The Reading Journey - Part 1
Looking back... It seemed like eons and eons ago that I started my learning journey of teaching Immanuel how to read. There is probably going to be a few parts and a desciption of my hard work.. hahah.. I must praise myself because I am doing a good job right? Just like the mummies out there, hehe... Before starting, I had to revise the phonetic sounds of the letters. I made a "mistake" right in the beginning of concentrating on the alphabets and not the sounds, which made him confused, so A is A or "air"? So it took a while to get the phonetic sounds through games and play first.He is not the type to pick up words easily and that is an understatement. My husband will remember how I almost vomited blood, making him repeat certain words again and again, just to make sure he gets it. One day, he said that Mummy is like a volcano and will erupt. I was like thinking, "wow! He can make comparisons, not bad!" All I can say is, "never give up!" Actually you can't because it is your kid... there is no best teacher other than the mummy... (I hope my hubz skips reading this sentence). So I told myself to push on... though blue in the face. First of all, Immanuel does not like to read.... and he likes to run away from me. But as they always say, the hardest is always at the beginning, true?
Then I started my journey officially abt 3 years old... I have tried introducing it a while earlier but he did not seemed interested but at 3 years old, I pushed myself to do it... This is the montessori box of LMA (Largo Movable Alphabets). The method says that children can start making words even before they start writing. And I agree with it. I purchased the Pink Box from right to Learn. It was a little expensive but I felt that I wanted to build the foundation and I might miss the window if I tried doing my own materials as he might have grown up by then :P
However, letters like that were not so interesting to him. So I included my own games by making my own sentences and using alphabet pasta to make the words. It is also to train his eyesight (and mine) since the letters are so small. This also allows him to understand short sentences and their structure.
I started using the LMA at times after capturing his interest with my own games. As he grow more confident, it is ok to be more "boring".
Some Pink Box activities. This comes more towards the end when he has recognized more 3 letter words with the letter "A" in the middle. Using tangible objects captures his interest more. It is good to invest in tangible objects when you first start as the children are still relatively younger.
Then there is also the match the pictures and the words type.
I further developed the reading part by alternating this set from Amazon at the same time. There was a dvd which I played. During the first time, it would show and read the word. Second time, it would show and there would be a significant pause before reading the word. So I will tell Immanuel, "faster faster! Let's see if you can say the word before the "auntie" does!".
After watching the DVD, I went over these words in order. Next I will skip and point. There were certain words in which he just couldn't get it. This got me quite frustrated! But I also understand that even for me, there are some things I will never understand (like certain maths concepts), so this thought calmed me down.
There were interesting stories that has words that will be repeated, plus using these words we have just learnt. It is all about reinforcement!!
These were the extra little books that I read to Immanel after he finished all the 3 letter words with letter "A" in the middle. Like "can, tap" etc
So this was the beginning. When he can read this book by himself at 41 months, he felt so proud! (and me too), at least my hard work paid off!! When hubz came back, he ran to him with the book and read it to him. He might have paused at times but he read it himself nonetheless. No words can describe the feeling I guess... Hubz gave me a thump on my back which almost burst my lungs and said "Well Done!".
It took him about 3 months (cos we had to focus on other stuff and also celebrate Christmas) to build the foundation and to understand the breaking up of the word as well as building it. But after that I got faster (and maybe lazier). Don't give yourself a timeline in the beginning because it will only stress you.
