Can I Leave Phonics Behind?

[Sapa]

Hi all and thanks in advance for any insight. 
 

My DS showed a strong interest in words and reading at a very young age, and when I did some research on how to help engage his interest, I became really fired up about phonics despite not learning it myself growing up. I followed an early reading simple phonics program with him at that time, and he was readily sounding out and reading CVC words at 2 and a half. Impressed with his interest and progress, I’ve kept up with phonics with him ever since, working primarily through reading.com’s app, which appears to approximate the famous Teach Your Kid to Read in 100 Easy Lessons book. He’s now pre-K age and has completed that app’s 99 lessons. 

 

To be clear, I really have had no goal for his reading. Since he seemed to be so interested, I just followed his lead and tried to help him along. I never pushed him; he’d ask to do the lessons. 
 

Now having completed a comprehensive phonics program with him, I’m honestly less impressed with phonics than I was going into this. Not trying to upset anyone who is a strong proponent, and I may just be ignorant here, but I feel misgivings about the potential it has for adding confusion. I feel like I‘ve presented to my child something as “the code” to reading, and in reality, he can only decode one in several words using his suite of learned phonics, with little to no explanation provided as to why that’s the case and why so many words don’t obey the phonics he’s learned.  All of the “this is how it sounds sometimes, but other times it makes this sound” and “this word cannot be sounded out and just has to be memorized” has felt somewhat dizzying even for me, and I can’t imagine what it feels like to a new young reader.  Of course, I see the other side of how confusing English might seem without the guidance of phonics, but I sometimes wonder if having it suggested that I’ve given him the answer when I’ve given anything but just makes it worse and undermines confidence even more  

And recently, I’ve been feeling like he’s getting frustrated and discouraged focusing on phonics and sounding words out. He stopped asking to read, and he started to rail against encouragement to try sounding words out. 
 

As a result, the past month or so I’ve dropped the focus on phonics. I still often point out ones he’s learned where present, but I don’t ever tell him to sound out a word and instead just focus on reading books he enjoys together without any pressure to work on phonics. I challenge him to read words on his own, and sometimes he just says what he thinks it is, and sometimes he tries to sound it out, but I don’t pressure him either way.  He’s asking to read *much* more now, and he seems to be picking up a lot of words, probably just through sight, as a result. 
 

All of this has me wondering whether I can basically just leave emphasis on phonics behind at this point and just focus on language exposure and reading.  Would I be doing him a tremendous disservice? Has anyone else essentially left phonics behind early on? Have I just botched handling his phonics learning or started it too early and need to go back? 
 

I realize he’s still young for reading, so the stakes are rather low for progress, but as long as I’m going to be the one helping him learn to read, I figure I should have a sense of direction now.  Any input is appreciated—sorry for the long read! 

Edited January 22, 2023 by Sapa

[maize]

Teach your child to Read in 100EZ lessons is not comprehensive phonics; it's bare-bones basic phonics. If you want him to learn more than basics, you could look into All About Reading or Logic of English.

Whether a child needs more phonics that what is presented in 100 EZ lessons really depends on the child. Some of mine didn't and some did. You might try getting just the readers from All About Reading and working through those--they will present almost exclusively words that can be sounded out phonetically so are a good way to build fluency and confidence. 

Edited January 22, 2023 by maize

[ScoutTN]

Seconding leveled, phonetic readers and lots of reading real books together. Let him practice what he knows. He’s young; don’t rush. 

[ScoutTN]

The Sold a Story podcast might interest you? 

[maize]

For higher interest decodable books, this company is great:

https://www.phonicbooks.com/shop/

Also, if you like online or app-based learning, Reading Eggs' Fast Phonics program is quite good (and does move much faster than the standard Reading Eggs program).

[KSera]

I think with a child only pre-K, it's much too early to decide phonics "didn't work". Sounds like he's reading well for his age, and he may just not be developmentally ready to integrate more advanced phonics. The studies that have shown the benefit of phonics over sight reading haven't been trying to show that it's more effective for a very young reader, but that it gets kids to be better readers in the end. Getting there faster or earlier isn't important, so I would just work with what he's confident on and put the instruction aside for awhile and try again when he's ready. It's amazing how kids make leaps on things like this when we're not even specifically working on it with them.

[maize]

Also seconding those who say there is no rush. Reading younger does not equate to reading better. If he isn't enjoying reading you are likely better off taking a break from instruction and focusing on reading to him. He's very young.

Edited January 22, 2023 by maize

[Clemsondana]

A lot of kids are spurty - they get interested in something and make great strides at it, and then their interest moves to something else and they make rapid progress there.  Not making more progress at something doesn't necessarily mean that the method is bad.  In my experience, it as often a sign that the child had reached their developmental limits with that particular skill or had more interest in something else at that time.  I'm sure that not all kids are like this.  But, with both of mine, who have really different temperaments, I found that sometimes if they were putting effort into one thing - learning to ride a bike, or developing social skills through more social time, or learning math or learning to read - then their progress on the other skills slowed or even regressed a bit.  And sometimes we'd hit developmental limits and then suddenly they'd be off and running with new skills.  If they were experiencing frustration, we'd take breaks.  And, even if we weren't doing direct instruction with something, that didn't mean that we dropped everything related to it.  Even when we weren't practicing phonics, I still read both complex story books for content and simple readers that they could follow along with. 

