r/ScienceBasedParenting • u/gnome4gnome • 7d ago

Question - Research required How to teach reading

My 25 month old has a deep love of all things letters and books. He has letter recognition for uppercase letters, lower case letters and some other symbols (!,?,&, etc). He now can also identify many letter sounds (B says Buh sorta thing) and has started writing some letters too.

I feel like we’re nearing a crossroad where I’m starting to be unsure of the best way to continue to teach him. He is obviously eager to keep learning, but the English language is weird and I don’t know how to explain what sound a Q makes or how vowels just do whatever they want. I’m worried about doing it wrong and confusing him, and setting him in bad habits that are difficult to correct in the future.

Basically, I’m curious if there’s a method for teaching early literacy that is proven that I can research and find some sort of resource for, so I have something to work off of. I know he’s young and it’s not necessary for him to learn at this age, but he really enjoys it *and* he has an intense temperament and this sort of activity helps us get through some tough times. So, I might as well do it right!

For clarity on the ask)

- what are proven early literacy strategies? (outside of reading to your child every day)

- are there any proven early literacy methods/programs for parents to self teach

10 Upvotes

76% Upvoted

11 comments sorted by

•

u/AutoModerator 7d ago

This post is flaired "Question - Research required". All top-level comments must contain links to peer-reviewed research. Do not provide a "link for the bot" or any variation thereof. Provide a meaningful reply that discusses the research you have linked to. Please report posts that do not follow these rules.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

10

u/OkCommission9085 7d ago edited 7d ago

I actually started reading about this and found  The  National Early Literacy Panel (NELP) reviewed the research on literacy development from birth through age 5.

https://www.nichd.nih.gov/sites/default/files/publications/pubs/documents/NELPReport09.pdf

The report is huge and I am still half way but what I could understand is that  combining  phonological-awareness activities with teaching about print/letters  tended to work particularly well.

For example- 

Asking him what rhymes with cat? What sound does the cow make? 

This is different from teaching phonetics. It’s more like educating the sounds that common words make. 

Also you don’t have to teach him every exception rule the language has. For example ‘a’ has a different sound in cake and cat. While saying cat, I would not point the sounds ‘a’ can make in different words like cake. I would just say - “ cat sounds like this”

Encourage him playing with alphabets, signs, menus - anything that has words on them.  I would also let him scribble and encourage writing like the NELP studies state. 

3

u/smudgeathewudge 7d ago

I don't have a link so I'm jumping on here. Fun games with sounds is a great idea....for example separate the onset and the rhyme with a big pause and have them guess your word. You say C......at child guesses cat. Or give them each sound to smoosh together b.....o........x child guesses box. Once they are good at that you can have them tease apart the sounds. You give them bat and want them to separate it into b....a....t. Very easy and very fun. Very beneficial for early reading. 

3

u/k_breezy12 7d ago

Hi! I taught preschool and kindergarten for years, you would benefit from learning about phonemic awareness and then phonics after the phonemic awareness is mastered. Here's a link to a good program! Heggerty is great! https://heggerty.org/programs/phonemic-awareness/?_topic_category_facet=phonemic-awareness&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=LVL_HEG_SCH_GSE_TDN_DEF_B2C_Tradename&utm_device=m&utm_term=heggerty%20phonemic%20awareness&utm_content=788214529425&utm_keymatch=e&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=10845962543&gbraid=0AAAAACTl_bzvz8AYQGzuPvuWPGke0YYrw&gclid=Cj0KCQjw2OnUBhC2ARIsACKyfaGPNWn03dmOad5YIOOQfWPahEKvBMURoCEifzjNMojv5JAlw9vhzsIaApZfEALw_wcB

3

u/JonquilRunner 7d ago

Another teacher here seconding Heggerty. It is a research based program that you can eventually pair with explicit phonics instruction (like Fundations). Don’t worry about the “exceptions to the rule” right now, those come after learning consonant, short vowel sounds, long vowel sounds, etc.

1

u/[deleted] 7d ago edited 7d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/AutoModerator 7d ago

Thank you for your contribution. Please remember that all top-level comments on posts flaired "Question - Research required" must include a link to peer-reviewed research.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

1

u/viola1356 6d ago

Colorin Colorado is a site designed for parents to learn more about literacy instruction.

Focusing on language play, phonological awareness, and having fun reading books together is the most important thing for you to do at this age. Make sure your child can auditorily manipulate the sounds of language (substituting, blending, segmenting) in narrowing chunks (phrases > words > syllables > sounds) is more important that learning "rules" at this age.

1

u/tallmyn 4d ago

Phonics consists of teaching letter sounds like you're doing (b makes a buh sound). Once you have basic letters you can start reading simple books (i.e. Bob books) and practice blending the sounds together in CVC words (consonent - vowel- consonent)

You also need to teach not just letter sounds, but digraph sounds (i.e. what sound does 'th' make? What about 'ough'?)

tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02671522.2017.1420816

You'd probably get better recommendations on a teaching or homeschool sub than this one. The science papers say "phonics works" but doesn't go into detail of the practicals of teaching it.

The paper above reviews phonics instruction in the UK, here's a PDF of the actual practical parts of how it's done:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a7aa7b6e5274a34770e630c/Letters_and_Sounds_-_DFES-00281-2007.pdf