Page twelve

READING

Understanding the Problem of Poor Reading.

Fluent reading is essential for Accelerated Learning.

Exercises designed to overcome problems

And improve reading speed, and comprehension

Knowing How to Help your Child with Reading Skills is important. The ability to read fluently is one of the fundamental Skills in successful learning and study.

Page 24 of the Study Guide describes the problem of poor reading that plagues many students today. With so much visual media, such as television, videos, and CD's, young students often have no incentive to read regularly and widely – although books like the Harry Potter series seem to be helping to correct that problem.

Poor reading may also be the result of a disorder called Dyslexia. Further down this page there is access to articles on Dyslexia.  If you are concerned that this may be the cause of poor reading, you should investigate - their Internet addresses are provided.

You know if reading is difficult: reading too slowly; sub-vocalising or saying the words while reading; hesitating and going back over what  has been read because the thread of the meaning has been lost; or unsure how words are pronounced. These, and other problems, take the pleasure out of reading.

When first taught to read you start by recognizing words by their spelling – such as ‘C-A-T spells cat’. As you progress you learn to recognize and say the word as a whole, and not bother about the letters; although longer more difficult words may be broken down into syllables. But, like words have more meaning than the individual letters of which they are composed, sentences and text have much more meaning than the separate words that make up the sentences and text. Poor readers have often stopped learning to read at the word stage and don’t progress to the text stage. Fluent readers read, not the individual words, but groups of words – sentences – that have meaning not contained in the individual words.

The following exercises can help you become a more fluent reader.

1.            Use a pointer, such as a pencil or your index finger, and move it along the line you are reading. Keep the pointer moving steadily, without stopping or hesitating, and make your eyes follow. Read it aloud and don’t worry about words you don’t understand – that will come later. Gradually increase the speed of the pointer. With practice you’ll overcome the bad habit of going back and re-reading words. Later, if you found words you did not understand, look them up in good dictionary for both meaning and pronunciation – practice saying them aloud. 

2.            If you have developed the bad habit of saying the words to yourself as you read, the pointer exercise, as it speeds up, will help break the habit of sub-vocalising. Sub-vocalising makes you concentrate on words rather than phrases and meaning, and slows up reading and understanding, so train yourself out of the habit.

3.            In reading practice always read aloud. Just reading silently, or listening to someone else reading, is not sufficient. This exercise is designed to make you aware of both the sound and sight of the words; and their flow, as it stores both together in your memory.

4.            This last exercise I have found very helpful. It combines all the above exercises. Co-opt the help of someone who is a fluent reader. Choose a page or two from a novel, or an article from a newspaper, and ask them to record it on a tape recorder – reading normally.

Now it’s your turn.  Replay the tape at a volume level that is not too loud, but is distinct – your part is to read the same text aloud at a good volume along with the reader on the tape, trying to emulate the same fluency as your good reader – pace, pronunciation, punctuation, intonation, emphasis, pauses etc. You hear and see the words together at the same time; you are forced to read at a fluent speed, and you are encouraged to read in groups of words with meaning rather than just individual words. After using the tape once or twice, read the same text without the tape in exactly the same way.  Repeat the exercise using text from different sources. If you practice this method for half an hour a day your reading skill, fluency, and comprehension will improve rapidly.

Lip Reading: Sometimes reading and learning may be problems which stem from a hearing difficulty. If that turns out to be the case then it may be time for the student to consider the benefits of learning to lip read. I can recommend the following website by Dr Mary Allen, who is a teacher of lip reading. http://www.lipread.com.au 

See page 18 for further information on reading and literacy

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Parents, Read Aloud to Your Kids, Say Experts (The University of Alabama - 24/07/08)

Professors Martin & Emfinger are authors of the new book "Sharing Books Together: promoting Emergent Literacy Through Reading Aloud,,,'

'Reading aloud to children helps them to listen and helps them develop oral language, and how narrative is structured, They also learn vocabulary... It is never too early to begin reading aloud. Even as they get older it still helps them learn about more complicated subjects and to listen and comprehend more sophisticated text. Be animated and use different voices for various characters. For older children look for quality literature that offers a satisfactory story. Narrative, poetry, non-fiction are all useful'.

Dyslexia Therapy Gets Kids' Brains on Track

This article suggests that in the USA about one in six children are affected by Dyslexia, in one form or another, and proposes a therapy that has helped. It appears that the method is not far removed from the reading exercise for poor readers outlined on this page, so that is worth using. There are  websites with useful information, and those not familiar with the disorder could contact the SPELD organization.

Another excellent background article on Dyslexia is found in the Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine. It talks about description, causes, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis. http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/g2601/0004/2601000450/print.jhtml

Physical exercise helps overcome Dyslexia:

A new physical exercise program, and tested over a two-year period, freed 40 pupils of dyslectic symptoms:  Balsall Common Primary School, in conjunction with the University of Exeter - U.K.

<http://www.fitcommerce.com/News/NewsView.asp?newsId=2093>

Tutoring changes how a child's brain works

Studies at Syracuse & Yale Universities demonstrated how one-on-one  tutoring of students in primary school greatly increased their reading ability. It changed their brain function by inducing a greater flow of blood to the area of the brain concerned with reading. Again, the exercises outlined in the Study Guide will help towards achieving the same result.

Reading Should be Part of a Well-balanced Breakfast

Claudia McVicker, Ass Professor, Ball State University (from newswise,com)

Children learn best in the morning. Adjust schedules to add reading time before and after breakfast. She offers hints to squeeze some reading into morning routines: Read the school lunch menu together every day; use an 'alphabet' cereal and spell out words on the table; a small dollop of shaving cream smeared on the bathroom vanity while dad is shaving can be used to write words with their fingers; Read a popular comic like Garfield each day, it will help define new words and develop inference of meaning.
 

 Reading Begins at Home

Don't fail you child

(Marion Star, 21 Dec. 2004)

To most of us it's like breathing, We don't even think about it. We see a collection of symbols and our mind instantly translates them into words and ideas. It's called reading.

It's the basis of education and essential to success.

Forget about computers, etc. Without reading it's all useless.

The fault lies at home.

Learning to read starts well before school.

Parents need to be exposing their children to books and reading as soon as possible.

The child that grows up in a home filled with books and with parents that read every day has the best chance to succeed in school.

We can't expect our children to do what we don't and we can't expect our teachers to make up for our indifference.

Read to your child every day and get involved in your school.

This is too important to be left to someone else.

Verse Broadens the Mind, Scientists Find

Psychologists at Dundee and St Andrews Universities in Scotland say that if Literature is food for the mind, then a poem is a banquet. (3 April 2005). They found that reading or listening to poetry, read aloud, increased the level of brain activity. The rhythms and rhymes, and the imagery and complexity in verse seemed to have a stimulating affect on the brain. It also helped to train the recall process. As the best selling crime novelist Ian Rankin (Rebus) said, 'Novels first began as a form of poetry where story telling was used to pass on tales from one generation to the next. This was done with rhythm and rhyme as it made the stories easier to remember'.

Computers blamed as reading standards slump

A UK study showed that attitudes to reading of children in the UK are poor compared with those in many other countries, and are possibly declining. The rise in screen based entertainment (computers), and a decline in the proportion of children being read novels or books outside school, has been blamed. England dropped from 3rd to 15th place, and Scotland to 26th place in the last 5 years, in a study or 45 countries.

Updated Feb  2010

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