Early reading - teach it or let them do it themselves?

[blondeviolin]

My young 3yo has been fascinated with letters and numbers from babyhood. Now he is starting to spell and sound out simple CVC words. My kids have all been early readers, but it's been parent-directed. I wasn't planning on teaching Hyrum to read for another 18 mos at least.

 

So do I let him continue to learn by exploration (and sneaking in on his sister's lessons) or do I start a five-minute-a-day sort of "lesson"? (Very loose use of the word here...)

 

For PreK, I was planning on What Your Preschooler Needs to Know (book and workbook) and some letter crafts (for fun since he's known his letters and sounds for years).

[maize]

Try lessons and see if he likes them. If he doesn't enjoy the lessons, or if he gets tired of them, drop it for now. If he's having fun keep going!

[Jackie]

I did "lessons" because DD expressed clearly that she wanted to know how to read. The lessons generally just consisted of cuddling with the Bob Books and working our way through them.

[desertflower]

I'd do both.

[TracyP]

I would do whatever he wants. I have started teaching my 3yo to read because she begged and cried. I didn't want to, but how do you say no to that? :laugh: OTOH, my 5yo could be reading better than he is. He is picking it up on his own, but he HATES actual reading lessons. I figure it isn't a battle worth fighting. If your son isn't asking for lessons, *I* probably wouldn't start teaching, but you can't really go wrong here.

[La Texican]

I put my young 3yr. old on Reading Eggs. She's now an old 3 yr. old and reading simple sentences, sounding out words, and telling similar looking words apart. I bought it because it worked well for my other kid. It works well on a laptop with a touchpad. I've read that if you have a desktop you can buy a smaller sized mouse for little kids. The program has a playroom where they can practice easy tasks with a mouse if they don't know how to use one yet. I've read mixed reviews, but I liked it for both of my kids. I mixed it with Kumon Tracing letters and then HWT k, copying letters.

[boscopup]

My oldest learned from Starfall. He didn't want anything resembling school lessons.

 

My youngest occasionally asked for lessons, but he really learned more when I didn't do lessons.

 

Basically, if they ask for a lesson, I'll do one, but I don't do it daily if they aren't asking daily.

[Runningmom80]

My kids all kind of asked for help.  I don't think lessons would hurt, as long as he's enjoying them!

[Donna]

I taught one early because he asked to learn to read and loved books. The lessons were short, cuddly, and fun. He enjoyed every minute and on days he didn't bring me the lesson book, we didn't do it…he brought it every evening as part of his routine unless he wasn't feeling well. I had another who brought me the lesson book twice when she first came upon it on the shelf then stopped so we played the games she liked with letters and I read to her all the time. She was my earliest reader and seemed to absorb the rules through osmosis.

 

I had another child who wouldn't pick up a book unless it was to move it out of his way for something else. He often knew what I had read to the others because he was nearby and listening when I didn't realize it. I taught him to read later.

[shawthorne44]

I would teach phonics.  

I know many people who self-taught themselves to read at a young age.  We all have pretty bad pronunciation skills.  Once we hear a word, we are fine, usually.  But, sounding out a word we've never seen before?  You'd think chance would lead to the correct pronunciation every now and then.  But, No.  In school it wasn't a problem, because our reading age was so far ahead of the class that we never actually had to sound out a word.  There a few books that I'm not allowed to read to DD.  A Disney Jungle Book, for example, Mowgli ?  How the heck are you supposed to say that?  

[boscopup]

I teach phonics even if they've taught themselves to read first. My 5 year old reads great, so we're doing phonics for spelling this year. ;)

[jar7709]

One of mine never wanted "reading lessons." He was read to a lot, and learned all the letter sounds in the field, so to speak. One day it was like a switch had flipped and he could read anything by about age 5.5. It was so easy and I think he really taught himself. Few pronunciation problems, doesn't need phonics except for some light mop-up spelling stuff.

 

Second child? SO different in that respect. She didn't want reading instruction either, but she needed it...finally now at age 7.5 reading ok.

 

So all that just to say: whichever is best for your child. :)

[Tanikit]

My children already read a lot of words and could read simple sentences before age 3, but were not ready for phonics lessons then although the concept of blending had been introduced to them by me informally. I started extremely short phonics lessons at 3.5 with my eldest and just before age 3 with my youngest as by this stage they needed it and they were able to cope with it. The youngest is only doing blends now but knows a large number of words with vowel teams in them so I have pointed these out to her too, but have not taught it formally and she seems to be putting two and two together slowly as she is reading words correctly that I have not taught/told her. The eldest did this too - despite knowing the phonics though, English is a complicated language and I have now switched my eldest to books that contain foreign words (Italian, French, Spanish etc) so that she will hopefully pick up how these particular words get read without me having to teach that too since these words do come up frequently in good English literature even though they are not directly English and have not even been stolen by the English language - but they still appear in our books.

[Korrale]

My son learnt to read via sight words when he was 2. But he wasn't fond of phonics until he was three. Not sure he was ever fond of them. He intuited most of it. But I am reinforcing phonics via spelling now. You could certainly do a balanced approach. There is no right or wrong way to teach reading.

And I don't think there is a time that is too early as long as it is enjoyable and you have a willing student.