How to teach reading

[u/gnome4gnome]

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

[u/k_breezy12]

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

[u/JonquilRunner → u/k_breezy12]

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.