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How to read with fluency


10 Fluency strategies for struggling readers

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How children learn to read

Learning difficulties that affect reading

Decoding and comprehension

10 Strategies for fluency

Offering encouragement and support

Read and Spell Blog

10 Fluency strategies for struggling readers

Literacy skills are one of the most important areas of ability children develop in their first few years at school. Most children begin by sounding out words and learning to recognize common vocabulary from books and classroom materials. With sight reading and more spelling practice comes greater fluency.

Reading then speeds up and comprehension of more complex texts becomes possible as vocabulary knowledge grows exponentially. However, not all students find learning to read such an easy process. Struggling readers can quickly fall behind their peers and may develop low self-esteem and a lack of confidence as a result.

Because reading ability affects performance across all areas of the curriculum, including writing skills, it’s important to provide adequate strategy training as early as possible. Ideally remediation is tailored to the individual student’s needs, particularly when a learning difficulty is involved.

Different learning difficulties affect fluency in different ways but one of the most common conditions implicated in reading problems is dyslexia. If a student has poor reading skills and a somewhat inconsistent approach to spelling –they recognize or produce a word correctly one day but not the next-- dyslexia may be involved.

There are different signs but around 70% of students with dyslexia struggle to split words into their component sounds. It is this lack of phonemic awareness that prevents accurate sound-letter mapping, which is required for spelling and decoding in early reading. A focus on phonics can help students with dyslexia. Another way to help is by taking a multi-sensory approach to teaching reading and spelling – learn more in this article on Orton-Gillingham based reading instruction.

Some kids have trouble focusing their attention on the books or classroom worksheets they are meant to be reading. For students with attention related learning difficulties, including attention deficit disorder with and without hyperactivity, the challenge is not so much in sounding out the words but concentrating long enough to process what they are reading.

Sitting still and controlling impulsive tendencies can also be problematic, particularly for students with ADHD. What’s crucial is that teachers recognize the root of the problem early on and find strategies to help enhance focus during reading sessions. One idea is choosing a regular time of day when the student is most calm, possibly after an outside exercise break. It’s also a good idea to reduce distractions and create a quiet space where they can go to read on their own.

Parents and teachers may observe reading fluency is lacking in individuals with slow processing. This is because the brain requires more time to carry out the complex cognitive processes involved in reading, from word recognition to comprehension.

Patience, time and more time may be the solution here. In some instances, a student can appear to read fluently but not actually understand what he or she is reading. This is often true for students with autism spectrum disorder—learn more in this article on reading comprehension and autism. For information on addressing fluency issues for students with visual impairments, try this article.

Pre-literacy skills

It’s extremely important and beneficial for children to read with their parents. Even 1 year-olds can enhance their vocabulary and learn more about the world as they point to objects and characters they recognize. Reading with adults helps kids understand how books work. They participate by choosing their favorite stories and turning the pages as their parents read aloud.

Ample exposure to print also gets children ready to learn the alphabet. Silly songs such as "Old McDonald Had a Farm" are used to enhance phonemic awareness and help kids develop their control over stress, rhyme and rhythm in language. Discussing their day and reciting sequences of events is a precursor for understanding how narrative works.

Learn more in 6 pre-literacy skills parents can encourage.

Decoding & comprehension

Reading is a complex cognitive task that involves parallel activity in different areas of the brain. Readers must decode the letters on a page, recognize the words they are made up of and make meaning out of groups of words, sentences and paragraphs. Issues concerning reading fluency can stem from decoding skills, comprehension skills or both. Learn more in this article on common reading problems.

Decoding

This is the process of recognizing letters and words and sounding them out. Decoding is easier said than done in English, a language in which multiple letters can be used to represent the same sounds. The only way to effectively learn how to pronounce common vowel and consonant clusters is to have seen them before. This is one reason why learning to touch-type and drilling letter combinations on a keyboard helps struggling readers. This is especially true if audio recordings of the words are played at the same time. 

Comprehension

Fluency can also be affected by a failure to understand what is being read. Readers are required to hold a number of details and contextual clues in memory in order to make connections and pick up on gist, inference and main ideas in the text. If comprehension is a struggle, it can interrupt fluency as students find they cannot follow what they are reading and need to go back to re-read earlier parts of the text. In the same way, focusing too much on decoding can prevent struggling readers from paying attention to the content of a reading.

