We live in an information society and literacy is the key to success in it. Being a good or excellent reader will be a huge advantage for your child over the coming years.

Kids who enjoy reading often read 2-3 books a week, the same as some children read in months. So the advantage they have is increasing all the time.

Here are 5 techniques we use in our Easyread System to help a child develop a love of reading:

TIP 1 - Don't Read Books

You probably think I'm nuts now! But we have seen so many children who have travelled down the wrong path, because of early reading books. It isn't the right way for a child to first start reading.

We all use whatever seems the simplest solution to a problem. If you have a bright kid, then the simplest option will seem to be to memorise the words that keep appearing in an early reader book. But, as the vocabulary increases, that gets steadily harder and you will see more and more guessing.

Eventually you will see a collapse of confidence at around 6 or 7 years old.

TIP 2 - "Dimensionalise" the Phonemes

Your child needs to be familiar with the 43 phonemes we use. They are the little sounds that make up each word. You can find a list of them in any dictionary.

But phonemes are non-physical, abstract objects and very hard for your child to remember. So what we do is create strong visual characters to represent each one. For instance, for the sounds of the letter A we have the ants in pink pants, the ape in a cape and the ark in the park. Those are things your child can visualise and so remember.

Our memories work mainly with visual images.

TIP 3 - Play These Games

You don't want to start with a book. So where do you start?

Well, in Easyread we use games like these:

Build-A-Word. Get hold of some plastic letters and select 4 consonants and 2 vowels. Go over the sound of each one. Then say a simple and regular 3 letter word for your child to build with them (like mat, ten, fin or hit).

Select-A-Word. Write three very similar words, like hat, mat and map. Say one of them and ask your child to select which one it is.

Nonsense Words. Using your plastic letters again, write a nonsense word, like leb, kib, teg, vod. Ask your child to try to read it.

Easyread-I-Spy. Play the classic "I spy with my little eye..." game. But instead of using the first letter of the name of the object, use the first sound instead.

TIP 4 - Less is More

Never do more than 15 minutes of reading practise at a go. Any more and your child's concentration level will begin to dip.

TIP 5 - Try Easyread TrainerText

TrainerText is how we let a child read unaided, while learning. The visual image for each phoneme in a word is floating above the text, so that the child can check if a word is unfamiliar. You can do the same with the images you have created in tip 2.

That will stop your child from getting stuck and is great for building confidence.

We see a new level of enthusiasm from day 1 and a leap in confidence over the first 3 weeks using these techniques. If you employ them, I am sure you will quickly see the difference.

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