Preschool Finish the Whole Idea Worksheet

About this worksheet

This page used to ask whether “Because the puppy barked.” was a whole idea. Judging a subordinate clause is a grammar-class question, and preschoolers who answered it correctly were guessing. What a three-year-old really can do is feel when a sentence is unfinished, because an unfinished sentence leaves them waiting. So every item stops mid-idea and hands the ending to the child. You read the opening aloud and stop; the child chooses the picture that completes it. The first level uses sentences a child has lived through, where the ending is nearly certain: when it rains, I open my umbrella. The second level needs the whole opening held in mind, because the last few words on their own would fit more than one picture. The third level joins two parts with because or so, which is the first reasoning most children put into words, and the choices are all sensible objects, so only the reason rules the others out. Wait after you stop talking. The silence is where the thinking happens.