Reading text written in capitals.

[George9978]

A have a Dc that is a very good reader, however I have just realised he struggles when text is all capitals.

When do children become good at this? I understand it's due to the shape of words not being the same.

Are there any reccomended ways to help with this?

Thanks.

Why is he TRYING to read all capitals? In what circumstances is text in only capitals?

You don't give any indication of age/Yr group.

Does he manage capitals at the start of a sentence, or in names and places? Does he write, and use capitals when appropriate?

In some word processors it is possible to change from lower to upper case (small to capitals) by selecting the text and using the appropriate command or icon to change automatically. But it seems to me you are making difficulties where none should exist.

In twenty-five years of working in schools I have never come across this difficulty before!

Ferguson - don't know if it was intentional but I love that your question of why would text all be in capitals contains a word all in capitals

Has he been taught to look at the shape of words? Word shape doesn't help anyone to read accurately whether the words are in capitals or lower case, it's an ineffective strategy for reading.

"he struggles when text is all capitals."

As does everyone else. Which is why road signage, railway station name boards, signs around airports, underground maps and so on are all in mixed case. Johnson's Underground font (designed for the London Underground in the 1930s and still their main font), Kinneir and Calvert's Transport font (designed for British road signs in the 1960s and still universal) and Frutiger's Frutiger font (designed in the 1970s for Charles de Gaulle airport, but now the main face for amongst others the NHS) were designed explicitly to use lower case as the main component.

Discussion here: www.fonts.com/content/learning/fyti/situational-typography/all-caps

No he hasn't been taught shape recognition. Teacher explained it made it easier. ( also a quick google confirmed)

Dc is 5 ( reads white book band)

Lots of things are written all capitals, monopoly chance cards for example.

Duh, I will read after cooking lunch, thank you.

The shape of "he" is the same as the shape of "be" and the shape of "house" is the same as the shape of "horse" your Google is outdated and ineffective !

It's an unhelpful strategy to teach or encourage ... Best avoided totally!

Comics are all in capitals. My son, who is a good reader and who was taught to read phonetically, also finds it harder to read in all caps. He is getting better with it though through practise. Reading comics of course!

Definately taught phonics shape certainly helps though, I can see that, just as predicting helps. ( children use higher order skills don't they? )
DS is well ahead of the phonics taught in class, so there must be other things coming into play.
Teacher mentioned it as her son teaches in America where they use shape.

Not that I'm wishing for a debate, amazed that other children do not struggle with caps.

George see above, my son also struggled with all caps. :) I think we cross posted.

Thank you, yes I'm slow typing

great idea I will buy some. Thank you.

Has he been taught that capitals represent the same sounds as lowercase? Silly as it sounds I've heard teachers say "capitals say the letter name and lower case the sounds" ??

No, he's not been taught that, I taught sounds, he could read well before school.

Teacher has taught basic phonics only. Sadly she doesn't understand how to deal with outliers.

I'm guessing it just comes with time. Children don't see big blocks of capitals text untill they are older maybe? Hadn't even noticed for example that monopoly cards were capitals myself. ( most children play this at 8 years)

Thinking about it all of the crappy books we get home are lowercase. Do you teach blocks of text in capitals MrZ?

What I think it is is that they are so used to seeing lower case for the sounds that it takes a tiny bit longer to read all caps. My son could read all caps but was just a bit slower at it and got tired quicker. They know th, sh, igh etc easily but I takes a tiny bit longer to recognise TH, SH, IGH. I think what I'm trying to say is that aren't as familiar with the shape of the individual letters in all caps as lower case.

"Do you teach blocks of text in capitals"

Do you, realistically, see this often enough for it to matter?

Often authors use blocks of capitals for effect

They should be taught both capitals and lower case as representing the sounds right from the start so it doesn't cause problems

It's the same reason why people on MN shout at people who post all in caps. We do use word shape as one of our reading strategies even if we're not taught it, and capitals signify the start of sentences so help us break up the reading as we go. I find all caps harder as I'm sure most people do, though obviously I can do it! It doesn't surprise me that a 5yo finds it tricky. My 6yo takes longer over all caps when looking at signs, boxes etc.

I wouldn't worry too much - I expect he'll get better as he gets more confident with reading, and he shouldn't really come across all caps in a school context anyway.

Typing in capitals on the internet is considered to be shouting that's why people get annoyed nothing to do with word shapes

The reason it's considered shouting (given the written word is actually silent whatever form it takes) is because reading all caps is like having someone shouting in your ear - it's harder to understand what the hell they're saying because you're trying to compute the noise/shape of the words.