Teaching a child to read (school, kids, sleep, leave)
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There is a vast difference between encouraging/helping a child to read who is ready and eager to move forward, and pushing a child to read who is not yet ready. I can't imagine *not* encouraging/nurturing a natural desire to read. Not everything is about whether a child will be advanced in school. I can't imagine why anyone would advise against reading when a child is ready simply because they feel there is no academic advantage. So what? I would think that not allowing an eager child to move ahead at their speed would be worse. Now, advising against pushing a not-yet-ready child, I totally understand.
Great post, MM! I totally agree on all points.
(I think my sons would have popped open from frustration if we'd said, "Sorry. Can't learn how to read. Gotta wait.")
Last edited by DewDropInn; 11-13-2011 at 04:18 PM..
Reason: Clarity.
(I think my sons would have popped open from frustration if we'd said, "Sorry. Can't learn how to read. Gotta wait.")
And yet, what do you bet that it happens all the time from parents who are too busy or not confident enough in their own skills to help a child learn to read? I don't believe in pushing a child who isn't ready and I don't believe in holding back a child who is. They know when they're ready and the advantage is in: 1. gaining all the entertainment from books, 2. larger vocabulary (which is hard to teach at school BTW--kids always get this from home), and 3. the background knowledge that they pick up from books, which will help them immensely in school later when they can tack the new knowledge onto what they already know and thus learn much faster. There have been many studies about a child's background at home being helpful to her in school later, and much has to do with enrichment, which reading is, and parental involvement, which teaching reading is.
And yet, what do you bet that it happens all the time from parents who are too busy or not confident enough in their own skills to help a child learn to read? I don't believe in pushing a child who isn't ready and I don't believe in holding back a child who is. They know when they're ready and the advantage is in: 1. gaining all the entertainment from books, 2. larger vocabulary (which is hard to teach at school BTW--kids always get this from home), and 3. the background knowledge that they pick up from books, which will help them immensely in school later when they can tack the new knowledge onto what they already know and thus learn much faster. There have been many studies about a child's background at home being helpful to her in school later, and much has to do with enrichment, which reading is, and parental involvement, which teaching reading is.
Good, thoughtful post, stepka. My guess is it happens a lot. Which is sad to me.
I think most kids are little vacuums sucking up everything they can. I don't know how many kids (of all ages) I've had walk in my house and say, "Books! Look at all the books!" and then ask if they could look through them. Could they look? I'd stick a return address sticker on the inside front cover and encourage them to take them home!
The Leap Frog letter magnets are a great way to help a child lean their letter sounds... I can still hear the singing in my head; " the s says sssss, the s says "ssss". Lol!
It is amazing how quickly they learn once in Kindergarten with their reading! Going in with the basics and some sight words won't hurt him, but no need to worry or rush
"every letter makes a sound! s says ssssss!"
Leapfrog has some good videos too. Letter factory and word factory were recommended by my son's pre-K teacher.
My son is 4 and has a firm grasp on the alphabet. We are ready to move on to learning to read before he starts pre-k next year. He has never gone to daycare or anything and i am completely in charge of his education at this point. Do any of you have any advice about how to even start?
Once he can say his ABCs, he can start on "An Ant - Learn to Read." It starts out with just 6 letter sounds, which are used in illustrated stories. Then it slowly adds new letter sounds which are incorporated into a new story on each page. I really like this book because kids want to read real stories, and this book allows them to do that while sounding out each new word. The book only has 4 sight words: "a," "to," "of" and "the." It's a good idea to teach as few sight words as possible in the beginning. You want to emphasize sounding out words, not memorizing them by sight.
It also has alphabet flash cards that you can cut out and practice letter sounds like long and short vowels, consonants and consonant blends.
Other books for beginning readers don't have any rhyme or reason to the progression of new words. They just use whatever words they need to tell the story. This really throws kids for a loop because they need to start out simple and gradually add new letter sounds and phonics rules.