10 Strategies for fluency

  1. Record students reading aloud on their own. If certain sound-letter combinations or words are causing problems, teachers will benefit from listening to the child read out loud. However, this activity can be extremely stressful in front of a classroom of kids, particularly for a student who struggles with fluency. It is best to avoid calling on struggling readers during group reading and instead have them work through a paragraph on their own. Make a recording that can be analyzed later on by a teacher or tutor in order to provide targeted help.

  2. Ask kids to use a ruler or finger to follow along. Decoding is easier when students don’t lose their place as they move across a page. It’s up to the individual student how they go about this. Some may want to use a pen or pencil, others a piece of paper that they move down to cover the bottom of the page and stay focused on the sentence in front of them. This is also a good strategy for readers with ADHD because it involves a kinesthetic element.

  3. Have them read the same thing several times. When you’re trying to improve fluency, it helps to see the same text multiple times. Each reading becomes easier and motivation goes up as students experience enhanced fluency thanks to repeat exposure to words and phrases. It can also help when it comes to developing comprehension skills as readers have more opportunities to notice contextual cues.

  4. Pre-teach vocabulary. Prime the words a student is going to see in a text and practice reading them in isolation or in phrases. You might do this via an interactive classroom based activity. Get students to use the words and then practice reading them from the board or on a piece of paper. Crossword puzzles can be an effective teaching tool or playing a spelling game. It’s much easier to read a word if it is fresh in memory.

  5. Drill sight words. Some words are more common than others and students who have a hard time with fluency will find it is much easier to read when they are familiar with 90% of the vocabulary in a text. Around 50% of all books and classroom based materials for young readers are composed of words from the Dolch List. Learn more in our post on teaching sight words.

  6. Make use of a variety of books and materials. If a student has difficulty with reading it can be even more of a struggle to practice with material that is not of interest to them. Sometimes all it takes is getting readers excited about a topic to help them lose themselves in the activity. Try chapter books, comics and poems. Even picture books can work as long as the student doesn’t perceive the material as being below their level. Experiment with texts of different lengths starting with shorter material and gradually working up to longer pieces. TOP TIP: Where fluency is concerned, emphasize the quality of the student’s reading, not the quantity of pages or speed at which they read them.

  7. Try different font and text sizes. If there’s a visual impairment that is causing some of the difficulty, reading larger text or text printed on color tinted paper can sometimes make things easier. There are specific fonts which are more appropriate for anyone with learning difficulties, including dyslexia, because they help with discerning letters and decoding language.

  8. Create a stress free environment. When students are enjoying a book, anxiety and stress are reduced and fluency is enhanced. It’s also possible to foster a relaxing environment by removing any deadlines, time-limits or assessment related goals and just focusing on classroom reading for reading’s sake.

  9. Guide students to help them establish a steady pace. One of the hallmarks of fluent reading is establishing a consistent rhythm and pace that guides students through a text. This doesn’t need to be fast and in the beginning new readers should have the option to start slow and increase their pace as they become more comfortable. Some students will want to have a guide, such as a metronome, which gives them a rhythm they can match. Others will find this strategy stressful. Playing music in the background might also work – or not!

  10. Introduce a typing course. If a student continues to struggle with fluency, teachers, tutors and parents may consider introducing an extra-curricular program designed to enhance literacy skills. A multi-sensory course like Touch-type Read and Spell can be used at home and in school to learn typing and enhance spelling and sight reading at the same time. An audio component accompanies letters on the screen while students type the corresponding keys. Automated feedback and coursework is divided into discrete modules and independent lessons foster self-directed learning and enhance motivation and self-efficacy in new readers. 

Learn more

Offering encouragement and support

Reading and writing are essential skills and when fluency does not come naturally, strategy instruction based around the individual student’s needs is crucial to help new readers gain the confidence they need to be successful at school.

Regardless of the intervention, progress takes time to achieve. That’s why it is a good idea to schedule a plan of action and set up attainable goals for improving fluency in the long-run.
 
Parents may consider hiring a private tutor – learn more about how to choose a tutor – and teachers can adjust classroom practices to create a less stressful environment in which children can hone their skills.

Above all, students need to be made aware that learning difficulties and reading ability have nothing to do with intelligence and understand that effort is more important than results. This will encourage a healthy self-image and help them maintain the motivation required to improve their skills.

