Reading Activities
Learn to Read through Phonics
The Reading Activities offered here are for both Students and Parents.
Students - If any of these are true:
You have trouble reading
You don't like to read
You are embarrassed to read aloud
Then Click Here for Reading Lessons that will help you
read better.
Parents - Give your child the Gift of a Lifetime - Help your child become an Excellent Reader:
Learn how our Phonics -Based Reading Lessons are the best way to teach your child to read
Understand the 7-Steps to Becoming an Excellent Reader that are field-proven over 20 years
Help your child master Phonemic Awareness, The Alphabetic Principle and Phonics
If you want to get started immediately then Click
Here for the first of many Reading Activities that will transform
your child into a self-confident, excellent reader.
If you want to understand the importance of reading, then read a summary of
the National Reading Panel's findings on the best way to teach reading
and read a summary of what is currently known about reading disorders, disabilities
and problems. Then visit the sections discussed and referenced below.
Personal Experience - The main reason that I have included this
section on Reading Activities in this website goes back to the
experiences I had in the 1980's when my one of my three sons fell victim
to the "Whole Language" approach to teaching reading. In this "Whole
Language" approach children are taught to memorize the appearance of
words as visual patterns and use this store of memorized words and their
"Whole Language" capability as a basis for learning to read.
The result was that my middle son was having great difficulty reading. This was of course before the
Internet was available. So, based on how I learned to read in the "one-
room-school" where I spent the 1st and 2nd grades, I purchased a deck of phonics
flash cards and started to work each night with my son.
The result of this phonics-based approach was that my son quickly became
an excellent reader and my youngest son (4-years old at the time)
learned to read by sitting, watching and participating in the phonics
lessons. Since this time several of my grandchildren have used this same
deck of cards to learn how to read, the latest are my twin 3-year-old
granddaughters.
So, I was going to recommend and provide a phonics-based approach solely
based on my own personal experiences. However, as a scientist by
training, I went to the Internet to review what is known about the best
way to teach reading and as I discuss below, the scientific data support
my personal experiences in this area.
We don't often link to other sites, but we do highly recommend the following three Reading Resource Websites.
Starfall.com is a site that provides a variety of truly excellent resources. My youngest son is using our Phonics Lessons to teach my twin 4-year old grandaughters phonics and then uses Starfall.com for further practice and additional reading activities.
Another site worth visiting is dedicated to Fun-Learning-Activites-For-Children. We think you will enjoy all the fun activities this mom has developed.
A third site that we think you will find full of helpful reading activities and reading information is Joy-of-Reading.com which is a website packed full of reading activities and information put together by a former school teacher with a passion for reading.
The Importance of Reading
The NICHD (National Institute
of Child Health and Human Development) was established by congress in
1962. Research conducted from the NICHD's Program in Learning
Disabilities led to the following conclusions:
Unless they receive the right kind of reading instruction and participate in specifically designed Reading Activities, at least 20% of children cannot learn to read well
One of the critically important Reading Activities is to provide your children with excellent books that you read to them or, when they are older, have them read aloud while you listen and help them. I recommend a wonderful website, Better-Childrens-Books, which lists tried and tested books by age group that will engage your child and be a great asset to helping your child become an excellent reader.
The first casualty of poor reading is self esteem
10-15% of reading impaired children drop out of High School
Only 2% of reading impaired children complete 4 years of college
About 50% of adolescents and young adults with criminal records have reading difficulties
About 50% of youths with a history of substance abuse have reading problems
Parents - make sure your child becomes an excellent reader!
Click Here further information on the Importance of Reading
Teaching Reading
The NICHD (discussed and referenced in the previous section) chartered a
14-person National Reading Panel(NRP) that reviewed over 100,000
documented studies of reading methods and results. From the results of
his research, Duane Alexander, M.D., Director of the NICHD, says "For
the first time, we now have guidance based on evidence from sound
scientific research on how to best teach children to read."
The panel concluded that the research literature "provides solid
evidence that phonics instruction produces significant benefits for
children from kindergarten through 6th grade and for
children having difficulties learning to read. The greatest improvements
in reading were seen from systematic phonics instruction."
The series of Reading Activities provided in the Phonics Lessons and
Reading Lessons on our website are based on the principles of this
systematic phonics instruction.
Click Here to learn the best method for Teaching Reading
Reading Problems
The NICHD has a website with a
wealth of information on Reading and productive Reading Activities. They state that approximately 75% of
children will learn to read reasonably well whatever the method used to
teach reading. However, the remaining 25% require "systematic phonics
instruction" to learn to read well.
Many of these 25% children are thought to have various learning
disabilities. While I am not trained in the area of children's education
or learning disability testing - from the reading I have done my
recommendation is that if you have a child that is a poor reader, work
with your child and expose him or her to "systematic phonics
instruction". I believe you will be well pleased with the results.
Click Here for a summary and overview of Reading Problems
Learning to Read
From the research of the National Reading Panel of the NICHD
discussed above, we have developed a 7-Step Reading Program which
presents a "Systematic Phonics Instruction" approach. This section
discusses these seven steps in detail and the associated Reading Activities with reference to the NICHD
findings. These seven steps combine Phonemic Awareness, The Alphabetic
Principle, Phonics, Guided Reading and Reading Comprehension Strategies.
Click Here to for the 7 Steps of Learning to Read
Phomenic Awareness
The English language is alphabet-based. That is, the words in the
English language are made up of letters of the alphabet which
individually and in specific groups make up the sounds that represent
the words. This realization that spoken words are made up of sounds
that are and can be associated with letters of the alphabet is known as
the Alphabetic Principle.
The sounds that make up words are called Phonemes and the recognition of
this fact that words are made up of these letter-sounds is called
Phonemic Awareness.
For all neurologically normal children, the verbal learning of the
sounds of the English language (phonology) occurs naturally without any
real specific systematic instruction. If this were not the case babies
would not so easily learn to talk. However, unfortunately for the
would-be reader, Phonemic Awareness, the association of sounds with
letters is not an automatic consequence of speaking the language.
This section gives a discussion of Phonemic Awareness and its critical
importance in children learning to read.
Click Here to learn about Phonemic Awareness - (Coming Soon)
Phonics Lessons - Reading Lesson #1
Our first step in our program of "Systematic Phonics Instruction" is
our Reading Lesson #1 which provides Reading Activities that teach your child the sounds associated
with each consonant and short vowel in the English Language. This
Phonics Lesson is essentially a digitized, information age, computer-
based version of the phonics flash cards that I used so
successfully with my family.
Click Here for Phonics Lessons -
Reading Lesson #1
Phonics Activities - Reading Lesson #2
The second step in our program of "Systematic Phonics Instruction" is
our Reading Lesson #2 which continues Reading Activities that teach your child the sounds associated
with each consonant and short vowel in the English Language. This
Phonics Activity is essentially a digitized, information age, computer-
based version of the phonics flash cards that I used so
successfully with my family.
Reading Lesson #2 is like Reading Lesson #1 except that we provide your child with the opportunity to try to sound out the letters without the aid of picture or sound and then we let you click through to the letter pictures and letter sounds if your child needs help or wants confirmation.
Click Here for Phonics Activities -
Reading Lesson #2
Click Here to start your child on Phonics Lessons
Click Here to Return from Reading Activities to Homework-Help-Secrets
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