Once he starts school you will find out that the schools don't teach systematic phonics. They will have a "reading" class which teaches mostly memorization of words, and a "phonics" class which teaches the letter sounds, but NOT how to sound out words. Then in the reading class they expect the kids to guess the words based on pictures on the page. If they guess wrong, they are asked "What's the first letter in the word." So for example, if the sentence is "I like dogs." The kid might guess "I like puppies" based on the picture of a dog. Then the teacher will ask, "What does the letter D say?" BUT they will not have the child sound out the whole word unless they are in a remedial class.
So what this means is that your child is not going to learn proper phonics unless you teach it at home.
Two more good books for parents of young readers is "Why Johnny Can't Read" and "Why Johnny Still Can't Read." After reading these you will completely understand what is going on in the schools today, and why it is so important for you to teach your own child to read.
There just isn't reason to push kids early. Let them take the lead here. Reading is actually developmental. Kids read when they are ready to read. .
[quote=Ivorytickler;21688367]There just isn't reason to push kids early. Let them take the lead here. Reading is actually developmental. Kids read when they are ready to read.
Sorry, I can't agree with that. It is a common fallacy being taught to teachers. They say that reading is developmental and kids will learn it on their own without being carefully taught. They say you can just read books to them and point at the words and they will learn.
The sad truth is that most schools are teaching most kids this way today.
The kids who REALLY excel are the homeschooled kids who almost always learn phonics.
If reading was "developmental" then all the isolated jungle tribes in New Guinea would have been reading and writing before being reached by missionaries. All the tribes along the Amazon would have alphabets and a writing system.
Because reading is NOT developmental, you have to teach it. A child is ready whenever they can sit and pay attention for 5 minutes at a time. The REAL QUESTION is: "Is the parent ready?"
I used the book below for my homeschooled son. It worked.
He was 5. We started in Sept. IN late Nov he read and abridged version on Treasure Island
Teach Your Child To Read in 100 easy lessons Teach Your Child to read in 100 Easy Lessons
We did 2 lessons per day. This is based on phonics
ETA, I just realized Stepka already mentioned this. I second it then
I left that to the professionals. I ponied up the money for full-time kindergarten and after just three months, it is just absolutely amazing the progress she has made. From just being able to sight read a few words when she started to now reading whole children's books with little assistance. I have no doubt she will be an excellent reader by the end of the school year.
I had my daughter also in preschool when she was 3 and 4, but they only stressed pre-literacy skills. They never expected children that age to read. Good if they did, but not the end all be all.
Once he starts school you will find out that the schools don't teach systematic phonics. They will have a "reading" class which teaches mostly memorization of words, and a "phonics" class which teaches the letter sounds, but NOT how to sound out words. Then in the reading class they expect the kids to guess the words based on pictures on the page. If they guess wrong, they are asked "What's the first letter in the word." So for example, if the sentence is "I like dogs." The kid might guess "I like puppies" based on the picture of a dog. Then the teacher will ask, "What does the letter D say?" BUT they will not have the child sound out the whole word unless they are in a remedial class.
So what this means is that your child is not going to learn proper phonics unless you teach it at home.
Totally agree. I taught my first three to read through phonics, they all read when they were three, they were ready and eager. My fourth is four, she doesn't even know all her letters yet and is not ready, I feel no need to push for right now, but next year, before kindergarten, I will work with her on phonics at home, because I won't leave it up to the school. When I helped at school, I was so confused at how they taught kids to read. First of, a lot of the time is spent with them doing it independently, so they don't know if its right or not. A struggling student could look at the word "ear" and say "elephant", because there was a picture of an elephant. They would move on without comprehension if there isn't an adult right there to say... no, try (guess) again. And this is encouraged. I much prefer the at, cat, bat, sat progression..... and I think children feel much more confident with it as well, they don't see the "ea" blend, until they are taught the "ea" blend, and then they get to practice it.
just to clarify for the OP, I didn't mean it was early to learn letter sounds. I meant it was early to learn to read.
Not really, IME, I was reading by 3/4, my brother was not fully reading till he was 8 or so by the time I was 9 I was reading on a high school level.
I thought you were suppose to either be reading by K or at least have some skills before you started school?
Correct me if I am wrong.
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Beginning Reading
