11 Ways to Help your Child Learn to Read

At Jefferson, your child receives reading instruction from their classroom teacher, from me, and should also continue to receive support from you.  This week, I'm going to share some tips on how you can help your child to continue to grow as a reader at home.
Pin It

1) Sand Paper Letters –Your child traces the letter with his finger and says the sound to emphasize the learning. You can create DIY Sand Paper Letters, buy wonderful letters and numbers from Etsy, buy authentic straight from a Montessori company or Amazon also supplies Montessori Sand Paper Letters.
2) Sand or Salt Tray – The child draws the letter or number in the sand with his finger or with the use of a small stick. You can DIY, buy authentic from a Montessori company or Amazon also supplies Montessori Sand Trays.
3) Tracing Paper – I made upper and lower case letters pages, then laminated them. Then, by placing tracing paper over the page, my son can practice his writing in his writing center.
4) Montessori Books – I recently read about these Montessori Letter books on How We Montessori and fell in love with them.
5) Emphasize Sounds – All day, every day, simply emphasize sounds when speaking and reading to your child. May seem a bit annoying at first but your child gets so much from this approach.
6) Sound Bag – We love our Sound Bags. It is fun to wander around the house seeking objects to place in our bag. We choose a letter and go from there collecting throughout the week.
7) Sound Box – I bought an artist box that has enough compartments for small objects. Each compartment is labeled with a letter. We switch up the objects as we discover more around the house and more that fir our box. You can create a larger box but this works for us now. Safari has mini replicas that work well and their small replicas even fit. Plus I have newly discovered Japanese erasers. They are mini sized and cover a wide variety of topics from school to shopping.
8) Sound of the Week Box – Each week we focus on a different letter sound. We have a box in which we collect various objects that satisfy that sound. I place a small sticker letter on the box and my son collects objects through the week. Interactive and involves movement as he seeks out new objects to include in the box.
9) First Readers – Our favorites first readers are Miss Rhonda’s Readers. Miss Rhonda is a Montessori teacher by day and amazing author by night. Please check out these Montessori First Reader books for your home and your classroom. Adorable illustrations and cute stories that your children will love to read on their own.
10) Create an Environment for Reading – Place baskets of books in various areas of your home including the living area, bedrooms (your bedroom and your children’s bedrooms) and even the kitchen. Besides a reading nook, children will find places you least expect it to curl up and read. We also have plenty of books in the car.

11) Apps – We love Montessorium’s First Letters and First Numbers apps. They provide a sensorial experience with a twist on your standard sand letters. When you trace the letter, the app make a scrapping sound and creates a line representing the line drawn. Montessorium’s Intro to Letters is by far one of the best Montessori apps that exists in cyberspace. The options include tracing lower and upper case letters, identifying letters, tracing double letters (th or oo, for example) and sounding out the letters and letter combinations. The app’s voice is realistic and reads/sounds to you but also gives the opportunity to record. Plain ol’ awesome.
(These ideas are from: http://www.oneperfectdayblog.net/2012/11/20/guest-post-11-ways-to-help-your-child-learn-to-read/)