Reading Made Simple |
You may have come to Reading Made Simple because you know that your child has difficulty learning in the standard way. Maybe your child is struggling to learn to read, or maybe to spell. Maybe you have noticed other things about your child that concern you. Maybe you cannot afford specialist help. If this is you and your child, this article for you. As well as making Reading Made Simple as systematic as possible, we need to understand the child's way of learning - or those things that are stopping him/her from achieving the standard we think s/he ought to be achieving. Many children with difficulties learning to read and spell have less obvious difficulties that are underlying these difficulties. What do I mean? I mean things such as poor
These things sound scary! But put simply, it means that maybe:
To get you started thinking about these things, can I suggest you listen to this 5 part course of mini videos? As you listen, write down anything that sounds like your child. https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Looking-at-Learning-Differences-Differently-Part-1-of-5-8437421 The main take-away from these 5 videos, if you learn nothing else, is that your child is not being lazy, or defiant. Of course, all children are these things from time to time, some more so than others, but when reading or spelling it is most probably because of one of these difficulties, and if worked on, with a systematic programme and a teacher (yourself) who now understands where the child is coming from, you can work together more harmoniously and you help to make learning something that your child can at last feel successful at. As you teach Reading Made Simple, there are some simple strategies that you can make sure that you include in your lessons to help your child with these difficulties. Some of these things are part of the programme, but knowing how they can hep a child who learns differently will help you to use them more constructively.
Develop the ability to hear sounds in words: Understand that the main aim of phonics is hearing the sounds in words. If your child has trouble hearing the sounds, then you will need to build in more listening exercises or games. Many children learn to hear the initial sound easily enough, but have trouble putting three sounds together to make a word, c-a-t, or separating the sounds of a word out to spell. The answer is much practice, patience and much modelling - you showing the child what is needed. I like to use an ' I do, now you do' approach until the child starts to understand what is needed. Of course, every new sound form Level 1 onwards is taught by the teacher first modelling how to use the new sound, but do not stop there: keep modellling. Understand that this sound awareness will not necessarily only apply to the early stages of learning to read. I have children who have trouble hearing whether a word has /o/ or /oo/, or /e/ or /ee/, as well as many who need a lot of help to differentiate between /sh/ and /ch/. When we reach powerful 'e' I like to play games where the child must listen to hear whether the 'e' is needed or not, to change the vowel to say its name. So be alert as you move through the programme. Watch and listen and step in with more listening exercise if necessary. Use sound it out boxes to help your child to visually sequence sounds. Draw one box for each sound (not each letter). The child can write each sound in each box as s/he sounds out the word. Tracking exercises These are built in to our supplied workbooks for Levels 1 and 2, but you can easily make your own once you understand how Reading Made simple builds on itself, one tiny step at a time. The key is to write a short passage using only words that the child can sound out while using as many words on the new sound list as possible. The child should then first find all the words with the new sound and underline them before reading the passage. Give your child time to think Repeat the instruction, but do not jump in too quickly to help - do not leave it too long either so that he child gets frustrated, but watch for the right moment to intervene, whether it be decoding a word, or spelling a word. Do watch for things the child needs more practice of Use the dictations to assess your child's learning. Give more targeted practice of anything that seems to be a problem. This can be in the form of simple games, practice dictations/revision of a sound family. Understand how children learn Children do not learn in a neat upward line. They go up a bit, back a bit, forward a bit more, back a bit..and so on. Add into this that children who learn differently often have bad days when it can seem as if everything you ever taught them has been forgotten. If this happens, simply model some more until the child realises 'Ok, nothing as changed, I can still do this." Also, remember that a child will not learn for example how to use /ck/ in one week. We are not after instant perfection here. We will teach the lesson in one week, and the child may now be able to sound out /ck/ words, but they will need much, much practice of using and applying the rules in the weeks and months ahead as new rules are introduced. At these times, you will see children do what I call 'wobble' - things you thought were secure suddenly seem to be very insecure. Do not panic but push through. Reassure - and use our old friend - modelling - "I do - now you do." Soon you will find that the 'problem' has resolved itself. Some children wobble far more than others and for longer, but if they COULD do it - they still can! Take it from me! You can teach your child, but you will be teaching yourself as you do so! Phonics learning rarely goes smoothly.