Read more about encouraging children with learning difficulties, or try our tips for motivating students to read.

Do you have any tips on enhancing fluency for struggling readers? Please share them in the comments!

About the Author 

Meredith Cicerchia is a teaching affiliate at the University of Nottingham, an education consultant, and a freelance writer who covers topics ranging from speech and language difficulties and specific learning differences, to strategies for teaching English as a second and additional language.

Reviewed by 

Chris Freeman has a BA cum laude in Sociology, and has undertaken post grad work in education and educational technology. She spent 20+ years working in public health and in the charity sector.

Read and Spell Blog 10 Fluency strategies for struggling readersEstimated reading time:

Fluency | Reading Rockets

Fluency is defined as the ability to read with speed, accuracy, and proper expression. In order to understand what they read, children must be able to read fluently whether they are reading aloud or silently. When reading aloud, fluent readers read in phrases and add intonation appropriately. Their reading is smooth and has expression.

Children who do not read with fluency sound choppy and awkward. Those students may have difficulty with decoding skills or they may just need more practice with speed and smoothness in reading. Fluency is also important for motivation; children who find reading laborious tend not to want read! As readers head into upper elementary grades, fluency becomes increasingly important. The volume of reading required in the upper elementary years escalates dramatically. Students whose reading is slow or labored will have trouble meeting the reading demands of their grade level.

What the problem looks like

A kid's perspective: What this feels like to me

Children will usually express their frustration and difficulties in a general way, with statements like "I hate reading!" or "This is stupid!". But if they could, this is how kids might describe how fluency difficulties in particular affect their reading:

  • I just seem to get stuck when I try to read a lot of the words in this chapter.
  • It takes me so long to read something.
  • Reading through this book takes so much of my energy, I can't even think about what it means.

A parent's perspective: What I see at home

Here are some clues for parents that a child may have problems with fluency:

  • He knows how to read words but seems to take a long time to read a short book or passage silently.
  • She reads a book with no expression.
  • He stumbles a lot and loses his place when reading something aloud.
  • She reads aloud very slowly.
  • She moves her mouth when reading silently (subvocalizing).

A teacher's perspective: What I see in the classroom

Here are some clues for teachers that a student may have problems with fluency:

  • Her results on words-correct-per-minute assessments are below grade level or targeted benchmark.
  • She has difficulty and grows frustrated when reading aloud, either because of speed or accuracy.
  • He does not read aloud with expression; that is, he does not change his tone where appropriate.
  • She does not "chunk" words into meaningful units.
  • When reading, he doesn't pause at meaningful breaks within sentences or paragraphs.

How to help

With the help of parents and teachers, kids can learn strategies to cope with fluency issues that affect his or her reading. Below are some tips and specific things to do.

What kids can do to help themselves

  • Track the words with your finger as a parent or teacher reads a passage aloud. Then you read it.
  • Have a parent or teacher read aloud to you. Then, match your voice to theirs.
  • Read your favorite books and poems over and over again. Practice getting smoother and reading with expression.

What parents can do to help at home

  • Support and encourage your child. Realize that he or she is likely frustrated by reading.
  • Check with your child's teachers to find out their assessment of your child's word decoding skills.
  • If your child can decode words well, help him or her build speed and accuracy by:
    • Reading aloud and having your child match his voice to yours
    • Having your child practice reading the same list of words, phrase, or short passages several times
    • Reminding your child to pause between sentences and phrases
  • Read aloud to your child to provide an example of how fluent reading sounds.
  • Give your child books with predictable vocabulary and clear rhythmic patterns so the child can "hear" the sound of fluent reading as he or she reads the book aloud.
  • Use books on tapes; have the child follow along in the print copy.

What teachers can do to help at school

  • Assess the student to make sure that word decoding or word recognition is not the source of the difficulty (if decoding is the source of the problem, decoding will need to be addressed in addition to reading speed and phrasing).
  • Give the student independent level texts that he or she can practice again and again. Time the student and calculate words-correct-per-minute regularly. The student can chart his or her own improvement.
  • Ask the student to match his or her voice to yours when reading aloud or to a tape recorded reading.
  • Read a short passage and then have the student immediately read it back to you.
  • Have the student practice reading a passage with a certain emotion, such as sadness or excitement, to emphasize expression and intonation.
  • Incorporate timed repeated readings into your instructional repertoire.
  • Plan lessons that explicitly teach students how to pay attention to clues in the text (for example, punctuation marks) that provide information about how that text should be read.

