Top 5 Ways to Get Your Child Reading Ready

Breezy Mama Maya teaching.

My life long amazing friend Breezy Mama Maya is my go-to on all things parenting! Lucky for me, she’s also a first grade teacher who runs a tutoring program and a first-rate reading expert. The mother of three readers gave us her tips on getting your own child started.

Driving home from our summer vacation, my sons and I bopped to the First Five California’s “Teach Me” Radio announcement. Several young children sing to a fun hip hop beat reminding parents how important we are to their educational and social growth especially during their first five years of life:

”You can teach me my A-B-Cs
You can teach me my 1-2-3s.
You can teach me about rhyme and song
Keep me healthy and keep and strong.”

This simple message is a powerful reminder to parents that we are our children’s first teachers before they take one step into the classroom. I strongly believe that one of our most valuable gifts to our children is to share the values of reading.

Maya's three readers, Noah, Joshua, and Lucas.

How do we begin this journey? When do we begin this journey? What do we do?

These were my initial questions when I began teaching my three sons how to read. I wanted to empower each of my sons to become the best readers they could be. Although each of my sons learned to read in a different way, I looked for similar patterns and signals that they gave me during the reading process that allowed me to understand when they were ready to go to the next level in their reading abilities. By taking the time to listen and being aware of my sons’ learning abilities, I was able to have more successful reading outcomes. Additionally, I was able to use these lessons with my first grade students. Everyday I teach in the classroom or teach my sons, I remember these important lessons that can be summed up with the 5 ‘Rs’.

The following ‘Rs’ are my five steps to get a child ready to read:

1) Read
2) Rhyme
3) Repeat
4) Respond
5) Recognize

• Read – Read to your child as much as you can. Find the moments to completely relax and enjoy the book with your child. This is probably the most important first step because you are modeling the joys of reading. Talk about the illustrations, the characters and what might happen next in the story. These discussions will benefit your child later in their elementary school years to develop reading comprehension skills. Once you have established this pattern, then begin introducing the letter sounds with flashcards, ABC games and books. This will be a natural transition as your child will now be able to recognize the letters in their daily lessons within the books that they are reading with you. If you feel your child is ready and familiar with the ABC sounds, begin blending the sounds together to make simple words. For example: S-A-T: Say each letter sound then blend the sounds together to say the word sat. The book I used to reinforce these skills was: Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons by Siegfried Engelmann, Phyllis Haddox, Elaine Bruner. As I combined the reading, alphabet songs, alphabet sounds and blending skills, my sons were able to read successfully the simple sentences and stories within this book.
  

  Noah reading to his Dad.

• Rhyme: Rhyming is a very important skill as you are preparing your child to read. I always play the rhyming game with my children to help reinforce the reading skills that we are learning. I think of one word such as ‘at’ and then my sons would think of 5-6 words that rhyme with the word. Then we think of a silly sentence with all the words. For example, if my sons rhymed bat, mat, cat, sat, our silly sentence would be, ‘The cat sat on the mat with the bat.’ The Dr. Seuss Books were integral during this stage of the reading process because the books helped my children to rhyme and use their imaginations to create new words and talk about the nonsensical creatures they were reading about. There are so many activities that you can do with the Dr. Seuss books. My youngest son’s favorite Dr. Seuss rhyming activity was the Dr. Seuss ABC reading program (click here to purchase).


The boys and their beloved Nana.

• Respond: I found that responding positively to my sons’ reading progress at any level, helped them to feel secure in their reading ability and they had more confidence in taking risks. The most important lesson I learned is to be specific about my praise. Instead of simply stating, ‘good job!’ I explained why my son did a good job in his reading skills. For example, “Noah, you read well today. I like the way you segmented your sounds and blended them together. You read with great expression.” Positive reinforcement encourages children to always do their best.
• Repeat: Repeating books, repeating sounds, and repeating ABC lessons are extremely important. Children need to hear the patterns continuously to help develop their reading vocabulary. The more repetition, the more successful their reading process will develop.
• Recognize: Recognizing that each child learns in a different way is huge for parents and educators as we teach children to learn how to read. There are three different ways in which children learn: visual, tactile or auditory. Most of us are visual learners but my three sons all learned differently. My oldest son had to feel the letters and flashcards while we were learning the alphabet and the alphabet sounds. My oldest son had to feel the connection between the sounds and the letters. On the other hand, my middle son learned visually and he thrived with a phonics based reading program that also included illustrations. Finally, my youngest son learned through songs and games that we created. His energy level was too high for sitting still and looking at books for too long. We learned to sing and dance to our alphabet songs and each dance move would be an alphabet sound. It does sound exhausting but once you recognize your child’s learning style, the creative juices begin to flow. Your ultimate goal is to find what works for your child’s learning style. I always looked at teacher’s websites for inspiration and ideas to help me teach my sons.

Joshua gets a hug from Lucas in his classroom.

After applying these five ‘Rs’ to my reading lessons, I also included the most important lessons that I learned from my sons. Preparing young children to read takes time, patience and love.

Our gift of reading to our children prepares them to learn how to read and to be ready for their educational future. As the First Five California Radio Announcement ends, the children sing:

“The more I learn, the more I grow
Teach me, mold me, show me and give me love”.

I don’t think I could have said it better! Good luck on your reading journey and enjoy the wonderful benefits to follow.

Helpful websites for your reading journey:
http://www.starfall.com/
http://teachers.net

Breezy Mama Tip: For a video that helps your child learn to read, check out Leap Frog’s Talking Words Factory video in the Breezy Mama “Videos for Kids” story here.

Maya Ramirez Drake lives in Carlsbad with her husband Todd and their three reading sons, Noah (11), Lucas (9) and Joshua (7). She is a first grade teacher and runs the after school tutoring program,Tutor Outreach Program (TOP), at Calavera Elementary School.

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