Little Reader

[beetiger]

projectmothra is sight-reading some phenomenal number of words these days. He's just randomly walking around places, trying to read signs, and getting them kind of right more often than not. (It say "Please Flush"! This store is "Closed on Sunday"! "Men"! That the bathroom of going with Daddy!" That lady's shirt saying "Soccer"!) It's kind of boggling. He'd been "playing" our Apples to Apples set by trying to read the cards, so we just bought him Apples to Apples Junior so he'd be able to get more choices like "Hot Wheels Cars" and "Cowboys" and fewer like "Henry Mancini" and "Adolf Hitler".

In any case, as I mentioned, his sight reading vocabulary is huge, but he doesn't have any interest in phonetics/sounding out words. He knows all his letters and the primary sounds they make, but he's somewhere between uninterested and incapable of "sounding out" a word even if I guide him heavily through it. He'd rather I tell him the word so he remembers it next time he comes across it.

My friends who know more about Early Education than I do: should I be fussing about trying to help him get the sounding out concept, or should I just let him build an arsenal of sight-read words and not fuss about it?

Comments

[metafori.livejournal.com]

First, I want to say that I’m enjoying this thread quite a bit. It’s encouraging to see how other parents have nurtured their children’s intellectual development.

Words are messages from one mind to another. The fact that you’re reading these words gives you the power to know what I think on this subject. That your son has a vast sight-reading vocabulary makes me believe that he’s got the words-as-clues concept down. Of course, it’s so much easier to ask the All-Knowing Mommy and Daddy when unfamiliar words pop up. I remember getting “What that say, Mommy?” all the time from both boys. I wouldn’t be too concerned about that.

As far as phonics go, I understand its importance as a key for unlocking future, more difficult words, but I never stressed it. That is, I’ve always thought it was more important to instill a love of words through the stories they tell. Still, I’m aware that it’s a good idea for a child to know that the letter H makes a huh sound.

I’m sure that given his sight-reading vocabulary, your little one has more knowledge about phonics than you realize. Your reader who suggested that children learn in intuitive leaps was absolutely right. But if you really want to support his learning to sound out words phonetically, here’s my philosophy:

Keep your ears open and make learning a joyful experience.

My grandmother used to make her traditional Italian S-shaped cookies every Easter. When my first son was a toddler, I remember him saying s-s-s-s before eating the cookie. Right then and there, I knew this was wonderful tool to help teach the sounds that letters make.

I didn’t bake the cookie letters often, mind you. I was never what you’d officially call a mommy who bakes. But I made those letter cookies just often enough to help them “devour” letter sounds and, eventually, whole words that they created. Of course, I probably created some food issues with that one, not to mention the spike in blood sugar, but I tried my best. Sounds like you do, too.