More information

Find out more about fluency issues with these resources:

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How to teach a child to read fluently in grades 1-3

Today, many parents want their children to master speed reading, because this skill directly affects school performance. If the student is able to read quickly and memorize what he read well, then mastering the material from textbooks and various manuals will not cause difficulties. There are many ways to take reading skills to the next level. Which of them are best for schoolchildren and how to teach a child to read fluently in grades 1-3?

Rapid reading technique

The ability to work with information is the most important skill of a modern person, which he acquires in childhood and improves throughout his life. Since we draw most of our knowledge from textbooks and books, the ability to quickly work with text is of particular importance. Already in the first grade or even before school, kids gradually learn to read and write, learn to read syllables, words and whole sentences. Over time, their skills improve and hone, but is such progress enough for a productive and high-quality acquaintance with the text?

The older the child gets, the more textual information he has to work with. The school curriculum is gradually becoming more complex, more and more new subjects appear. At some point, the child may be faced with the fact that doing homework takes a lot of time. Often this is due to the fact that the reading skills acquired in elementary school were not given enough attention. Even if a child reads aloud or to himself quickly enough, he may have difficulty understanding and remembering what he read. That is why it is so important to pay attention to the ability to work with text.

It is not uncommon for elementary schools to test reading skills to allow the teacher to assess how quickly a student can reproduce a given text aloud. It does not matter how well he absorbs the material at the same time. Because of this, it often happens that children either read quickly or try to understand and remember what they read. Few people manage to combine these approaches to familiarization with the text. That is why more and more parents are thinking about how to teach their child a quick reading technique without losing the quality of assimilation of information.

How to teach a child to read fluently

Learning to read quickly involves several stages at once, each of which is important. First you need to work out the primary skills of working with text in order to teach the child to read at speed, since this is the basis of any speed reading methods. In order for the student to be able to work with the text faster, it is necessary to correct the most common shortcomings that are most common in children:

  • reading by syllables. It is necessary to gradually teach kids to read words in their entirety, because reading by syllable negatively affects the speed of reproduction and perception of textual information.
  • insufficient concentration while reading. If students are constantly distracted, then it is difficult for them to grasp the meaning of the work, so you need to train to maintain attention in the process of familiarizing yourself with the book. Otherwise, the student will constantly return to the part already read, as he has lost the thread of the story. It will also significantly slow down the reading speed.
  • pronouncing the words to yourself. It is necessary to try to suppress internal articulation, otherwise it will not be possible to achieve such a reading speed that would be faster than the speed of oral speech.

When the period of work on the mistakes has passed, you can proceed to the study of viewing reading. At this stage, you need to expand the angle of view and teach the child to read the text not line by line, but in whole blocks. To do this, you have to give up the habit of concentrating on any particular line. This period is the most difficult

when teaching speed reading, but it is precisely this period that allows you to learn how to absorb a whole page of text in a few seconds.

Benefits of speed reading in grades 1-3

The ability to read quickly affects a child's progress and motivation to study, even in elementary school. The easier it is for children to work with text, the easier it is for them to do homework. And this is not only about those subjects that involve oral work with the text. The writing literacy of children who read well is much higher than that of those children who have difficulty working with text.

When a child consciously reads literary works, he intuitively memorizes the spelling of previously unfamiliar words. Even understanding how to punctuate improves over time. This is especially noticeable when writing essays at school. Children with a good reading skill write them more competently, understand where to put commas, question marks and exclamation marks. They master the division of the text into its constituent parts faster than their peers, better understand the main idea of ​​what they read.

Another important plus is that the ability to read quickly allows the child to fall in love with books. When reading literary works is easy, getting to know them is much more interesting. And, conversely, weak text skills are very often the reason for the negative attitude of schoolchildren to books.

All this makes the method of speed reading one of the most popular programs of additional education, because it can significantly improve the skills of children and give them a good basis for further mastering knowledge at school. But is it possible to learn speed reading at home?

Methods of teaching children speed reading

Assimilation of any curriculum requires regular training. Only by observing the frequency of classes, you can improve your skills and achieve visible results. If we are talking about schoolchildren, then it can be difficult for them to plan their day on their own and devote time daily to exercises to master speed reading. Parents also do not always have the opportunity to help their child with studies at school, and to work with him additionally. That is why adults are increasingly sending their children to speed reading courses, where they manage to maintain the regularity of training. But what activities are best for students?

