Literacy-Points to Ponder

By Carmen Markowski, Discovery Toys Team Leader

I worked as a grade three teacher for many years before having kids of my own. As a school teacher, obviously, I knew the importance of reading to children at an early age. Every year when students entered my class, I’d witness the variety of skills and abilities of the group. There were always some weak readers, some strong readers, and everything in between. To me, this is just the way the world worked, some kids had greater skills than others, or were born with a stronger aptitude for reading compared to some.

Seven years later, I have kids of my own. My oldest will be seven in October. Watching his development in the area of literacy has really changed my idea of how the “world works” when it comes to reading skills. Are some kids just born with a greater ability than others? Well, yes, I still believe that, however, I see now there are many things parents can do before their child enters school which will allow the child to learn to read far easier and quicker.

I should tell you my son was by no means at the top of his class in reading. Quite the opposite, in grade one he was a part of a small group pulled from class in order to get extra help in reading. My son is a typical boy. He was very physical from day one. He could walk to the park at 11 months old and was climbing apparatus’ far too big for him at age two. He had no interest in drawing or puzzles in those early years. His fun was jumping off the couch or climbing my door jabs. The best thing I ever did was read to Luke from an early age. He was probably only a few weeks old when I cuddled him on my lap and got through “Good Night Moon” for the first time. By three months we had a very set routine, two or three books just before bed. We have continued this routine every day, with a few days missed here and there. So books....he loves them. Now he enjoys down time and always, I’ll see him surrounded with magazines, or thumbing through a Captain Underpants book.

Here’s how all this reading has paid off...in Luke’s grade one year, I hate to admit it, he still didn’t know all his letters. The teacher side of me truly believes children should know their letters by grade one, however, the parent side of me, doesn’t want to push things like the alphabet on a child if he does not have the interest or the will (remember, Luke was more interested in doing cartwheels in my livingroom at this time!). Anyway, it took from November of that year (when he didn’t know his letters), to the following April, for Luke to learn to read. To me, that seemed fast. Only five months! As we worked on reading during those months, I could see Luke using picture cues, and his knowledge of story patterns to decode words he wasn’t sure about. These were not strategies he was necessarily taught, these are strategies one figures out when one reads book after book (or is read to book after book). The knowledge piles up in those little brains and when they are ready to use the knowledge...boom, they can read. And they can read with a fury!

I now think back on those struggling students in my grade three class and wonder if some of their challenges could have been avoided by something as simple as fifteen minutes of reading everyday from an early age. Just some points to ponder as you’re picking a book off the shelf tonight. Enjoy!