Prompts

Prompts

Here are some elements of reading to keep track of. These aren’t all the factors in reading, but they are some that I find parents can observe and document. 

Print awareness: Can he distinguish a word from a symbol? Does he know that words mean things? And that words can be read? How about the difference between letters, words, and sentences? Does he know what direction reading moves? 

Letter names: Does she know all the letter names?

Alphabetic principle: Does he know that letters make certain sounds and are read from left to right?

Letter sound correspondence: Do they understand the relationship between a grapheme (a letter or group of letters) and the most common sound? What about other sounds that that grapheme can make? What are some that you notice they know? 

Phonological and Phonemic awareness: This is an aural/spoken skill “phon” means voice or sound. Can she rhyme words? Can she count the number of words in a sentence? Can she count syllables? Can she count the sounds in a word? We’ll dig into these soon because this is a common area of deficit in struggling readers and it’s a lot of fun to work on. 

Guessing: Do they guess words often? Perhaps using the first letter of the word? Or do they guess a word that looks nothing like the written word, but means the same thing, or would make sense in the story? For instance, saying “pony” when the written word is horse, or reading “after a long night of wor, Joe was exhausted” when the text read “after a long night of work, Joe was satisfied.”

Skipping words or lines: Does she skip words, or even whole lines when reading aloud? Does she miss key words in instructions?

Background knowledge: When your child hears about something or sees something with declarative information, does that information stick with them? Or do you find that you re-explain things? 

Vocabulary: Can your child often define words? Does she ask for definitions while reading or listening to a book? Can she come up with synonyms or antonyms? Does her writing repeat words often?

Working memory: Does your child seem to hold things in their memory well for repeat encounters? For instance, if he spends a moment decoding chop, /ch/ /o/ /p/, then encounters it in the next line, does he recognize it or is it brand new again until he’s seen and manipulated it many times? 

Long term memory: What are examples of things that she recalls in vivid detail? Concepts, events, feelings, stories, songs? 

Fluency: Does your child read at an appropriate speed, accurately, and with expression? This doesn’t necessarily mean fast, but at a speed where they aren’t sounding out words, but the words are automatic and fluid. 

Prosody: Does your child read with expression, intonations, and pauses? How about when they aren’t reading, if they are engaged in imaginative play, or singing, or re-telling a story, do they include a lot of expression? 

Comprehension: Does he understand what he reads? Can he identify the main point? Connect details? Make inferences? How about if something is read aloud or listened to? Is that the same, or different?