Short A Reader - Tabby's Play Date

Jumpstart reading success with this Short A Reader. Most pages of this full-color storybook feature just one line of simple, repetitive text to help children learn to read with ease and confidence. This book is designed for the classroom and home and includes full audio support with a Read to Me mode. Each word can be touched individually as well.

This book was authored by Mary Beth Spann who is a long time teacher, writer and puppeteer. To date, she has authored dozens of teacher resource books and childrens readers for publishers such as Scholastic and Time for Kids. As is her practice, each of her Tapfun readers begins with an engaging story with characters kids can relate to. According to Mary Beth, "So many early readers sacrifice story for the sake of skills and concepts. Thats always a big mistake. Its the story that speaks to the mind and heart of the child, and so the story must come first; attention to skills and concepts can easily springboard from a meaningful story premise."

This app includes two modes: Read to Myself and Read to Me. Touch any word in the story to hear its professional pronunciation by experienced voice over artist Natalie Gray. The Read to Me mode also includes clear pronunciation of the entire sentences.

This reader gives students practice decoding and blending words with short a.

Story Summary:

In this beginning Short A Reader, a family consisting of Dad, Pam and Frank, interact with their pet cat, Tabby.

As the story opens, each family member is shown greeting Tabby as he or she gets ready to leave the house for the day ahead.

Frank assumes that Tabby will be sad without the family around all day long and reassures Tabby that they will be back soon.

But there is not much time for Tabby to brood (if, indeed, cats do brood).

After the family drives away, Tabby’s feline friends come to visit. They enter through a pet door and scratch at a big bag of cat food. They eat all the food and take a nap.

At the sound of the family returning home at day’s end, Tabby’s friends scat just in time to avoid discovery.

As the family members walk through the door, Tabby is once again pictured alone in his cat basket and the family assumes he has been sad and alone all day long without them.

Short A Words:

Tabby, Dad, Pam, Frank, sad, back, fast, slam, sat, and, scratch, cats, ran, glad, tan, bag, cat, snack, fat, nap