Helping children learn to read

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Abstract

These 13 effective strategies for teaching children to read are excerpted from the booklet, Tips for Parents About Reading (Davis 1997). Included in this resource from LEARNS are ideas about what to expect at different ages and stages of reading development, suggestions for what can be done at home to support reading skills, and a list of favorite children's books available at most libraries. The ideas are useful for parents, teachers, and others in deciding how to help children do well in reading.

Issue

Helping children learn to read can be achieved most successfully with knowledge of proven strategies and principles.

Action

Thirteen "Understandings" About Reading

1. Reading requires the use of many different tools — "sounding out" (phonics), sight words, context clues, knowledge of language patterns, and comprehension strategies. The reader's feelings about what he is reading (is it interesting?) and the situation (is she comfortable, threatened, or embarrassed?) also affect reading development.
2. Background knowledge and prior experiences are critical to the reading process. For example: Two children read a book about zoo animals. One child has recently visited the zoo and has read other books about the zoo, and the other has not. Which child will understand more?
3. Children need to see others reading, they need to hear stories read, ask questions, and talk about what they read — at school and at home. Just like all forms of language, reading requires interaction among people.
4. Reading and writing develop together. Encouraging children to write at all ages (even when it just looks like scribbling) can help them read better and see the connections between reading and writing.
5. Reading involves complex thinking. Reading is a problem-solving activity. It involves thinking at different levels — from getting the gist, to being able to compare what is read in one text with another, and applying what is read in new readings.
6. Access to many different kinds of reading and writing materials — library books, magazines, newspapers, other resources, and supportive adults — all make a huge difference in learning to read. Children need to see adults reading so it seems important.
7. Children must be interested and motivated to learn to read. It is important for children to be able to select materials to read that are interesting to them on topics they care about and can relate to.
8. Children's understandings of print are not the same as adults' understandings. Adults must adjust their expectations based on the developmental stages and prior knowledge of the children they are teaching. Initially children become aware that print carries a message, and gradually realize that groups of letters stand for certain sounds, and that print matches spoken words.
9. Phonemic awareness (the ability to hear separate speech sounds within words), and phonics (the connections between letters and sounds) are very important to learning to read. Many children will learn these skills as they are read to, and as they practice writing, sing repetitive songs, and work with the alphabet. Other children learn these skills best with explicit instruction.
10. Children need to learn many different reading strategies. Readers need to be taught how to pay attention to certain things (letter-sound relationships, context clues, and word patterns) depending on the type of text. Readers also need to learn how to self-monitor for comprehension.
11. There's no evidence that there's one best way to teach reading. Rather, teachers must have a variety of ways to meet children's needs such as reading aloud, shared and independent reading, and guided reading practice.
12. Children need the opportunity to read, read, read. The more children read, the better readers they become — at school and at home. One of the best ways to practice is for kids to read books and other materials they choose.
13. Monitoring and assessing how children are reading is important to their success as readers. Children's mistakes in reading can tell a lot about how well children are doing. Listening to a child read, asking questions, and observing are ways teachers assess regularly. Standardized tests provide another way of measuring children's progress compared with other students. Other tests show how well students are achieving compared to how they should be achieving at grade levels (for example, at fourth, seventh, and 10th grades). This type of assessment can give parents and teachers valuable information so that if a child is not performing at a particular level, help can be given to get the child "back on track."

Context

Three Important Things

1. Learning to read is like learning anything else: It happens over time, with practice, and with the help of others. Children develop reading (and writing) behaviors in a developmental sequence — they do certain things at certain times as they become more and more knowledgeable.
2. Many experiences and activities help children learn to read:
  - Talking and interacting with others
  - Recognizing and connecting sounds and letters
  - Experiencing new places and situations
  - Instruction on specific reading strategies
  - Exposure to all types of reading materials from a child's earliest days throughout the school years
3. Children learn to read best when they have books and other reading materials at home and plenty of chances to read and talk about what they are reading.

Citation

Davis, Deborah (Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory), and Jan Patricia Lewis (Pacific Lutheran University). Tips for Parents About Reading: Information and ideas for helping children through grade eight succeed with reading. Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory's Comprehensive Center, Region X and Curriculum and Instruction Services. October 1997.