Inside: Follow these five steps to teach a child to read.
Helpful for parents, homeschoolers, and teachers that are teaching beginning
readers.
I looked like a mother hen with my chick gathered around me.
Sitting on the floor with my legs crossed, I stared into six eager pairs of
eyes that were ready to learn to read… but there was a problem.
A knot tightened in my stomach as I realized just how
unprepared I was to take kids from non-readers to readers. Sure, I could
say “sound it out”, but was that really going to get it? This was a serious
responsibility! Who decided I could even be trusted to do this?!?
“Let’s all look at the first page,” I said. And we dove into
a book.
Step 1: Pre-Reading Behaviors
There are activities that don’t look like reading at all,
but they set the stage for a child to become a reader. These pre-reading
behaviors may appear spontaneously through a child’s own observation and
mimicry or an adult can encourage them.
Look for and encourage the following:
- awareness
of print on signs, labels, packaging, etc. Kids can know that a
sign says “McDonald’s” before they can actually read the letters
- sound
manipulation games, think “Hannah Hannah banana, banana-fana, fo-fana,
me-my-mo-mana, Hannah”
- awareness
of rhyme
- concepts
about print – Does the child know which way is up on a book? Do
they have a sense that the pages turn one at a time and always in the same
direction? As you read, point to the words so they can see you are reading
from left to right.
- sound discrimination – “Max is eating a muffin. Mmmmax…mmmmuffin…. those start with the same sound.”
When a child demonstrates these behaviors and abilities,
they may be ready to learn to read. If not, work activities like these into
your daily routine to help guide them in the right direction.
Continue reading aloud to the child. If children learn that
reading is an enjoyable experience through read-alouds, they will be motivated
to learn the skill themselves.
I bet you can totally guess the next step…
Step 2: Learning Letters
Obvious, right?! But you might be surprised to learn these
things about introducing letters:
Letters don’t have to be taught in alphabetical order.
Think about it: If you taught the letters a, m, t, and s, the child can start
to read a few simple words right away and that’s so exciting for them! Quick
pay-offs like that keep kids motivated!
Mastering a single letter involves two different skills:
Identifying the letter visually, and memorizing the sound associated with the
letter. Then there are letters that make more than one sound… but more on that
in a bit.
Using the senses and movement helps kids memorize letters.
Build the letter with clay, draw the letter with your finger on the child’s
back, associate a motion with the letter’s sound like jumping and making the
sound of letter J.
One exposure is not enough. A lot of memorization has
to happen to learn all the letters and sounds. Incorporate plenty of review and
don’t rush it.
Step 3: Blending Sounds
Moving from knowing single letters to reading words is all
about blending the sounds together. Try this technique:
- Using
a 2 or 3-letter word, point to the letters and say each sound.
- Then
start back at the beginning of the word. Slide your finger slowly under the
letters as you stretch the sounds and put them together.
- Have the child try to do it, too.
Pro tip: Keep it simple here. Stick to words where
every letter makes its “normal” sound. Stay away from words where two letters
work together to make a new sound, like the th in “the.”
Step 4: Start Introducing Sight Words
Sight words are typically shorter words that come up very
frequently in text and sometimes they don’t follow predictable spelling rules.
Some examples are: look, yes, the, do. It’s better to know them by sight rather
than trying to sound them out.
Sight word practice can include flash cards, hunting for the
words in books, and using computer games.
One of my favorite ways to practice sight words is through
the use of predictable or patterned text. These are books where each sentence
is the same except for one word which can be inferred with the help of a
picture. Kids get lots of practice with the sight words and are proud to be
reading sentences.
This is patterned text.
Pro-tip: Spread out sight word instruction. Yes, this
is “step 4” but it’s really more of an element of reading that gets sprinkled
in here and there. Teach a couple of sight words so kids can read a book.
Practice some other phonics patterns, teach a couple more sight words, etc.
Step 5: Work With Word Families
You’ll get a lot of bang for your buck if you spend time on
word families. Teach kids that if they can read the word “can,” then they can
also read “man,” “pan,” and “fan.” 2-letter word families are perfect at this
stage (-am, -at, -et, -en, -it, etc.)
Step 6: Phonics Skills
We all know English is weird! Learning the individual letter
sounds is just a foundation. I like to follow this sequence as I introduce
other phonics patterns:
Blends: Two letters that are frequently together in
words, both letter sounds can be heard. Examples are bl, tr, sk, dr, sm
Digraphs: Two letters that make a new sound (sh, th,
wh, ch, ck)
Glued Sounds: These are a blend but are 3 letters and
come at the end of a word (all, ell, ill, ull, ank, ink, onk, unk, ang, ing,
ong, ung)
There are plenty more phonics patterns and rules but this
gives you a lot to work on with beginning readers.
Making Meaning
Making meaning? Is there a recipe for that? Ha!
“Making meaning” is a phrase that’s always thrown around in
teaching workshops and books. It just means that as a child starts to read
sentences and longer texts, they should be able to get some meaning out of it.
They should have a sense of what is going on in the story or what the author
wants them to know.
Making meaning should be woven in as soon as a child starts
reading sentences. Help the child make meaning by:
- asking
questions about what they just read.
- encouraging
them to reread if they didn’t understand what the author was saying.
- demonstrate
your own reactions to the text
What’s the point in learning to read if you’re not enjoying
a story, learning something new, or being exposed to a different way of seeing
things?
So what about my little reading group? Did they ever learn
to read?
They sure did!
I’m not sure who learned more in that group, them or me.
What I do know is, there’s no reason for you to struggle with developing a
reading-teaching roadmap from scratch. Start with pre-reading skills. Then move
through letters, blending, sight words, word families, and other phonics
skills. Allow time for review and the natural development of the child.
Reading Head Start by Sarah Shepard? is a super simple and
extremely effective system that willeven
teach 2 and 3 year old children to read.This is a unique
reading program developed by a loving
parent and English teacher of 14 years,who successfully
taught all of her children to read before
turning 3 years
old.The reading system she developed is so effective that by the time her
daughter
