Step by step teach your child to read guide

How to teach your child to read without them even knowing they are learning

This guide is basic outline for a programme on teaching children how to read.

This guide assumes that you have read and created a pro reading environment in your home.

1. Invest in some good quality flash cards using both upper and lower case letters. Click here to see our recommendation.  These are the only cards we can find on sale in the UK that use a single flash card for each upper and lower case letter.  Alternatively, you can make your own.
   
   
2. We recommend that you buy a selection of Educational DVD’s that promote childhood learning of alphabet and numbers. We strongly recommend the Sesame Street programme as it has been used by us very successfully.  You can search for available DVD or VHS titles here (use a search of 'Sesame Street VHS') : Shop at Amazon.co.uk
   
   
3. Have a morning routine after breakfast of educational play. If this is not possible schedule some other time of the day when you child is alert and active.
   
   
4. We recommend watching a Sesame Street DVD or similar for approx 30 minutes as part of your educational play routine. Once you have finished watching you can casually introduce flash cards to reinforce letter recognition. If the child is disinterested put the cards away or leave them in an accessible place. Reintroduce the cards at a later stage of the day or you may even find your child picking up the cards and playing with them.
   
   
5. Invest in alphabet and number wall charts, posters and floor mats (recommendation pending - we won't recommend products that can be confusing to children and don't meet our high standards). Having letters and numbers around everyday reinforces recognition.
   
   
6. Enlist the help of favourite dolls or teddy bears. Young children like to copy adults and will happily copy you in your teaching methods by showing letter flash cards to a doll or teddy bear.
   
   
7. As your child becomes more confident introduce the phonic sounds each letter makes.
   
   
8. Once the child has mastered the phonic sounds of letters, introduce a simple three letter world such as CAT and show how to blend the sounds together Spell out CAT on the floor or table with flash cards and get your child to read it phonically.
   
   
9. Now find a baby first words book with the word cat and see if the child can recognise the word and letters. Encourage the child to sound out the letters. Make the decoding out the word fun and give lots of praise. Ensure the whole exercise is treated like a fun game. Click here for recommended first words books,
   
   
10. Gradually introduce more easy phonic words. It is important to ensure that the words used are nouns like Dog, Cat, Pig, Milk etc. These are things that young children can identify.