If you are a parent, you would want to introduce your kid to reading at an early age. However, you may feel confused about how to do this, especially without a teaching background. Does it mean you cannot help your child with reading skills? Thanks to online resources, you can guide your kids in their reading development. Nowadays, various evidence-based approaches are used to help kindergarteners make gradual but effective progress in this area. They include simple tips and techniques that break the learning process into small steps, helping establish a solid foundation for children to master what they learn along the way. One of the most effective methods in this area is the Orton-Gillingham approach.
Orton Gillingham training is all about giving lessons through a structured and multi-sensory way. It helps students retain their knowledge more efficiently.
Phonological and Phonemic Skills Development
Making kids aware of different sounds in words and how to manipulate them is a crucial part of the teaching process. These basic skills allow kids to break words into small units. You can use games to introduce them to this concept. Or, consider helping them with isolating sounds. Let them figure out the first sound in the word ‘cat’ and the last sound in ‘dog.’ After this, blending practices can start, where you articulate a few sounds and kids put them together to form a word. During this learning process, kids’ listening power plays a critical role.
Letter Recognition Skills
Recognizing letters is also an essential component here. It involves making kids familiar with lowercase and uppercase letters. You also guide them on how to name the letters. As soon as they pick up the letters, it becomes easier for them to identify the sounds as well. The use of letter-based games can prove helpful during this learning phase.
Letter-Sound Coordination Skills
When children know the letters, they can associate them with their corresponding sounds easily. They are taught this relationship through a method called phonics; it helps them link letters with their associated sounds. The process can start by introducing them to common letters like “mmm” or “sss”. This type of instruction enables them to recognize the relationship between written and spoken words. You can explore workbooks that include phonics activities, among others.
Sound Blending Skills
Familiarity with the sounds of individual letters will take the children to the next stage in reading skill development. The kids can practice blending those sounds to initially make simple words that follow the straightforward consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) pattern. Think of words like dog, cat, sit, etc. During training, you can make your kid say each sound individually and then encourage him to blend them. Again, you can use workbooks to make this step of teaching more engaging for them.
Read-Aloud Sessions
During reading lessons, read aloud to attract attention to reading. It exposes them to new words, sentence formations, and ideas before they start reading by themselves. You can indicate each word while saying it aloud to help them connect with written language.
Orton-Gillingham is a comprehensive approach, and these are just a few examples of how it is made effective.
