Tag Archives: reading strategies

Reading Strategies

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Thank you to those who were able to complete my reading survey! The information you provided will help me learn important reading information about your child. If you haven’t had a chance to complete the survey yet, here is the link, Reading Survey.

First Grade: Students have worked hard to master letters and sounds this past week and many were able to “graduate” to beginning sight words. Having quick recognition of these words will help when reading first grade books. Next week, we will add two more strategies to our reading toolkit. Along with using picture clues (Eagle Eye) and the first sounds of words (Lips the Fish), we will learn how to use the rest of the sentence to help figure out a tricky word. This strategy is called “Skippy the Frog” and readers skip the word, read the rest of the sentence, and then try to use this additional information to figure out the word. We have discussed how a reader always checks his/her guess, to see if the letters and sounds match with the word. We will also practice stretching out the sounds of a word (Stretchy the Snake).

Sometimes, readers need to use multiple strategies to figure out tricky words, a very difficult skill for beginning readers. The old standby, Sounding Out, doesn’t always work! If your child gets stuck on a word, guide him/her to use a strategy that will be most helpful. If you can see that a great hint is in the picture, prompt them to use Eagle Eye. If they need to read the rest of the sentence to learn more information, prompt with Skippy the Frog. By giving these great hints, you can help your child become more comfortable using different strategies.

Second Grade: With second grade recently starting Reading Counts (RC), each student will choose a RC book at his/her reading level. After practicing this book several times and discussing it with me, students will take the RC quiz during our reading time. We will also discuss how good readers read all of the answers before choosing the best one, an effective test taking skill. Accuracy, reading words correctly, remains important and we are focusing on breaking longer words into smaller, readable parts, as well as making sure that their word choice matches the letters and sounds. Please encourage your child to use these strategies when reading to you, making sure that his/her reading speed is not too fast.

Most importantly, your child should be engaged in reading every night. You can read aloud to your child or offer support if your child reads a just right book to you.

Happy reading!

Frogs and Lions!

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Two great reading strategies that our students have been practicing are, Skippy the Frog and Tryin’ Lion. These two strategies work well together to help readers use the context of a sentence to figure out tricky words. With Skippy the Frog, the reader skips the tricky word to read the rest of the sentence or page. Next, the reader uses Tryin’ Lion to return to the beginning of the sentence to try again. Using the surrounding words and the meaning of the sentence often helps the reader figure out that tricky word.
So, the next time your child gets stuck on a word, this Frog and Lion might be just the right strategies to help!
Happy reading!

The Importance of Pictures

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For the last 2 weeks in reading support, we have been practicing how to use the pictures to help us read. Illustrations provide valuable hints to help students decode or figure out words. This is a necessary strategy for beginning readers to use and helps prepare them for other more developed strategies later on. You can help reinforce this strategy at home by using a picture book to model how you spend time looking at pictures when reading. Talk about your thinking so that your child can hear your thoughts. Most importantly, let your child know that good readers DO use pictures when reading in order to understand a story.
reading

Strategies That Good Readers Use

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When helping your child read at home, use these strategies that good readers use to help figure out an unknown word:

  1. Tell your child to look at the picture. You may tell him/her the word is something that can be seen in the picture, if that is the case.
  2. Tell your child to look for chunks in the word, such as it in sit, at in mat, or and and ing in standing.
  3. Ask your child to get his/her mouth ready to say the word by shaping the mouth for the beginning letter and saying the beginning sound of the word.
  4. Ask your child if the word looks like another word he/she knows. “Does bed look like red?”
  5. Ask your child to go on and read to the end of the sentence. Often by reading the other words in context, the child can go back and figure out the unknown word.
  6. If your child says the wrong word while reading, ask questions like:
Does it look right?
Does it sound right?
Does it make sense?
Happy Reading!