slide deck used at Ridgway School information evening for parents about how children learn to read.

1. How to help
your child learn to read
Parent information evening

2. This session will cover
1. How children learn to read
a. Reading to, with, and by
b. Reading skills
2. What parents should do at home to help their children learn to read
3. How we organise for learning at Ridgway
4. What if your child is struggling?
5. What teachers do and what parents do

3. How children learn to read
● Phonemic awareness (can hear different sounds)
○ Nursery rhymes, “playing with language”
● Identify letters by name, sound, and a word (alphabet song + phonics songs)
● High frequency words
○ Caterpillar
○ Early Words
● Reading practice (guided reading in class, reading daily at home)
● Blending and segmenting
○ Blends, digraphs, phonemes, letter chunks
● Independent reading (from 8 years)

4. Shared book / teacher read
Reading to
● Foster the love of books
● Kōtare - picture book 2x a day After lunch, during fruit break
● Tūi - novel every day (while eating) and picture books at other times
○ Develop vocabulary and oral language skills, general knowledge
● “Tell a friend what you’d do”
● Discuss the concepts and idea in the book

5. Big Books
Reading with
● Text that can’t be read independently by the majority of children in the
group
● Read aloud together
○ Modelling “reading in a talking voice” “a voice that makes me want to listen”
● Discuss punctuation, visual features, word meanings, suffixes, prefixes,
language features, etc

6. SHARP reading
Reading by
● Our method for reading lessons
● Is a formula - no surprises
● Taught using graded “reading books”
● Prior to the lesson teachers may get children ready for learning by...
○ introducing particular vocabulary or ideas
■ Remind children about what they already know
■ Prompt children to remember or think about a particular experience
■ Ask questions, these may relate to the front cover

7. Yolanda Soryl - phonics programme
Reading skills
● 7 stages
○ Most children at Stage 5 after 1 year
● Stage 7 after 2 years
● Gives students a good base knowledge of sounds and accelerates
knowledge and
● Taught alongside reading and writing
○ Teachers remind children about phonics during reading and writing
● Robot arms

8. SHARP reading 2
● SHARP used throughout the school
○ Stage 1 Learning to decode (Y1)
● point to the word
● “Here comes the question…”
○ Stage 2: Learning to decode (Y2-3)
● prefix, suffix, compound words
● “What do you remember?”
○ Stage 3: Focus on understanding (Y3+)
● “I think that means”
● roadblocks

9. What about the picture?
● The picture is valuable and a major source of information
● Picture important for supporting beginner readers
○ “What’s happening on this page?”
Always let your child
see the picture

10. Reading at home
● Children take a book home every day
○ From Browsing Box
● Child’s choice
● Selected readers that are easy to read
○ From guided reading lesson
● Child read this book with the teacher today
○ Children might need help to read - tell them the word
○ Poems, songs lyrics, karakia - Friday
● Fun and creative
● Might be a difficult text - read it to your child

11. Sunshine Online
● Parents can select books at home for their child to read
○ Important - Don’t make your child read above their reading level
● Children can play interactive literacy games
○ www.sunshineonline.co.nz
■ Username: sunshineonlinenz
■ Password: ridgway17

12. Reading at home
Reading at home should always be a lovely time to be with your child
Rules for parents to follow...
● Enjoy the story
● Discuss the picture and family experiences they remind you of
● If your child makes a mistake - praise their effort and then tell them the
word
● If your child is tired or struggling - read the book to them or take turns to
read

13. Flexibility
Children work with any teacher in the school
Children work in any space in the school
● Some Kōtare children have reading lessons with Tūi teachers
○ for example: 4 children in Mrs Sturland’s reading group in T2
● Sometimes a teacher may take a group to work in the library, the
staffroom or the foyer, or outside
● Sometimes older children work in junior rooms

14. Support for learning when it’s hard to do
● Linking learning from phonics, SHARP, Big Books; to other parts of the day
● More direct teaching
○ Smaller groups so they get more teacher attention
○ Repetition - Sunshine Online allows children to listen and read along often
○ Early Words & Caterpillars - parent help
● Y3 Lexia Programme
○ Focus on letters and sounds
● Learning Conference - teachers give parents tips about how they can help
at home
○ Read to your child

15. Who does the work?
What teachers do
● Teach children
how to read
● Monitor progress
● Report on
learning (via Seesaw)
What parents do
● Encourage
● Praise effort
● Read lots of stories
to their children
● Let their children
see the picture
● Tell children the
words they don’t
know
What children do
● Read at home with someone
else
● Turn the page by themself
● Pack their school bag
a. put bookbag into school bag,
b. remember caterpillar or spelling book
● Select a book to take home
from their browsing box
● Put their reading books
away in the morning before
school

16. Always do this 1 thing...
Parenting is a challenge! On those days that are most challenging of all,
When nothing quite seems to go right,
When your feeling tired, and stressed, or your child is, or you both are,
It’s ok to not do the reading book, or not do the caterpillar,
Always read to your child. Ending the day with a cuddle and a story is the best
thing you can do, to help your child learn to read.
Read to your child.