How Children Learn to Read

How Children Learn To Read

Michael Miller

Fall 2014

Practicum III

Wilmington University

How Children Learn to Read

     The ability to read is often cited as the single most important predictor of future academic  success.  For this reason, the process by which children learn how to read has been extensively researched to determine when this learning begins and how best to facilitate continual growth and improvement.  Children learn how to read through five distinct phases, beginning at birth and ending in the third grade, when the focus shifts from learning to read to reading to learn.  Each of these phases include some if not all of the five components of effective reading instruction, beginning with phase one building phonics skills and phonemic awareness and ending in phase five with a more in-depth focus on comprehension and richer text connections.

     Phase one of how children learn to read is the awareness and exploration stage encompassing the years from birth to pre-school.  These years are the most critical in establishing a solid foundation for future instruction in reading.  Children learn about reading by observing the adults around them interact with print, which can include something as simple as writing a grocery list or reading a recipe to prepare dinner.  It is through these everyday experiences that children soon realize how important a role reading ability will play in their lives.      In order to get a good start in reading and writing, children must have access to print and books, observe adult demonstrations of literacy behavior, and be surrounded by supportive adults that read to them regularly.  With the proper exposure, children begin to develop phonemic awareness and phonics skills by learning and reciting nursery rhymes, using invented spelling, and participating in activities that encourage word play.  Boyd and Bee (2012) confirm that, “Developmentalists now have abundant evidence that children who are more phonologically aware at age 3, 4, or 5 later learn to read much more easily and score higher on tests of reading comprehension in later childhood than children who are less phonologically aware (Kim, Petscher, Schatschneider, & Foorman, 2010)” (p 209).  Another critical component in learning how to read is the vocabulary a child is exposed to prior to entering formal schooling.  Because children are surrounded by literate adults in their early years, they are hearing a copious amount of new words and slowly adding these to their knowledge bank.  Vacca et al (2012) adds, “The stakes are high for young children regarding vocabulary; research tells us that children from professional homes hear more than 30 million words by age 3 compared to 10 million words heard by children in welfare homes” (p 122).  This lack of exposure to a print rich, verbally stimulating environment significantly widens the gap between these two groups by the time they enter pre-school.  It is clear that while this early phase does not often entail explicit instruction, the world around a developing child must be filled with opportunities to observe and hear reading and language in order to set the stage for formal schooling beginning in phase two.

     Phase two of how children learn to read focuses on experimental reading and writing in kindergarten.  In this stage, children are beginning to make sense of the print rich world around them through the development of concepts of print.  The development of phonemic awareness really explodes in this stage, often aided by explicit phonics instruction.  Students recognize letters and letter-sound relationships, rhyming words, and begin writing letters and high frequency words.  There has long existed a debate between those who favor explicit phonics instruction and those who favor a whole language approach.  Proponents of the whole language approach believe that children learn how to read best when instruction centers around exposure to language through high quality literature.  Given that both sides of the argument have their merits, a more balanced approach that includes phonics instruction and exposure to high quality literature is most favored.  Vacca et al (2012) adds, “When working with children, it’s important to use read-aloud books, nursery rhymes, riddles, songs, and poems that play with language and manipulate sounds” (p 123).  The value of literacy related play centers, like a post office, restaurant, or doctor’s office setting, should not be underestimated at this stage as they are integral to student exploration and instruction and allow children to play with print on their own terms.  By the end of phase two, children begin to engage in sustained reading and writing, develop a solid foundation in phonemic awareness and phonics skills, and are prepared to focus on fluency and comprehension.

