Alphabet Knowledge Basket

Wooden Alphabet puzzle
Alphabet bingo
Alphabet flash cards (concentration game)
Alphabet books (see appendix B-1 of Shanker text)
pages from Magazines, newspapers, cereal boxes to do alphabet hunt
letters cut out of sandpaper
a shoebox lid with salt or sand to trace letters in

Phonemic Awareness Basket

Books (see appendix B-1 of Shanker text)

Rhyming Books; Books with Alliteration
Elkonin Blocks
Rhyming flash cards
Grab bag of objects with decodable names

Back-To-School Tips for the Special Educator

To do list for the first couple of weeks:

http://www.readingrockets.org/article/38311/

Whole Brain Teaching

http://wholebrainteaching.com/

Strategies to start the year off with.

Reader's Notebooks

Fountas and Pinnell have very useful ideas for setting up a reader's notbook for each student.
In their book, Guiding Readers and Writers, reference pages 174-179.