Learning to read

[barbara818]

Hi,

Some help would be much appreciated on how to help my 5 years old with his reading.

He roughly knows his ABC and I was wondering if there are any methods you found effective to help with his learning?

Thanks so much

Jolly Phonics, The book and CD will help you with the sounds, there are a bunch of dance movement type things that go with the song.

When you say he knows his ABC do you mean he knows what sound each letter makes or that he can recite the alphabet? If he knows the letter sounds move onto teaching him digraphs (2 letters which make one sound) and trigraphs (as above but 3 letters).

Once he knows the sounds he can start to blend simple CVC and CVCC/CCVC words (c stands for consonant and v for vowel). Once he has mastered words move onto sentence and explain about the spaces between words along with the purpose of full stops/capital letters.

There are some good schemes you could use but most of these are expensive for using on just 1 child. The book people is a good place to start for phonics books.

I'm not the biggest fan of jolly phonics, IMO smart kids move off it so quick it's pointless whilst those that need more support get so caught up with the action, song and faff of it all they forget that it's about reading, blending and letter recognition.

But it can be good fun and the kids do love it.

If they know the pure sounds like the sounds 'c' 'a' and 't' in cat make rather than the letter names or the horrible 'cuh' 'ah' tuh' which just says cuhahtuh then moving on to blending. I do love alphablocks! Some good shorts on youtube. And as much as I hate them the bloody Biff, Chip, Kipper and (sodding) Floppy books are great at moving them forwards.

It's very good for parents who are unsure of the actual sounds to teach.

I just read to mine and spelled the words out at times. Didn't use a se t method.

I think that unless a child is headed for school very soon, where they will be expected to read regardless of whether they are ready and interested, it is best to get the timing right by ensuring that they are developmentally ready and truly eager - not just willng, but eager - before starting.

The road to reading is far smoother when you do that. There is no evidence that reading earlier rather than later confers any advantage within a home ed environment.

If your child is champing at the bit and begging for help with reading, you might just sample a few reading programmes with him (as well as the method of just sitting and reading with him and answering his questions) and see which method excites him most.

Does he know initial sounds? Once he knows all of those you introduce blends and then Diagraphs.

We have a child who is a phonics hater. He is making some steady progress with whole word recognition, and while we do some letterland/alphablocks because they all find it fun, I am coming to the conclusion that all the time I've spent working on phonics (with him at any rate, his brother has grasped it and is well away) has been a complete waste of time. I could have spent that time teaching him something about the world verbally, or just letting him play.

I find it really hard because although on an intellectual level I have completely rejected forced education and know I should be letting them be at least 90%, if not 100% of the time, I know he is 'behind' in reading (it's not a race, it really isn't!!) and being schooled myself, it's hard to let go of the competition, and the worry that he might actually grow up and not be able to do anything useful. I see him develop other strengths and know I should relax, I can see he's going to be able to read eventually. I also know that being read to, rather than reading early, is a bigger predictor of academic success, and we do that. It's so hard though isn't it. Wanna be my worry buddy???

The best phonics based readers I have found are these:
www.amazon.co.uk/Books-First-Bobby-Lynn-Maslen/dp/0439845009/ref=sr_1_1_twi_pap_2?keywords=bob+books+set+1&tag=mumsnetforum-21&ie=UTF8&qid=1535916849&sr=8-1
They work out at about £1 per book, and often less if you look at the different buying options. They start with just 4 letters and build from there, introducing some 'tricky' words as you go.

Thank you all for these wonderful comments! Clearly some knowledgeable moms here!

He can read words already and is making his way into sentences but I wouldn't say he his word's recognition is super strong.

Obviously the more he practices the better he'll be. was wondering if visuals might make it easier though? perhaps an image of a clown next to the word clown, what do you think?

I wouldn't use picture word cards to be honest as the child would not be reading the word they would just be recognising that the shape of those letters together went with that picture. Whilst that strategy would work for some children its not really best practice as they are not actually learning the skills needed to read words.

If you showed a child the word clown and they associated it with the picture they wouldn't be learning that the 'ow' in the word made the owwww sound and transfer that knowledge to other words with the same digraph e.g. frown and down.

True, but also wouldn't it strengthen his letter recognition by knowing clown starts with C so when he sees C again he'll know its sound ?

Def teach the sounds eg 'ou' is is diagraph. When you see those two letters together they make one sounds like in cloud, loud, shout
In shout there are 3 sounds. Sh ou t
Break it down and read each sound separately