How Will My Child Learn to Read?

Learning to read is a step-by-step process. It involves a series of developmental stages that come
together, over time, to reach the ultimate goal of making meaning from the printed word.

It is the foundation of all learning.

As a literate adult you probably don’t remember learning to read as a child yourself. Imagine now if
you were suddenly expected to learn a new language and master it quickly or perhaps you had to
learn to read music for the first time with a completely unfamiliar set of symbols and in a
complicated language with a large number of inconsistencies. It’s a big ask and we are asking it of
our little children. Throw in upper and lower case letter symbols (and variations of several of these);
add numerals and exceptions in sounds, digraphs and blends, silent letters and punctuation and you
soon realize that English is a monster!

Nature has given us an oral language. Written language is a man-made technology and it is
unnatural. It takes time to master each of the stages and support is needed at every stage to ensure
your child is successfully launched into a life of literacy and learning.

Step 1 - Foundation Stage

Around age 5, children enter school and begin receiving formal literacy instruction. They continue to
make rapid growth in literacy skills if they are exposed to literacy-rich environments (Burns, Griffin,
& Snow, 1999).

• Will look at books and enjoys being read to.
• Notices letters and words around them.
• Begins to understand that print carries a message.
• Writes their own name and can recognise it.
• Plays at reading – holding books and turning pages pretending to read.
• Enjoys learning about letters and words from books, games, songs and nursery rhymes.
• Looks at pictures and makes up stories.
• Uses memory and pictures to retell a story.
• Learns letter names and letter sounds – starting with their own.
• Learns how books work where a story starts and ends and which way the print progresses.
• Understands the concept of a letter and a word.

Step 2 - Emergent Reading Stage

Children at this stage continue to "read" from books they’ve heard repeatedly. Gradually, these
readings demonstrate the intonation patterns of the adult reader and language used in the book.
Emergent readers are just beginning to control early reading strategies such as directionality, wordby-
word matching, and concepts of print. They use pictures to support reading and rely heavily on
their knowledge of language (Holdaway, 1979; Pinnell, 1996b; Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998).

• Knows how books work – using left to right directionality of print.
• Matches spoken words to written words.
• Uses pictures to help read unknown words.
• Understands relationships between sounds and letters.
• Learns that text is a common way to tell a story.

Most children at the first grade level are or will become early readers. They know how to use early
reading strategies and can read appropriately selected text independently after a story introduction
given by a teacher (Pinnell, 1996).


Step 3 - Early Reader Stage

Early readers begin to attend to print and apply the phonetic value (International Reading
Association & National Association for the Education of Young Children, 1998; Snow, Burns, &
Griffin, 1998) of letters in order to read. They commonly look at beginning and ending letters in
order to decode unfamiliar words (Clay, 1991; Pinnell, 1996b; Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998).

Children in this early reading period also begin to attend to more than one source for cues while
reading. Attention is paid to meaning cues, grammatical cues, and prior knowledge on a limited basis
(Clay, 1991; Holdaway, 1979; International Reading Association & National Association for the
Education of Young Children, 1998; Pinnell, 1996b; Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998). These children are
able to recognize a small number of words on sight.

• Develops instant word recognition.
• Gains an increasing understanding of print conventions.
• Can read for enjoyment and for information.
• Expands vocabulary.

Step 4 - Fluent Reader Stage

Children at the third grade level typically are fluent readers. They use all sources of information
flexibly to read a variety of unknown texts. Fluent readers are able to read for meaning with less
attention to decoding and can independently solve problems encountered in the text (Clay, 1991;
International Reading Association & National Association for the Education of Young Children, 1998;
Pinnell, 1996b; Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998). If the reading materials are appropriately challenging,
children's fluency continues to increase.

• Automatic word recognition.
• Rapid decoding.
• Makes predictions.
• Self corrects.
• Checks for meaning.
• Uses vocab gained in their own writing.

 

Step 5 - Advanced Fluency Stage

Not only do good readers read fluently with adequate speed, but when they read aloud, they also
use appropriate phrasing, intonation, and their oral reading mirrors their spoken language. They
have more success with writing, better vocabulary skills and a greater understanding of what is being
read.

• Student reads easily.
• Reads expressively.
• Reads with comprehension.
• Uses a large vocabulary.
• Imitates author styles in their own writing.
• Manages different font styles including smaller typeface and irregular phrasing.
• Tackles challenges such as lists, bullet points.
• Enjoys reading!

Happy Reading!