In order not to make a mistake with the choice, you need to pay attention to the methodology by which the training is conducted. It should be as effective as possible so that the time and effort spent on training is not wasted. Given that the students in this case are children, the learning process should take place in a playful way. It is this type of lesson that allows you to better absorb the material and not be distracted during the lesson. It is worth giving preference to those courses that have passed the test of time with dignity and have proven their effectiveness.

Thanks to the speed reading method, children not only learn to read fluently, but also acquire important skills for good reading comprehension and retention. Thanks to this, schooling is much easier. In the future, such skills will become an excellent basis for reaching new heights in adulthood, because the ability to work with information in a quality manner will always be relevant.

A proven method for teaching a child to spell fluently

Many of us still remember that same red primer with a big bright letter "A" on the cover. Thanks to this book, millions of children quickly learned to read. Time has passed, and now these children have matured and become parents themselves. But now they no longer turn to the very book from which they themselves once learned to read. Today, there are so many methods for teaching children to read that you can easily get confused - what to choose in order to quickly teach a child to read and, most importantly, correctly. Tyulenev's technique is designed to teach kids almost from the cradle, Zaitsev's cubes and the rough letters of Maria Montessori promise miracles in learning. Young parents rush between all these ways, and with them their child.

And yet, how to teach a child to read, what methodology to give preference to, when to start teaching and with what? These questions concern many young fathers and mothers. But few of them think about the fact that learning letters and being able to put them into words and phrases with sentences is not at all the most important thing.

Early development of babies is very fashionable now. As soon as the child is one year old, they already begin to teach him to read and count. But it has already been proven that this is fraught with consequences for the emerging psyche of children. The belief that the sooner a child’s education is started, the better, is wrong. According to neurologists, parents who strive for very early learning can harm their baby.

Let's see how the child is formed.

– From early pregnancy to three years, the first functional block of the brain is formed, which is responsible for the emotional, cognitive and bodily perception of the child.

- At the age of three and up to five years - eight years, the second functional block of the brain is formed. It governs perception: sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch.

According to ophthalmologists, early teaching of a child to read is fraught with consequences for the eyes - myopia may develop from premature visual stress. Experts do not recommend learning to read before the age of five or six. Before this age, the formation of the ciliary muscle, which is responsible for visual acuity, occurs.

– The development of a child's conscious mental activity occurs between the ages of seven and fifteen.

The functional blocks of the brain are formed sequentially. All attempts by parents to "jump" any of the stages will negatively affect the development of natural processes that occur in the child's body in a given period. There is simply a distortion in the natural development of the baby. The consequences of a child's early learning may not be immediately apparent. That is what they are fraught with. Years later, this can affect the emotional and personal relationships with people. And it can also result in an unpredictable form: stuttering, tics, neurosis, various speech disorders and obsessive movements.

How can you tell if a child is physiologically ready to learn to read?

- the child has developed speech, he can speak in sentences and compose a coherent story;

- the baby has no speech pathology disorders. And here we mean not only the correct pronunciation of individual sounds, but also violations of the rhythm and melody of speech;

- the child is well oriented in space, not getting confused in the concepts of top and bottom, right - left;

- the child's phonemic hearing is quite developed - he easily recognizes the sound not only at the beginning of a word, but also in its middle part and at the end of a word.

How to properly teach a child to read so as not to cause tears, reproaches and resentment? This question is often asked by parents of future first-graders. Of course, you can stop at the usual method for everyone. It comes down to daily monotonous activities, during which the child learns to write hooks and sticks, and also reads the primer. But all moms and dads know that such activities bring boredom, fatigue and irritation, the child does not learn to read thoughtfully. As a result, a reluctance to study develops. And although the child will receive certain knowledge and skills, such training is unlikely to become for him a good school for the development of feelings and emotions, as well as a means of learning about the world around him and himself in it. To make learning an exciting game and turn it into a joint creative process of children and adults, so that the child learns to read correctly and quickly, choose a different path.

Just as babies learn to understand spoken language, they must learn to read words and sentences. But the most important thing is that it is quite real and the facts confirm it.

Scientists have proven that the eye sees but is not aware of what it sees; The ear perceives sound, but does not understand what it hears. The whole process of understanding this happens purely in the brain.

