Reading

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 ==//Effective teaching of reading in the early years // == ====To understand words, their meaning and how to say them, firstly, requires phonics; the teaching of sounds in words and the relationship words have with letters to form meaningful speech and writing skills. Phonics is a strategy for word identification and spelling as the sound of each letter needs to be identified, blended and then, as knowledge is built, compared with other similar sounding letters and words, (onsets, rimes etc...). Through phonics, students learn the elemental knowledge needed to enable them to blend letters into simple words, which, in turn, with proper instruction and practice forms the basis of their literary education which is then applied to all other areas of education and built upon continually from thereon. One area of phonics is; Onsets and Rimes. Onsets and rimes refer to the structure of a word. Simple 3 letter words such as; can, let and ham have a consonant-vowel-consonant pattern which, demonstrates a; consonant onset ie. /c/an /h/am and a vowel-consonant rime ie. c/an/ or l/et/. Another area of phonics is blending. Blending refers to the joining or ‘blending’ of a 2 or 3 consonant letter combination with other consonants, at either the beginning or ending of a word. The teaching of reading in early years of education can be quite challenging. Teaching reading also requires the understanding that, "reading is a process of constructing meaning from print and other symbols" (Hill, S 2006, p.170) Beginning, early-emergent, emergent, early, transitional and extending, are all phrases of reading development (Hill, S 2006, p.170) and therefore require different strategies. To teach reading for early years, readers assume four roles which help them to read. (Hill 2006, p.172) These roles need to be considered by the teacher as they're the skills used by the reader. The four roles are; Code breaking, meaning maker, text user and text critic. (Hill 2006, p.172) Code breaking encompasses a few skills which enhance the child's learning; The Alphabetic principle, Phonemic Awareness, Letter knowledge and Phonics all aid in taking on the role of code breaker. (Hill 2006, p.173) Because reading requires so many skills, teaching children to read can involve many stages, phases and applied knowledge. Some strategies for teaching reading can be; Modelled reading, guided reading, shared reading and eventually independent reading. these strategies can be very useful in aiding childrens' reading development by teaching for the various levels they're at and aiming to improve their reading.    ====