Signs Your Child is Ready to Learn to Read

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Reading is a precious gift that opens a child’s mind to endless possibilities. It is the key that unlocks the door to boundless knowledge. As children grow in their ability to read, a better understanding of the world is only a page away. Resources that inspire, challenge, and motivate heart and soul are now available to the child, simply because he or she can read.  

Reading on grade-level by the end of third grade is a very crucial milestone in education. Before third grade, children are learning to read, but after third grade children are reading to learn. Students are required to read texts across all subject areas and comprehend or make connections about the literature being read. If a student is struggling to read the words within a text, then he or she may have difficulty in comprehending what is being read. If this struggle is not addressed, the gap continues to widen with each new grade level. Unfortunately, students who cannot read well by the end of third grade are four times more likely to drop out of school.

According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the United States’ reading progress has been in decline since 2012. The NAEP has monitored the academic performance of 9, 13, and 17-year-old students in reading and math since 1971. As noted, since 2012 reading performance has declined among students. Regrettably, the decline in reading performance gained momentum as the Covid pandemic negatively impacted our countries educational system. In Delaware, in 2017, 2018, and 2019, the percentage of students scoring below or well below average in reading hovered between 46 and 48 percent, but on the 2021 test, 58 percent of students scored below or well below average.

(It is probably not a surprise to you, but sadly there is also a correlation between early low literacy skills and incarceration rates.  Seventy percent of inmates in America’s prisons cannot read above a fourth-grade level. (Gaille))

Signs of Reading Readiness

When is the best time to teach your child to read? As parents, we feel a lot of pressure to teach our children to read at a young age, but the best time to teach your child to read is when he or she is ready. Each child is different, matures differently, learns differently, and is ready to read at different times, but parents can help prepare a child along the way for when he is ready to begin the reading journey. Here are four signs to tell if your child is ready to learn how to read:

1. Your child shows an interest in reading. Does your child constantly bring you books to read? Is he beginning to ask about words or letters? If so, this is a key sign that he is ready to learn to read.

   If your child is not showing an interest in reading, don’t be overly concerned. Continue to have bedtime readings together, ask him to find a letter from his name in the text, point to a picture on the page and ask him to tell you a word that rhymes with the picture. This will help build his interest to prepare for learning to read.

2. Your child “reads” to you. If you have ever caught your child “reading” a book that’s a good sign he is ready to begin learning to read. If he is able to recall or retell parts of a story this is an important skill needed in reading.

3. Your child exhibits a basic understanding of book and print awareness. Most children are able to tell the front of the book from the back of the book or how to hold a book—this is book awareness. Print awareness involves knowing the difference between text and pictures or that words are read left to right (this is not required to learn to read—it can be taught).

4. Your child knows a majority of letter sounds. Knowing the letter names AND letter sounds before learning to read helps reduce frustration when learning to read. (If your child is unfamiliar with letter names and/or letter sounds, I highly recommend completing Toddler Lesson Plans: Learning ABC’s before you begin the activities in this book. This will help your child build a strong foundation to begin learning to read by learning the names and sounds of each individual letter and help reduce struggles or frustrations as we progress on this journey.)

If your child is showing signs of being ready to begin learning to read, then you are in luck because in 3 weeks I have 3 new Teach Your Child to Read series books releasing so be on the lookout!

READ to Your Child

However, if your child is not showing signs of being ready to learn to read don’t stress. Continue to read to your child! Even if your child is showing signs of being ready to learn to read…read to your child. This is such a valuable bonding time and it will help your child develop important language skills, allow them to see and experience places, experience different cultures, expand their mind, and engage their brain.

Here are a few tips to remember as you read to your child:

1. Point to the words of the story as you read. This will help your child develop print awareness; he will begin to understand that words are read from left to right and top to bottom.

2. Sound out random words in the story. For your child to be successful in learning to read he will need to master the “blending” technique (I will discuss this in more detail in a few pages), so it will be helpful for him to hear you sound out words in a story. To do this, pick a word on the page, break the word apart into phonemes (sounds), and then blend the sounds together to say the complete word.

3. As you read together, ask questions about the text. This will help build reading comprehension and communication skills. Reading comprehension is not a skill we will focus on mastering until your child has become a fluent reader, but it’s a good skill to practice when reading together.

Very soon your child will be ready to start their learning to read journey!