How do you teach beginning readers?

Teaching Beginning Readers

Research has proven that students who enter kindergarten not knowing their letters are at risk. So if they learn their letters easily, the risk can be diminished. 

Jan Richardson collected data on students who enter kindergarten knowing less than 40 letters and concluded that two instructional procedures have quickly taught letter names, letter sounds, and many concepts of print to students that did not know above 40 letters. They were daily letter tracing practice and small group guided reading guided reading.

📌THIS IMAGE FOR LATER

She recommends that a helper works with a student each day to tracing an ABC book. The ABC book is designed to teach letter names (upper and lower case). 

She recommends that students say the name of the letter twice as they trace the letter in the ABC book because students with very limited letter knowledge are likely to become overwhelmed if asked to learn the letter name and letter sound at the same time (Lipson & Wixson, 2010, Successful Approaches to RTI ). 

So add the sounds later.

How do you teach letters and sounds?

I have found that using arrows and starting dot point to help kiddos trace has made all the difference.

If students know the name of the letter it will be easier for them to remember the sound of the letter since the sound for the letter is often embedded in the name of the letter  (Lipson & Wixson, 2010, Successful Approaches to RTI, p. 42).

HOW TO DO IT

Sitting next to the student, have them trace each upper and lowercase letter with their finger and identify the picture while saying the names (i.e. “A, a, apple. B, b, ball.”). It’s important for the student to use their pointer finger (not a pencil or marker) and trace from top to bottom because “the tactile experience is essential for building a memory trace,” says Richardson. 

If the student needs help tracing, only help with the letters that are necessary with the hand-over-hand method. 

If they can identify 10-40 letters, they will trace the whole book daily.

ADAPT-If a student knows less than 10 letters, just have them trace the letters in their name.

other fun things I do to Help

Other fun ways to work with other phonological awareness skills. Here are a few ideas:

• working with letters-Games for Letter Work 
• working with sounds-Songs for Letters and Sounds
• reading a very easy book/poems with the teacher-Alphabet Poems
• writing daily-Writing with Rhyming Posters 

These activities integrate a variety of skills including early print concepts (Click here for free concepts of print handout), phonemic awareness, phonics, visual memory, visual scanning, letter formation, directionality, and using picture clues; students learn that reading makes sense. 

Catching readers early means we can close the achievement gap and prevent many of them from experiencing difficulty learning to read. 

Once they know a few letters and a vowel (I teach /a/ first) you can start teaching them how to blend. Check out How To Teach Blending the Right Way

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Make everyday magical,

Hugs,

💖Debora from Teach Magically