When we hear a spoken word or sentence, the sounds are split into several electrochemical impulses that are sent to the brain. Our brain connects all these impulses together and perceives their meaning and meaning. A similar action occurs with vision. Our eyes see what is written, but do not understand it. The brain does not see what is written, but understands it.

Visual and auditory endings are passed through the brain, which processes the information received. In the event that the baby would have to master only one of the many skills, then the ability to read would undoubtedly become such a skill. It is it that is the basis of all types of standard, formal and non-formal education.

How to quickly teach a child to read so that he does not get tired and does not lose interest? Exercise regularly, but not for long. For the first lessons, five to ten minutes will be enough. Gradually, this time can be increased to thirty minutes. Conduct a lesson in the form of a game - the child should be easy, interesting and not bored.

Before starting the reading technique, learn all the letters with your child. Cubes will help a lot with this. The pictures drawn on them will help you recognize the subject and associate it with the letter. Teach your baby to name the letters correctly: watermelon - "A", house - "D", etc. Play a game with your baby - ask him to find the letter "A". At the same time, do not rush to give hints. The child must learn to independently find the right cube. If he can't, he needs help.

HOW EASY TO TEACH YOUR CHILD TO READ

10 important tips to help you teach your child to read correctly :

TIP 1

What method of teaching reading to follow? When teaching your child to read in syllables, give preference to the usual primer, which was compiled by K. Zhukova. This book is an effective helper for a child who is learning to understand how to put letters into syllables, syllables into words, and these words into whole sentences. There are few pictures in the book, but they are quite enough so that the child is not bored.

TIP 2

In what order to learn vowels and consonants. First, we teach the child open vowels - A, O, U, E, Y. Now you can proceed to hard consonants - M, N. But make sure that the child pronounces them correctly: not “em”, and not “me”, but simply “m”. The next in line are deaf and hissing sounds: Ш, С, etc.

TIP 3

Remember to review the material from the previous lesson with your child every time. Remember together what sounds you learned in the last lesson. By consolidating the material covered, you will help develop a competent reading mechanism in your child.

TIP 4

How to teach your child to read in syllables. When your child has mastered some of the sounds, you can begin to teach him to put letters into syllables. This is not at all difficult, as it seems at first.

Look in the primer. Show your baby how the first letter of the syllable "m" hurries to the second letter "a". Explain to the child that this is how it should be pronounced: m-m-ma-a-a - m-m-ma-a-a. In such an accessible form, the child understands that one letter runs to another. As a result, they speak together, without separating from each other.

TIP 5

Now let's start learning simple syllables. To easily teach a child to read, you need to start with simple syllables, in which there are only two letters: ma, la, ra, mu, mo. The kid must master and understand how two letters form a syllable. It is important for him to master the mechanism of reading by syllables. After he understands this, he will easily learn to read more difficult syllables - with deaf and hissing consonants: shi, yes, in, etc.

TIP 6

You can start learning more complex syllables. Do not rush to read words or books. Give your child a better understanding of the mechanism of reading by syllables. Just complicate the task - read with him syllables that begin with a vowel: am, av, he, y.

TIP 7

After all the syllables are mastered, we start reading the simplest words: “ma - ma”, “ra - ma”, “we - lo”.

TIP 8

How easy is it to teach a child to read by syllables? Be sure to teach your child to pronounce syllables correctly. This is a guarantee that he will learn to read well. Note. According to one of the methods, teachers and educators in kindergartens teach children to sing syllables. Kids quickly get used to it and sing syllables constantly in one breath. However, they do not make any pauses between words. Some kids get so carried away that they sing the entire paragraph without respecting the punctuation marks - periods, exclamation marks and question marks. If you decide to teach your child to read, do it well. No need to let the child sing everything. Pay attention to the pauses between words, and especially between sentences. Teach your child to this order: sang the word - pause, sang the second - pause. In the future, he himself will learn to shorten the pauses. But at the beginning of training, it is simply necessary to do them.

TIP 9

What is the best age to teach a child to read? Do not get ahead of events. At the age of three or four, it is unlikely that your child will be interested in poring over books, learning to read and putting letters into syllables. At this age, it is definitely too early to start learning to read. The only exceptions are those cases when the child himself unequivocally shows a desire for this.

