While not everyone agrees that reading is one of life's pleasures, few would dispute that reading is an essential skill for a rich and full life. Certainly, without learning to read well, schooling becomes a lot more challenging. If you're not a good reader and writer, you will encounter many hurdles in a school environment.
There are five skills that we see in all good readers. These skills are necessary for readers to recognise words easily and quickly, focus on the meaning of the words they are reading and make sense of what they have read.
The idea for Helping children become better readers came to me many years ago when I was working in schools with parents and teacher aides helping children learn to read. It became clear to me that some of the prompts being used weren't particularly helpful.
It is very common for people to say to me that their child reads but doesn't understand. This is not reading.
All students need to be given more opportunities to write and to write more. There are three steps primary school students can take to make it easier to turn their thoughts into words.
