Letters, the building blocks of reading

“The Novice Reader” is in general a child in preschool up to Grade R. “The Decoding Reader” is generally the child in the Foundation Phase that is Grade 1 – 3. The “Fluent Reader” is the Upper Junior or Intermediate child – Grades 4 – 7. Learning to read doesn’t happen on a given day – it is a process that develops well through our lives.
There is robust research out there that reports a high correlation between knowledge of letters and success in learning to read. Many of the reading programs used in our schools today begin with this very premise.

The debate rages on between whether it is important to know the letter names first or to concentrate on phonemic awareness first. Phonemic awareness is the ability to hear, identify and manipulate different sounds in words. In my opinion it is important to understand both. A good well rounded educational curriculum will spend time on making sure kids know their letter names, and the sounds associated with them. The reason phonemic awareness is often not the focal point in the initial phases of learning to read is that English is a complicated language with many “tricks” in the spelling and pronunciation of words that give very different meanings (for example: There is no time like the present to present the present)!
Letter names form the building blocks of learning to read. Letter names form the basis of an idea or thought that can be built on. As such they are the bricks onto which other skills and concepts are going to be added. They are the links onto which readers will be adding the more complex skills of learning to read.
Knowledge of Letters is the essence of reading. Children in the pre-reading phase will know that there is a link between the printed word and meaning, but they don’t know enough to understand that link. Have you ever seen a child mimic reading? Here they may pick up a book and “read” a story to whoever is listening. They know there is some link between the print on the pages and words. This is essentially what teachers build on – that link. Learning the Letters is the first step in learning to read.
Once children have an understanding of Letter Names and their associated sounds, teachers start to link letters together. Teachers will start with very simple three letter words, and build from there. Here the teacher asks the child to draw on the knowledge they have acquired of the letter names, and start applying this knowledge in connecting the letters together to make words. This is where the child’s skills building begin to accelerate. Once they start linking letters together, the teachers then teach them common letter patterns and vowel-pairs. Children will use their knowledge and apply it to each level of their learning to read.
But in addition to linking letters together, there are a number of “Sight Words” that a child will need to learn. Sight Words are high frequency words that occur in text. These are words a child can’t “decode”. A child can’t take a “Sight Word” and apply the skills of sounding out the different sounds to get the word. For example the word for the number “one”. It is a sight word that children will need to know. They can’t take the individual sounds and break them up and link them together – it just does not make sense. Children need to look at the word and say “one”.
This is where the children progress from being in the Novice Phase of Reading into the Decoding Phase. In the decoding phase children will draw on ALL the skills they have learned up to this point and build on them. The decoding phase of reading is marked by the sudden change in fluency of reading. Children move from sounding out each word, to reading with ease. Reading is much smoother and more competent in this phase.
In the beginning of the decoding phase of reading the child will devote much brain capacity to reading the words that their meaning may not always be understood by the child. This happens when children begin to read at a level that is slightly above them. They have the ability to read, but they don’t process what they are reading yet. That is to say, their reading comprehension skills haven’t caught up to them. As the child’s skill level improves and their reading becomes more automatic, so their comprehension will improve. This is because they are not using as much brain power to read any more, and they can begin to devote some of that brain power into comprehending what they read.
Children enter the Fluent Reader phase when their comprehension of what they are reading is good. In this phase readers draw on their prior knowledge to enhance and deepen their understanding of what they are reading. They are again adding to their reading “building” by drawing on their past skills. Children will call on past experiences to help them infer what they are reading. They will begin to predict good or bad consequences within their reading. They will begin to identify the clues in the text to fill in the gaps in their knowledge. Children begin to unravel the layers of understanding necessary to read more complicated text.

Knowledge of Letter Names – https://www.eduplace.com/marketing/nc/pdf/fw_p04-10.pdf
The Myth of Learn to Read/Read to Learn – http://teacher.scholastic.com/professional/readexpert/mythread.htm
Learning To Read – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_to_read

Sarah Ohlsen de Fine
Sarah is a qualified Foundation Phase Teacher and owner of LearningTools, an online shop that specialises in educational games and resources