Supporting Kindergarten and 1 st Grade Readers: Reinforcing Reading Strategies at Home

How can I help my child as he or she grows as a reader?

Reading is Thinking… Before Reading Strategies  Look at the title and activate prior knowledge. What do you know about this topic?  Connect to children’s experiences and help them make connections. What do you think is going to happen in this book (predict)?

Before Reading Strategies  Look at the pictures before and during the reading. Have your child look through the pictures and think about what is happening (overview of the text). Fiction: Build a sense of story (characters, setting, events) Nonfiction: Preview the features (table of contents, photographs, headings, captions, bold faced words, index, glossary)

During Reading Strategies  Focus on directionality. Put your finger on the first word. Which way do you read? Show me where you go to read the next part.

During Reading Strategies  Focus on 1:1 correspondence. Point to each word as you read. Did that match? The ball is red.

Three Reading Cue Systems MEANING (Semantic) Does it make sense? Sense of StoryPrior Knowledge Grammatical Patterns and Language Structure Knowledge of the English Language Visual/ Spatial Concepts Sound/Symbol Relationships VISUAL (Graphophonic) Does it look right? STRUCTURE (Syntactic) Does it sound right?

Meaning My sister and I like to play with dolls. My sister and I like to play with doing. Did that make sense? Look at the pictures. What happened in the story? What do you think it might be?

Structure Yesterday it snowed. Yesterday it snowing. Did that sound right? Can you reread that? Can you say it another way? What is another word that might fit here?

Visual The hamburger is on the dish. The hamburger is on the table. Does it look right? What sound/letter does it start with? Point to the words. Did that match? Can you point to______? Can you find______?

When your child is stuck on a tricky word Give wait time…try it 1. Ask her to go back and reread the sentence and think about what would make sense. 2. Tell him to look at the picture to help him think about what would make sense. 3. When she takes a guess, prompt her to look at the word to see if it looks like the word she said. Look and listen to beginning sound, ending sound, etc.

When your child is stuck on an unknown word 4. Ask her if there is any part of the word that she might recognize (-at because she knows cat; -un because she knows fun; -im because it is in her name, etc.) 5. Once he reads the word, ask him to go back and reread. This helps build fluency and reinforces meaning.

cat hip the up chip laugh A word about “sounding it out”…

 *If your child seems unsure of him/herself when reading a word correctly, you can still prompt with these strategies.  This will help teach children to monitor their own reading, cross check using strategies learned, and build confidence.  Then you have an opportunity to praise them-not just stop them when they are wrong or struggling.

After Reading Strategies  Talk about the story. What did you like most? What did you notice? What do you think about…?  Model your own thinking about the book. This makes me think about…I wonder why the author…  Have child locate words he/she knows. CAN YOU POINT TO _____? SHOW ME _____.

Most of all… HAVE FUN!  Read stories together and talk about them.  Read to your child and with your child. Try different genres like poetry and nonfiction.  Let your child see you read.

Questions? Thank you for supporting your children as readers. Enjoy your classroom visits!