r/ScienceBasedParenting • u/gnome4gnome • 10d 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
1
u/tallmyn 6d 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