Here are some common problems that you may encounter. Level 0 Most children learn the letter sounds easily, but many have trouble learning to blend the sounds to read and segment them to spell. Follow our programme suggestions first as we deliberately follow a set of order of teaching. This will give your child the best start. Then remember that some children do need lots and lots of practice before they can do these things. So it may just be a matter of needing yet more practice and time. NEVER move away for CVC words until your child can blend. This is the NUMBER 1 mistake many make in their rush to see their child progress. You must go at your child's pace. The rest of the programme will not work unless your child can blend and segment easily. If your child has trouble hearing the initial sound, may be s/he is not developmentally aware yet. Try doing a lot of listening games before trying again. In addition, you may like to read this post. Levels 1 - 4 When learning new sounds each week, some children will not need much more help than to be introduced to a new sound, and then the child will absorb that information, begin to see the sound in words that are not even on the list, apply the rule and will not encounter any difficulties, or will do so only rarely. These children still do best with a structured programme. Others, however, will encounter difficulties. These are the most commonly occurring difficulties. If you run into others, do research for a means of helping your child over them before moving on. The most common problem is: The child cannot sound out a word to see the error in either/both of spelling list and dictations Be constantly assessing your child as you teach and watch the child working. If a child cannot sound out the word to see the error, then something is wrong, and the problem must be identified and put right before moving forward. Always assess, as problems will not go away without intervention. Ask questions of yourself:
If the child cannot sound out his/her own word, have him write the word again and remind him/her to SOUND IT OUT. The child MUST SOUND OUT, unless s/he has stored the word into the long-term memory, in which case it will be spelled correctly.
Nobody can quite predict the form in which a wobble can take place. Troubleshooting examples Child 1: wobbles briefly with blending every time a new sound is introduced. The teacher has to repeat blending, starting with oral blending, in relation to the new sound being taught, to help him/her to see that we are just adding a new sound, not changing the way we sound out. Did the pupil start Level 1 too early? No, as blending at Level 0 was very good and the child can basically blend. Is the child guessing? No, it is just the brain trying to come to terms with a new sound. Does the child need more tracking exercises? This child will always need more tracking exercises, but this is not affecting the ability to blend. Child 2: did a different phonic programme for reading and is just doing RMS for spelling. S/he has just started Level 1 and completed /ee/. S/he met the word 'Ann' in the phonic workbook and had a wobble when s/he saw the double 'nn'. The child tried to sound it out and kept making it 'and'. The parent was concerned. The parent ruled out guessing after trying another day and finally concluded it was a wobble, which the child later confirmed by telling the parent that having learned double /oo/ and double /ee/, she thought that 'nn' must have changed too. Solution: reassure the child that the rule about only saying a double consonant sound once is still the same, supply the word by modelling sounding out to reassure the child and move on. Child 3: is doing Level 2 for spelling and can already read fluently. S/he reached /i-e/. In the dictation s/he just could not spell 'bike'. S/he wrote bick, bicke, and bicek, before finally resting on bike. The parent was concerned. Had the child started Level 1 too soon? No, s/he had coped well so far. Was the child guessing? Yes, the child was going by the visual look of a word and trying to remember the spelling rather than applying sounding out. Solution: the parent reminded the child of the /ck/ rule. (that we only use /ck/ after /ack/, /eck/, ick/, /ock/ and /uck/. The child was asked to sound out 'bike' orally: three sounds were heard: b -ie -k. The child was asked: Can you hear /ick/? Answer no. Therefore the word does not have /ck/. The parent then asked the child to sound out the three incorrect words s/he had written. S/he needed help to do this as now s/he was having a brain block and could only sound out what s/he wanted the word to say. None of the words sounded out correctly. Therefore the parent helped the child to sound it out correctly: "How are we going to make the /ie/ sound? Can you remember how we make /ie/? The parent pulled out the list of /ie/ word and had the child read them. the child then applied the rule and was no more confused about /ck/. The parent understood that this child would probably need help to apply the /ck/ quite often for a while. The dictations give plenty of practice. Back to: How to teach Level 1 |
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How to teach RMS The weekly lesson schedule explained How to do a dictation Make sure you do it correctly! Where to start your child Troubleshooting What to do if you hit a problem |