How To Help Your Child Learn To Read

The information below will help any child who is struggling with reading.

There are three things that you should do with struggling readers.

1 Play with spoken words to investigate the sounds in them.

This has nothing to do with letters.. this is about spoken words. You need to forget about letters while you're doing this.

Please watch the clip to make sure you're clear about the difference between sounds and letters.

We'll start with a little word, 'it'. Let's suppose I say the word 'it' to you. You say the word now, out loud, slowly. What's the first sound you hear coming out of your mouth...that's right...'ih'. And the second sound is a very short 'tuh' sound. So that word has two sounds in it. Put up one finger for each sound as you say it.

Now let's take a word like 'dog'. Say it out loud slowly
First sound....short 'duh'
Middle sound...short 'ohh'
Last sound...short 'guh'

So there are three sounds....put up a finger for each as you say it.

Now I know you're thinking about letters again....something like 'these are just the letters'!

No they're not. I need to explain.

Let's take a spoken word like 'fish'. Say it out loud slowly.

Now what's the first sound coming out of your mouth? That's right..a long 'fff'
Next sound....short 'ih'
Next sound coming out of your mouth ....'shhhhh'

Look at this last sound. It's one sound, but when it comes to writing it down our alphabet doesn't have a single letter to represent this sound, so a rule was created that says we use 2 letters to represent this one sound ...the letters s and h next to each other, like this 'sh'.

So the spoken word 'fish' has only three sounds. One finger for each please, as you say the sounds again.

One more example of this so you really understand...and then I'll tell you why doing this with your child is very important.

Let's take the spoken word 'chip'. Say it out loud slowly.

First sound coming out of your mouth....long 'chhhh'    ....one sound
Second sound coming out of your mouth.....short 'ih'   ....one sound
Last sound coming out of your mouth....short 'puh'     ....one sound

Three sounds only. One finger per sound please.

When we write the word our alphabet is not able to represent this 'chhh' sound with one letter. There aren't enough letters...only 26. So the sound is represented by putting the letters 'c' and 'h' next to each other like this 'ch'.

Stick to short spoken words while you're learning to hear the separate sounds.

The easiest sound to hear in a word is the first sound.
The next easiest is the last sound.
Any middle sounds in a word are harder to hear as separate sounds.

Your child may only be able to hear and isolate the first sound as he says the word slowly. If this is the case, practise doing that with him so he feels successful (the 95% known I talked about), and show him how you find the last sound in a word by saying it slowly and listening for the last sound, and then separating it, putting it into your memory so you can say it. Then after he's seen you doing it and heard you explaining it he can try himself (the 5% challenge).
If your child can do first and last sounds but struggles on hearing a middle sound, practise the first and last sounds (the 95% known) and show him how you find a middle sound so he can see it and have a go himself (the 5% challenge).

Now hearing and being able to repeat the sounds is one thing.

While your child is improving at this, you should start to 'play around with' the first sound in a spoken word.

For example take away the 'cuh' sound at the beginning of the spoken word 'cat' and replace it with a different sound (remember not to say 'letter' accidentally for 'sound'...this is not about letters)
So the 'cuh' in the spoken word 'cat' could be replaced with' buh' to make the spoken word 'bat'.

If your child can do this easily with the first sound, but not the last sound, give him more practice in doing it with the first sound (the 95% success) and show him how you can do it with the last sound so he can see it and have a go himself (the 5% challenge).

Why you should play this sounds game with your child....

If your child has trouble reading or writing it is quite likely that he has not had enough practice in focusing on the sounds in spoken words. This is not about having a hearing problem or a learning problem...it's a vital component of pre-reading that he may have missed out on.
 

If you want the best computer program around to support what you're doing with sounds in spoken words, this is the one you need. There are very few programs that deal exclusively with phonological awareness, and this one is used by speech and learning therapists worldwide to assist them in their work.

 
This program is absolutely brilliant for kickstarting kids' reading and writing. Look in my shop for versions for different ability levels. Earobics for Adults and Adolescents is suitable for anyone over the age of 10 who is really struggling to read and write.
 

2 Be clear about letters

Letters, as you know, are alphabetic code for sounds. If you can't hear the sounds in a spoken word how could you possibly write down the code for them (that is, the letters to represent them).
Children who are struggling often have had the alphabet hammered over and over again. Unfortunately, it means very little to the child and he may not even remember it because he doesn't understand what it's actually the code for. He doesn't understand that it's related to 'spoken' language. He doesn't understand that reading and writing is language that could have been spoken, but instead has been recorded using a special code called the alphabet.

Now on to how you should talk about letters. You say, 'The name of this letter is 'B' and it's code for the short sound 'buh'. Listen to this word...(say 'bus' out loud). The short sound 'buh' is the first sound in the spoken word 'bus'.

You always talk about the letter's name and what sound the letter is code for.
The reason for this is because the letter's name never changes, whereas the sound it represents does change sometimes, depending where the letter is placed in a word, and which other letters it's next to.

For example the letter name  'a' is always the same, but its sound changes a lot depending on what letter pattern it's part of. It can sound like short 'ah', long 'ayyyy', long 'i'.

But when you talk about the letter by itself say its name and that it's code for the sound it makes when it's by itself....so the letter is called 'a' and it's code for the sound short 'ah'. You must focus on the basic sound each letter represents first, and of course make sure your child knows its name, as that will never change, and is the anchor point...something he can always rely on being the same.

3 Use The Five Finger Check

Ok we've talked about the need for your child to experience success (95% known, 5% challenge)

Let's think about this in relation to the books he's reading.

In order to want to read he must be able to feel successful, and so he must be able to read almost all the text on a page.

A simple check for this is the Five Finger Check. This is a brilliant way to get your child to start taking some responsibility for his own learning in something he has either disliked or avoided previously.

Look at one page of the book your child is being asked to read. Get him to put down one finger for each word he can't read. If more than 5 fingers go down that text is not suitable for your child to be reading by himself.

There are three ways you support your child in reading
1 Read to him...a text slightly above his reading level...for enjoyment, discussion and to build up his vocabulary.
2 Read with him...a text he needs to read that may be slightly too difficult (say 10 words on the page that he can't read). You do this by taking turns with sentences, or even words. Have a chat about what you're reading together as well.
3 Listen to him read...if you make sure the book is at the appropriate level your child will love to read to you. You should respond by asking a funny question about an idea or character in the text. When it comes to the 1- 5 or less words on a each page he doesn't know, ask him to read on past them to the end of the sentence and see if that helps him work out what the word might be.