But at the age of five and six, it is necessary to work with children so that they can read and write words in block letters. Those children who go to kindergarten are taught this by educators. If your baby does not attend kindergarten, you will have to deal with the child. Let this responsibility be at least partially taken over by the grandmother or grandfather. As a last resort, hire a tutor. This is necessary because modern methods assume that the child will come to the first grade already prepared and reading in syllables. This is also important from a psychological point of view. If you teach your child to read before school, it will be easy for him to read in the first grade and the first stress from school will be avoided.

TIP 10

To quickly and correctly teach your child to read in syllables, turn learning into a game. Do not force your child to expressive or fluent reading. It is much more important that he independently be able to put letters into syllables, read them in a book, and be able to compose words, phrases and sentences. He just needs to master the technique of reading. It does not matter if at first it will be slow and difficult for the baby. Remaining calm, smoothly and quietly help him correct mistakes while reading. Let it be like a game. After all, in the game you can relax without getting stressed. In the process of learning to read, it is necessary to ensure that the baby, without straining, understands what the elders want from him.

If you follow these tips, you will be able to teach your baby to read fairly well in a month and a half.

HOW TO TEACH A CHILD TO READ FLUISHLY

If your child already knows how to read entire phrases tolerably syllable by syllable, we gradually move on to teaching the baby to read fluently. Below are 14 lessons with which you can teach your baby to read fluently, and most importantly - correctly. It is advisable to teach a child of six to seven years of age fluent reading no more than 30 minutes once or twice a day. You can complete these lessons in any order. No more than 4 lessons per day.

LESSON 1

How to develop a child's vigilance

Try this task:

- In a series of five to six vowels, insert one consonant. Invite the child to find the extra letter. You can change this assignment.

- Write down the words in which only one letter is different: whale - cat; juice - bough; wood - weight, etc. The child must answer how the words differ from each other.

LESSON 2

Gymnastics that develops articulation in a child

These activities help you improve your pronunciation, encourage proper breathing, and help you speak more clearly.

Game “make a word out of halves”

Pick up simple words consisting of two syllables. At least ten words are required for one lesson. Write these words on two cards and ask your child to put the words together correctly. Cards need to be changed constantly.

LESSON 3

How to quickly train attention

The task is as follows. Your toddler is reading a text in a book. At your command "Stop!" he takes his eyes off the book, closes them and rests. On command "Read!" the child must find the fragment where he paused his reading.

LESSON 4

Semantic guess (anticipation)

The principle of anticipation - when reading, the child's peripheral vision sees the contour of the next word. From what he read, he concludes what word should be next.

To develop a semantic guess, you can do the following exercise with your child. Write words in which either a letter or a syllable is missing. Let the child guess which letters to enter. These activities greatly improve a child's ability to learn to read fluently.

LESSON 5

Teach your child to read in parallel

You will need two identical texts. Start reading slowly, and let the child read after you, following the lines with your finger. Gradually speed up the pace, but make sure that the baby does not lag behind.

LESSON 6

Time Reading

Choose a simple text. Record the time (for example, a minute) and let the child read. When the time is up, count how many words the child managed to read in a minute. When reading again, the child will read more words.

Read tongue twisters with your child to develop clear pronunciation. First, read them slowly and in a whisper. Then - confidently and loudly. Make sure that the child clearly pronounces the endings of the words. In the same way, read proverbs and sayings with your child.

How to teach a child to read well? The kid must learn to read to himself. When a child reads aloud, the eyes see the text and send a signal to the brain. At the same time, the organs of speech are prepared, and the ears perceive the spoken text.

LESSON 7

Stress game

Choose a word with several syllables and try with your child to stress each of the syllables. The child must determine which accent is correct.

Try to involve your child in the process of reading. When reading your favorite fairy tale to him, stop at the most interesting place. Say that you are tired of reading and ask the child to read a short passage of text.

LESSON 8

Watch the filmstrips

This activity is the best way to train the technique of reading.

LESSON 9

How to develop a child's field of vision

a) Draw a table. Write one letter in each cell. Invite the child to read them all silently, pointing to the letters with a pencil. You need to read as soon as possible and memorize the sequence of letters.

b) Invite the child to read the unfamiliar text silently. This should be done as quickly as possible and with closed lips. Then ask them to retell what they read. Now you can read the text again, but out loud.

Practice reading words in different scripts.

LESSON 10

Role-play reading.

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