M

Hi, I'm Marissa. Long time lurker, first time poster (I think). My 5yr old son has recently shown great interest in learning to read. He says, he's "ready to try to learn to read". What should I do now? I've been teaching him the letters and their sounds but I'm not sure if that's the right thing to do. Should I forgo teaching through phonics, and just increase the amount of "reading together" time? He seems fine with learning letters and their sounds, but I wonder if I should stop after reading the recent posts on reading.
Any advice is very welcome. I still consider myself a newbie to unschooling, even though it's been almost a year since we started. Thanks.

Marissa

plaidpanties666

--- In [email protected], "M" <mharbajan@...> wrote:
>He says, he's "ready to try to learn to read". What should I do now?

Let him know he's *already* learning to read, for one! But you could also see if he wants to look over some simple picture books with you, if y'all enjoy reading together, and play around with figuring out/ guessing the words. Treat it as a game, though, rather than some kind of lesson.

>>I've been teaching him the letters and their sounds but I'm not sure if that's the right thing to do.
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Some kids enjoy phonics, but something to know is that kids who are geared to learn to read that way can figure it out from the alphabet song and a general knowledge of the letters (this has been established in studies of various open classroom situations, btw, comparing kids who've been taught letter sounds and others who've had no such instruction, beyond the abc song).

If your ds is asking about letters and sounds, answer his questions, play games with sounds, rhymes, aliteration, "I spy" sorts of games, but if its not fun, drop it. Focus more on fun and less on "content" because content, when it comes to reading, is nearly ubiquitous. Its hard to Avoid print and symbolic information.

Think about reading as another kind of play. Would you work with him on block building? Mud-pie technique? Painting? Play along with him, for sure! Make suggestions you think would make things more fun for him, if he likes those kinds of suggestions, buy related toys if that's appealing. That's all he needs. In a rich, fun life, learning takes care of itself.

---Meredith (Mo 8, Ray 16)