Effective Practices for Teaching Children to Read - Research Paper Example

An overview of Effective Practices for Teaching Children to Read Teaching how to read is a complex process that requires a lot of expertise and experience. It is an art and a science at the same time. Its scientific part requires that the teacher should possess the necessary skills about reading, based on scientific evidence. It is an art since it requires that the skills be applied effectively in order to achieve the best results. A difficulty comes in the actual application of the skills. A teacher may be well equipped with the scientific knowledge but may lack on the effective teaching practices, which are necessary in delivering. A teacher who knows to teach how to read is the one who associates well with the children and knows their strengths and weaknesses individually. The following paper is an overview of the research about effective practices for teaching children to read. It gives a brief description of how a teacher can teach how to read effectively using the five scientific components, together with other findings from various researchers. Most of the findings are from major world investigators and have been tested over time and their implications on the students have been approved. The body also consists of the tools, techniques, procedures and approaches that were used in the past and which can still be applied and their effects. It also suggests a number of variables which can be used as standards for assessing the progress of the students. Through proper monitoring, the teacher can tell whether the student is learning the skill and know the action to take in case of otherwise. The paper winds up with a brief conclusion and a list of references from which one can refer to for further reading. Introduction As mentioned earlier, teaching how to read is a process. It is compound and requires special expertise. The main question that the research wants to answer is; what are the effective practices of teaching reading? This is a question that many researchers have been seeking to answer over time. The question is quite interesting because, teaching is one of the main drivers or sources of knowledge. In order to assimilate the knowledge, the learner has to read and understand. This can only be achieved if the learner is first of all taught how to read. The research findings and the results Effective teaching practice in reading has been defined as the teacher’s comprehensive understanding of why certain practices lead to learning to read and how. Before giving a consideration to being caring and sensitive to the student’s abilities, a teacher must have good knowledge on what to teach and how to teach it. Many teachers tend to use fads in their teaching. These are teaching styles or behaviors that develop and become so popular to the extent that their use seems obvious. From the findings, fads only work well with certain children and not every child. It is the role of the teacher to identify which program best suits each child and which one is not effective. The teacher is however cautioned on embracing instructional fads instead of scientific research on the essentials of effective practices to teaching reading (Timothy, William, & William, 2007). There are a number of components which are considered essential to teaching reading. The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) was involved in a review on reading research, and this review has been the basis for many new programs that try to explain the concept of effective reading. The reviews, together with other written works which are given in the reference list identify five main scientific essentials to teaching reading. These are phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension (NICHD, 2000). An explicit combination of these components yields the best effect. The components are briefly described below. Phonemic awareness: This is the awareness that spoken words are made up of units of speech sounds, and the ability to hear, identify and say individual sounds in words. Any spoken word is made up of individual sounds known as phonemes and one requires the skill to be able to spell a word and to combine the sounds to read the word. This is one of the skills that will enable a child to read and hence, it is necessary for effective teachers (National Reading Panel, 2000). A controversy comes in in deciding how to teach the skill, whether in isolation by its own or in context. This sometimes depends on the ability of the children. If they are slow to learn, they may require a systematic and an intensive teaching but since in many cases a teacher handles children with mixed potentials, phonics should be taught explicitly (Sask. Learning, 2004). For primary teachers, phonemics should be taught to children daily, and around six minutes a day for kindergarten. Phonics: This is quite different from phonemic awareness. This skill is used when the student comes across a difficult word and focuses on the individual sounds in the word in an attempt to read it. It relates a letter to a sound. The understanding of phonics is what leads to phonemic awareness. The two however must be taught together. This should be done from the very basic level (primary), where the teacher needs to focus on blending letters as well as saying sounds. Fluency: This refers to the ability of a student to read orally with speed, smoothness, accuracy and effortlessly (National Reading Panel, 2000). Fluent readers have some expertise that contributes to their good vocabulary and word recognition. Encouraging children to read more is not the only thing that enhances fluency. There are other ways like repeated reading, echo reading, choral reading, controlled silent reading among others (Sask. Learning, 2004). Vocabulary: In order for students to understand what they are reading, a great deal of knowledge on words is needed. Teaching of vocabulary is therefore necessary for both oral