Parent's Guide to Learning to Read

Hi everyone! I hope you are all enjoying your summers. This summer I'm taking two online classes and one of the assignments is to plan a family literacy night. Although I've been wanting to do this for quite some time, I haven't. So, I'm glad that I'm getting that push to do it! One thing I have always wanted to create for a family literacy night is a beginning reading guide for parents. Keep in mind I work at a school with a lot of parent involvement. I get asked a lot what they can do at home. I'm so lucky and so are their children! I find that, while giving ideas about what to do at home, I feel the need to give background knowledge about reading. It's hard to give tips and ideas when parents do not have any general information about the process of learning to read. I have handed out separate resources before, but I never put it all together in one nice, neat packet. Until now!

I thought about the main things that went into learning to read and tried to break it down. If you've followed me for a while, you know I love anything with tabs. Ha! Keep in mind that I made this one pretty with colored bright paper, but you wouldn't have to! I also made a version without tabs so you just print and staple or bind. That one is a little more convenience. ;) 

Here is a little peak inside:

The colored pages are the tab pages. They have basic information for parents about that area of reading. After each tab page, there is a page with ideas for parents to use at home.

You can find resources and information about teaching the alphabet HERE.

Please note: The ideas in the phonemic awareness section come from my Phonemic Awareness Take-home kit.   You can find a TON of information about phonemic awareness in these old posts HERE and HERE.

 I added in a link to a phonetic word list! I wish I would've made that one years ago!

You can find an old post about sight words HERE.

You can find an old, but very detailed blog post about reading strategies HERE.

You can find a huge post about comprehension HERE.

This resource is perfect for pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, and first grade teachers. I will be using it as a resource for my intervention students' families. 

This is all based on years of experience and research. I realize there are many differing philosophies and beliefs about what is best when teaching children to read. This is what works for me and is based on a lot of research. Much of the research for the alphabet, phonemic awareness, and phonics is summarized HERE in this report from the National Reading Panel. I acknowledge and respect different views and beliefs and by no means discredit other ways of teaching. If these ideas do not reflect your teaching practices and beliefs, then this probably isn't for you. ;)  

So there you have it! You can find this resource HERE.

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