notice that phonics is back in fashion same as we taught (many years ago ) 

[nikzam]

From my experience as a teacher in various schools, I found that they all seem to take the same approach - teaching the lower case letters first and then moving onto the upper case.  The procedure they took also first focused on the letter sound in words and once those where mastered by the children they moved onto teaching them the letter name.  This prevented them from getting mixed up with the letter name and sound.
At the moment I am assissting a boy with special needs and the lower case letters are being tackled first.
When one thinks about it, it makes more sense teaching the lower case letters first as most writing is done in lower case apart from the first letter of names, sentences etc.  So I think that the lower case should be tackled first.

[carpe_diem]

Thanks 
I just wanted to confirm that using the lower case first, then dealing with upper case would be acceptable nowadays - I had wondered whether fashions had changed in schools.
 
I was talking to a friend the other day and told her about LR. She said it sounded great - but then she said that doing LR might be harmful because her child will be going to school at the end of next year (he has just had his 4th birthday). Then she told me that during a first visit to the school where her DS will be attending - she was actually told not to try to teach Daniel any letters or anything to do with reading - but to leave all that to the teachers when he starts school - so that the teacher has all the children at the same stage and can 'take them through it' all together.

I was very surprised, and actually quite shocked, to learn that the parents of that set of children had got the idea that they were not to introduce their children to books with words in until they reached the age of nearly 5 years old 
It was because of this that I started to wonder whether things had changed in education now.  After what you have said I think I shall just do things the way I used to for our three little grandsons

[nhockaday]

That's just dumb...teach away!

[kmum]

I can't find my copy of Teach your baby to read right now but I'm sure it said that if you are teaching your baby a word like a name that should have a capital letter, do use the capital, but don't point it out or draw attention to, just read it like you would the other words. 

[KL]

Re upper/lower casing, I would suggest that (except for words like names as kmum mentioned) it would be best to start with lower casing, then switch to upper casing.  and don't forget you can do that easily with the LETTER CASE settings in LR's playback options.

[carpe_diem]

Thanks and a Karma boost to alll for your reassurance on this   

kmum - I feel sure from what I remember of the Doman book it DID say use the capital letters when doing Proper Nouns - but having not looked at the book for years - I just wondered whether 'advised practice' might have been updated.

KL Yep - I find the playback settings invaluable since I use the same sets for three kids of different ages.

I just love the support provided by all the like minded people on here. Thank goodness for Brillbaby and Brillkids

[TABS]

I have been using the - first school website - they encourage a letter of the alphabet each week.  All their material has the uppercase and lowercase letters.  My son has thrived on this method of teaching and is fine with the Big A and the small a, sometimes we get him to find the A and a's on a page - or what ever letter we are doing - and he reckognises it right away!  His alphabet on his wall though is lowercase.  We do tracing of letters both upper and lower and it's his favourite part of the week.  I guess you just have to try and see what works for you.

TABS

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