and written work. This can be done directly or indirectly. The teacher can mention and explain the new words before reading a comprehension, or teach on each new word that the students come across within the story. Reading aloud and repeating the new words severally also promotes vocabulary development (NICHD, 2000). Comprehension: This is the last scientific component that is necessary for effective teaching of how to read. It is the act of grasping or understanding the contents of a printed text. It requires the student to be involved actively in the reading. There are strategies which teachers can use to teach on comprehension such as question and answer forums, graphic organizers and story maps. They can also teach students how to monitor their reading in order to know whether they understand. According to Debbie Miller (2002), four stages can guide children into understanding. The stages are; teacher modeling and explanation strategy, guided practice, independent practice together with feedback, and application strategy in real reading situations. The strategies are well illustrated in the research and in the book Reading with Meaning by Miller. The strategies enable the students to connect to what they read, draw inferences and make critical judgments based on knowledge. This program, together with all the others will effectively promote reading among students. The other very important part of effectively teaching how to read is the knowledge of how to apply the scientific components. These are the practices and techniques to be applied. A number of them have been suggested by No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) and The Canadian Education Statistics Council (CESC). Some of them include taking a comprehensive approach towards reading, laying some standards that can be used to monitor the reading progress, use of the available professional skills and resources appropriately, and intervening to help children with reading disabilities. Teachers should have access to researched documents about reading. There are documents which have teaching practices that have been tested and approved. These can be obtained from school libraries. However, there is no any practice that can be said to be the best (Moats, 1999). An effective teacher should be flexible in applying the existing practices and implementing new ones as they come. The teacher should also be proficient with the English language, know psychologically how to develop the reading process and be able to analyze the capabilities of the children. Another practice that can promote efficient reading is the knowledge on how to group the children. Teaching a large number of students is tedious and yields relatively low results. On the other hand, tutoring each individual child on a one on one base is expensive in terms of money and time. Besides this, research has shown that teaching small groups produces better reading results than individual or classroom instructions (National Reading Report, 2000). Children learn best when they observe and listen to what the other children are saying rather than the teacher. An effective teacher should also possess some values that motivate the children. The teacher should be loving and caring towards the students and should work hard to ensure that every student is meeting their potential. They know the child’s interests and are able to identify with them culturally. Monitoring the progress of a child and assessing it against some standards is also essential in informing instruction. Students have different levels of skills and therefore different requirements. It is important to know each child’s level. The teacher can use both formative and summative methods. These guide on which instructional strategy is the best. The teacher will know the areas where a student is weak and decide on the action to take. He can give a test to the students before and after certain learning, and use this to assess their potentials. The teacher can then know whether to re-teach the skills or to revise on specific parts (Sask. Learning, 2004). An effective school reading program is one of the necessary resources. A teacher, no matter how skilled they are cannot successfully accomplish the goal of teaching effective reading alone. There are some key factors that were presented after a research by the Canadian Education Statistics Council. These are the four factors which have been discussed above (i.e. the approach to reading instruction, monitoring of the students’ progress, effective use of resources and intervention for children with learning disabilities). A teacher can improve on their efficiency if only they are able to bring the community together to be a part of the framework and a part of the reading program. This means incorporating the students, the parents and the leaders of the community into the program. The teacher will also be required to dedicate some time for personal reading so as to sharpen on his/her skills, and also to develop better reading strategies while at the same time updating to any new strategy. The research observes that many of the teachers lack the necessary skills required to be an effective teacher of reading because they are not taught as they graduate from their respective colleges or universities. The research therefore suggests that the teachers be accorded the necessary training so that they can be able to teach others. If the teacher has all the skills, then delivering will not be a major problem. Teaching how to read, as can be seen, is a complex process. It calls for a lot of expertise and a wide range of knowledge. Equipping a teacher with the scientific skills is one thing while ability to deliver the content is another thing. An effective teacher of reading is the one who is able to combine all these together, choose between ranges of programs for the best, and ensure that the students acquire all the skills accordingly. 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