When Reading at Home
by Judy Barnica
When helping your child read at home, several strategies may be used to aid in decoding unknown words.
1.
Tell the child to look at the picture. You may tell the child the
word is something that can be seen in the picture, if it is the
case.
2. Tell the child to look for chunks in the word, such as it
in sit, or at in mat, or and and
ing in standing.
3. Ask the child to get his/her mouth ready to say the word by
shaping the mouth for the beginning letter.
4. Ask the child if the word looks like another word he/she knows.
Does cook look like look?, for example.
5. Ask the child to go on and read to the end of the
sentence. Have a child
then go back and reread the sentence. Often by reading the
other words in context, the child can figure out the unknown
word.
6.
If the child says the wrong word while reading, ask questions
like:
Does it look right?
Does it sound right?
Does it make sense?
The 3 Bs
It is very important for parents to have lots of types of reading materials available for children to read at home. Keep in mind the 3 most popular places for placing books, magazines, newspapers, and other items that have words on them.
A
basket of books in the BATHROOM
A box or basket of reading material in the BEDROOM
Cereal boxes and newspapers at the BREAKFAST TABLE