     Termed the early reading and writing stage, phase three takes place in first grade with students reading simple stories and writing about topics within their existing schema or topics that connect to strong feelings.  It is within phase three that students continue to improve their phonemic awareness and develop word identification skills.  A report by Learning Point Associates (2004) emphasizes that, “Teaching young readers to segment words into individual phonemes appears to be as effective in helping them learn to read as instruction in both segmenting and blending (Torgesen, Morgan, & David, 1992)” (p 9).  In addition to segmenting and blending, students can also further develop phonemic awareness through the deletion, addition, and substitution of phonemes.  Reading with fluency becomes more evident as students have developed an increased knowledge of sight words.  Teachers can further develop fluency at this stage by offering many opportunities for guided, shared, and repeated reading.  The emphasis on vocabulary instruction continues to expand near the end of phase three with a focus on active engagement and learning new words within meaningful contexts.  Vocabulary words should be terms that children will encounter in their reading, should be taught in relation to words within their existing schema, and should be discussed prior to reading to activate prior knowledge and establish the hooks for retention as the words are encountered in context.  Offering an abundance of opportunities to read contributes significantly to vocabulary development as students move toward improved reading comprehension in phase four.

     While in second grade, students are in phase four, or the transitional reading and writing stage.  Within this stage, students begin to demonstrate increased ability in all areas of reading and writing including word identification strategies, sight word recognition, sustained silent reading, and conventional spelling.  By this time, students have developed a strong base in phonemic awareness and are able to read material without having to break-down the words, resulting in improved fluency and comprehension.  Furthermore, students develop cognitive and metacognitive strategies for reading comprehension.  The Learning Point Associates report (2004) on the five essential components to effective reading instruction states, “A short list of examples of comprehension strategies includes comprehension monitoring, cooperative learning, using graphic and semantic organizers including story maps, answering questions about what has been read, having students create their own questions about what they have read, using prior knowledge to connect what they read to what they already know, and summarizing what they have read” (p 30).  By the end of second grade, students are using most of these strategies to help them understand what they have read with the guidance of the classroom teacher.  By explicitly teaching and modeling these techniques, teachers are providing students with the skills required to read more in-depth and complex material, which will be required as they advance to the fifth and final stage.

     Phase five of how children learn to read is characterized by independent and productive reading and writing and often occurs within the third grade year.  During this time, students are extending and refining their literacy skills and strategies and moving away from learning to read and more towards reading to learn.  Students continue to improve their fluency and comprehension as they are exposed to longer, more advanced texts that cannot be read all at once.  Chapter books are often introduced at this stage, offering students increased opportunities for extension activities that tap higher order thinking skills and explore more thorough understandings of plot, characters, and story line.  Students at this stage still benefit from read alouds and guided reading, particularly at the beginning of the year, and should continue to be given an abundance of opportunities to read independently as they develop a preference for certain genres and authors.  Increased use of informational texts is also common in this phase as students are increasingly expected to utilize these resources within instruction.  By the end of phase five, students should have a solid foundation in all five components of effective reading instruction that they will continue to refine as they prepare to tackle increasingly complex reading material in the upper elementary and middle grades.

     Children learn how to read in five distinct phases that span the period from birth to grade three.  As is evident from the research, the most critical first phase begins at home when children must be exposed to copious opportunities to observe others interacting with print and exchanging information verbally in order to build a solid foundation for later learning.  Phases two through five span the period from kindergarten to third grade when students move from a focus on phonics and establishing phonemic awareness to expanding vocabulary in order to increase fluency and improve comprehension.  Teachers must employ research based strategies in each phase to help students move from learning to read towards utilizing comprehension strategies to aid in reading to learn.

Works Cited

Boyd, Denise; Bee, Helen.  (2012).  The Developing Child.  New York, NY:  Pearson.

Learning Point Associates.  (2004).  A Closer Look at the Five Essential Components of Effective              Reading Instruction:  A Review of Scientifically Based Reading for Teachers.  Retrieved from:             www.learningpt.org/pdfs/literacy/components.pdf

Vacca, Jo Anne L., Vacca, Richard T., Gove, Mary K., Burkey, Linda C., Lenhart, Lisa A., Mckeon,            Christine A.  (2012).  Reading and Learning to Read.  New York, NY:  Pearson.