The Six Steps of Literacy Readiness Heather Blankenship

Young children need a variety of skills to become successful readers. Reading experts have determined that six specific early literacy skills become the building blocks for later reading and writing sucess. Research indicates that children who enter school with more of these skills are better able to benefit from the reading instruction they receive when they start school.

Vocabulary is defined as knowing the names of things Most children enter school knowing between 3, 000 and 5, 000 words. Help develop your child's vocabulary by reading a variety of books with him by naming all the objects in your child's environment.

Print Motivation Print Awareness includes learning that writing in English follows basic rules Some of these rules are books are read from top-tobottom and left-to-right, and that the print on the page is what is being read by someone who knows how to read. These skills can be encouraged by pointing out and reading words everywhere you see them - on signs, labels, at the grocery store and post office.

Narrative Skills are defined as being able to understand tell stories, and describe things. This skill helps to later build comprehension skills Children need to realize that story telling must follow a proper sequence. You can help develop these skills by encouraging your child to make up stories, and retell stories you have read.

Letter Knowledge is defined as learning that letters have names and are different from each other, and that specific sounds go with specific letters. This is not memorizing the alphabet song, children do not know their alphabet until they realize the alphabet is how we build words. Letter knowledge can be developed by using a variety of fun reading activities, like pointing out and naming letters in picture books, or on signs and labels.

Phonological Awareness defined as the ability to hear and manipulate the smaller sounds in words. Phonological awareness includes the ability to hear and create rhymes and the ability to put two word chunks together to make a word. Most struggling readers have difficulty with Phonological Awareness. Help your child develop Phonological Awareness by playing word games, and singing literacy based songs such as ones that use rhyming words.

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