Today, we have sent home the Reception children’s reading books along with their reading diaries. These reading books can be kept and practiced over the Christmas holidays.
Next term, the reading books and reading diaries will be given out on Mondays and collected in on Fridays along with the children’s chosen Library books. Please try to read with your child as often as possible, ideally 5 x per week, and record their progress in the Reading Diary. You can record achievements such as a new tricky word recognised or a new skill such as blending achieved. You can also write what your child struggled with. You could record what they said about the story.
In Reception, we are learning to read and write through phonics. Phonics is a method of teaching reading and writing to children in which they learn the letter or group of letters that correspond to a sound. A sound can be represented by a single letter – for example, each of the three sounds in ‘hat’, h-a-t). Sometimes a sound is represented by more than one letter such as sh in sh-o-p, ay in p-l-ay, and igh in l-igh-t. Your child learns a set of sounds and the letters that represent them. At the same time, they are taught to blend those sounds together to read words.
The books your child is given to read are phonetically decodable books. These will contain words made up of the sounds that they learn in class. This means the books are ‘decodable’ by your child because they have learnt the ‘code’ – the letters and sounds that make up the words in their reading book.
Ways to support reading at home:
When helping your child with their reading, try to choose a time when they’re not too tired. Remember that learning to read will take time, so stay patient as your child acquires this new skill!
Don’t read the book to your child before they read it to you – they may just remember the words and not get any real practice.
Ask your child to ‘sound out’ the word by saying the individual sounds in the word and then blending the sounds together (for example, ‘c-a-t – cat’). Encourage your child to say the letter sounds in a short and clear way, without an ‘uh’ at the end of consonant sounds (for example, ‘p’, rather than ‘puh’). This takes some practice but it will help them when start blending the sounds together to make words. For example, it’s easier to blend the sounds c-a-t together to make ‘cat’, than the sounds cuh-a-tuh.
Don’t let your child struggle too much – if they are really stuck with a word, sound it out for them quickly so that they can hear the word. Plenty of praise when they succeed will help them to keep going.
Don’t ask your child to use the pictures to guess the words. Pictures can provide great opportunities to talk about what is happening in a story, but it’s important that your child doesn’t become dependent on them to read.
Read back each sentence or page to your child to ensure they have understood.
When your child has read the book, talk about it together.
If your child can read the book well, that doesn’t mean the book is too easy. It is important they get plenty of practice reading words containing the letters and sounds they have learnt. Celebrate their achievement with them – reading success is important in building their confidence and enjoyment.
As well as your child reading their reading books to you, it is important that you continue to read stories, rhymes, and non-fiction books to your child. This will increase their vocabulary, develop their comprehension, encourage the habit of reading and hopefully inspire a life long love of reading.
