Super Strategies for Reading

Can your child read a familiar book? Your child should find books that we send home easy to read. This develops- Reading speed Fluency Phrasing and intonation

Reading at home Most important- make it enjoyable. If your child is tired or just not in the mood, try book sharing- you read a page/ your child reads a page.

Book introduction Discuss the title- What do you think the story will be about? Look through the book- look at the pictures. Talk about the story line. Ask/answer questions. Introduce the characters and point out the character names in the text. Point out and discuss any tricky words that you know are new to your child.

How to support your child when they get stuck on a word. Ask your child to trap the word with their fingers. Blending skills. Splitting the word- e.g compound words. Look for other clues- e.g picture clues, look at the first letter of the word- what would make sense in the sentence. Missing out the word and coming back to it to check for meaning. Give thinking time- don’t rush to tell your child the word. Tell your child that a good reader does all of these things to decode tricky words.

Encourage self correction. If your child reads a word incorrectly don’t just correct them, wait until the end of the sentence then ask your child to look again at the word read incorrectly. Encourage your child to use all the strategies just discussed to self correct. Remember- we all make reading mistakes but we want children to begin to recognise when they have misread a word and self correct.

REMEMBER Praise every effort. The more your child reads the better a reader they will become. Once your child is beyond book band 6 then encourage your child to stop pointing to each word as this slows their reading down. HAPPY READING