Teaching Reading Painlessly
Teaching reading has been one of my greatest delights in home schooling. I am a little sad everyday as Alexander learns just a little more. I love to teach kids to read. I love how their eyes will light up when they finally get it. So how do you do it? Teaching reading is different for every child/parent relationship. In other words what worked wonderful with child number one may not work at all for child number two. So be prepared to change your approach if needed.
This is what teaching a child to read looks like in my home:
The first thing we do is read, read, read all the time. Letting our preschooler see us reading for pleasure. When my kids turn three we go to the library and we check out books. I do this on a regular basis (at least once a week) and we bring home 10-15 books. And I read, dad reads, sister reads… everyone reads to the preschooler.
Each of my children have come to me between the ages of three and four and said mommy I want to learn to read. I promptly tell them that reading is lots of work so we need to practice working hard and then I teach them to make their bed and fold the dish towels. These are things they have usually already been doing but now they become chores. We practice working hard. I have them dry dishes, wipe the table, try to sweep (this is too funny to watch). After a few weeks of working hard then we are ready to learn to read. This has helped to accomplish several things. The first it helps me to find out if my child is obedient because after folding the third dish towel the child will say, "I’m tired". They must obey and finish the job even though it is hard. You can not teach a disobedient child. It also helps to build their excitement about reading.
When I think they are ready I pull out the book Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons and I start going through it with them. I go at the child’s pace. If they are tired after one exercise we put it up for another time. I watch them for tired cues squirming, rubbing their eyes, yawning, mixing up letters. Little ones tire easily especially if you are teaching reading very young. I never push. Short lessons are the key to success. I never spend 20 min. at a time. Usually the lessons are less than 5 minutes in one sitting.
I do not do the writing component of the book at all. I teach my children to read before I ever teach them to write. If you are teaching an older child the writing can be taught easily along with the reading. I make reading lesson time a cuddle time. We curl up in a chair with the book and do our lesson. I never let my child see my frustration if the forget the sound for the 100th time. I promptly correct any mistakes they make by just saying the correct sound and then I have them start the word over.
This book has worked for three of my four children. My oldest learned to read before the age of four. My third child learned to read a little after four. And my son is now learning to read at almost five. We have had no tears over reading with these three kids. The two girls each quit using the book about 3/4 of the way through and were reading at a second grade level.
Now you ask what about the one it did not work for. You will probably have a child that struggles with reading. I believe that every homeschool mom usually does because children all have different gifts. I used this book with my second daughter at the age of 3.5 for several months and decided it was not time and I put it down. I picked it up at 4.5 for several months and decided it was not time. I tried again at 5.5 and realized we might have a problem. I tried using another curriculum that made the problems worse. At the age of 6 she told me that she did not need to do school that it was okay. Now we were still reading those 10-15 library books a week to her during this time and even had started longer read alouds. She did participate in school and was required to do all the hands on activities and coloring. So I promptly decided to quit reading to her! (gasp)
She needed to be motivated. I bought another curriculum which did not work. I cried daily in the solitude of my bedroom and told my husband I thought she would never read fluently. I prayed for God to intervene. She was 7 by this time and still only barely reading words such as cat, bat, hat. I picked up a used curriculum at a yard sale when we were out of state visiting my grandmother that summer. So she was 7.5 years. The curriculum was "Sing Spell Read Write" She was reading by the time she was 8. I do not even know how it happened. We were struggling daily through the lessons. One day I walked in and she was reading to her younger sister. My mouth was hanging open! I truly do not think it was the curriculum that we used I think that she just needed time.
My encouragement to you if you have a child that is struggling with reading is to not give up. To keep going forward but to not push too hard. Each child will read when they are ready. Always make reading enjoyable and a delight and they will want to learn. Throw out any and all curriculum that steals your joy or that of your child.
Heavenly Father, Thank you for the ability to read and write. I take such joy in reading Your word. Help us as we teach our children this skill. Show us how to best teach our children. Help us to not compare them with others of the same age but to let each child grow and mature in the way you made them. Help us to seek you for wisdom when we need it and to listen closely to Your leading for each of our children. Amen.
Whitney