One of my kids read early after a quick pass through Hooked on Phonics.  I practiced with my other, but it felt like we weren't moving forward until suddenly kid started reading midway through K.  With kids that I've volunteered with, some plodded along and made incremental progress while others seemed to go from 'can't read well' to 'reasonably fluent reader' very suddenly.  

[Tanager]

I am pretty sure I never learned phonics until I taught my kids. Logic of English really helped me, especially as it gives most of the sounds to eliminate sight words such as “s” makes the s sound and the z sound. So then the word “is” is no longer a sight word. S is just using it’s second sound. It also has rules that help with spelling and just making sense of this confusing language. I used their Foundations program with my second kid and we flew through it - he did have a little previous phonics knowledge from early interest. It was fun.

[Clarita]

I'm doing AAR with my son which is mainly phonics. I also talk to him about how English isn't just a phonetic language (this is where some of the "exceptions") come in. I forget the technical linguistic term, but English language mixes phonics with meaning. So early on I've incorporated some dialogue that notices some words are put together in a way that determines meaning. This part I felt has helped with where to divide the word to sound it out. 

My son is able to decode most words he encounters in reading. Occasionally, I have to point out digraphs he hasn't learned yet. Also the further I get in phonics and learning the construct of the English language the more I realize there aren't actually that many exceptions. We even passed the lesson on certain schwas and really you can pronounce the words phonetically and figure out (because you speak English fluently) how you would say it in regular conversation and realize that you are just not pronouncing everything clearly all the time. 

[ScoutTN]

2 hours ago, KSera said:

I think with a child only pre-K, it's much too early to decide phonics "didn't work". Sounds like he's reading well for his age, and he may just not be developmentally ready to integrate more advanced phonics. The studies that have shown the benefit of phonics over sight reading haven't been trying to show that it's more effective for a very young reader, but that it gets kids to be better readers in the end. Getting there faster or earlier isn't important, so I would just work with what he's confident on and put the instruction aside for awhile and try again when he's ready. It's amazing how kids make leaps on things like this when we're not even specifically working on it with them.

This!

[maize]

2 hours ago, Clarita said:

I'm doing AAR with my son which is mainly phonics. I also talk to him about how English isn't just a phonetic language (this is where some of the "exceptions") come in. I forget the technical linguistic term, but English language mixes phonics with meaning. 

The term you are thinking of might be morphophonemic; these are some examples of morphophonemic units in English:

 

Edited January 23, 2023 by maize

[Ting Tang]

Something I read at one point is children who may not need a lot of phonics help to actually learn to read might just be internally intuitive about phonics and how our language works.  I have a good reader who isn't the best speller, so I think had he learned phonics, that might be better.  Or not. Who knows.  I have him using a spelling program based on sound and structure now.

Since your child is so young, I think reading books together is honestly the best thing!  That is never a mistake. 

Since he is only in preschool, you have enough time to start formal phonics training in a year or two if you think it is necessary.  And you may not have to spend a ton of time if you do so.

I'm not an expert, just a mom, and these are just my thoughts.  🙂  

 

 

[Brittany1116]

My oldest taught himself to read and only had phonics with Abeka K in private school. He read easily and was a natural speller and I thought he didn't need it. Now at almost 12, he seems to mispronounce words often. I realized he didn't get the rules about soft C and G etc. It's a simple fix, but his younger brother who has had more intentional phonics can decode some things more quickly, even with less life and reading experience.

[Momto6inIN]

My older ones learned to read using a whole language program in public school, and it was easy and effortless for them. When we started hs'ing I realized my then 4th grader who had learned seemingly by osmosis couldn't sound out the longer and bigger words that were necessary for older kids to know and use. She had skated by so far because she had learned by sight without any trouble, but more complex words in her history and science assignments were challenging. So we hit some phonics with her at that point.

I definitely don't think you need to do any more phonics with a preschooler who isn't interested and who is getting read to plenty for enjoyment! 😊 BUT ... when he's ready, at some point you will probably want to go over some more in depth phonics with him in order to cement that knowledge and prepare him for reading bigger words.

Edited January 24, 2023 by Momto6inIN

[AnneGG]

If he has stopped enjoying the formal phonics lessons, I (personally) would stop.
There is a lot more to phonics than knowing sounds. Phonemic awareness, phonological awareness, blending, segmenting….

You could work on these skills without formal lessons all while continuing to encourage a love of literature. 

[Sapa]

Everyone, thank you so much for these thoughtful and insightful responses!  This board is such a tremendous resource.  After digesting your posts and following up on the leads you've given me, I've decided to set aside formal phonics study for now and just focus on reading and a love of literature (though I'll still take time to review phonics and related skills as we read to the extent it doesn't bother him).  Based on your experiences and points, I plan to revisit phonics later, probably through a different curriculum and program than what I've used.  I suspect, as many of you have intuited, that he may be more ready and receptive at an older age and that the benefits of phonics will probably most shine through as he engages in more advanced reading.

At the risk of sounding trite, thank you all again, so much!