Literacy
Of all the skills that a child acquires during their early years, perhaps none is more transformative than learning to read. SLPs are here to support children and families who are struggling with the journey of literacy development.
Pre-literacy and Literacy Development
The early years of a child's life represent a period of exponential growth and learning. Of all the skills that a child acquires during this period, perhaps none is more transformative than learning to read. It's a learning journey that equips children with language skills, cognitive abilities, and lays the groundwork for social-emotional growth. By creating a lifelong love for reading and learning, we are nurturing our children to become not just literate individuals, but people ready for a successful future.
Building Pre-literacy Skills
Long before children learn to read or write, they start developing the building blocks of literacy. This early development is what we call pre-literacy skills. These skills include receptive language (the ability to understand spoken or written language), expressive or oral language (the ability to express thoughts and ideas verbally), phonological and phonemic awareness (the understanding of how sounds function in words), print awareness (the recognition of print and understanding its purpose), and alphabetic knowledge [1].
A Deeper Look at Phonological and Phonemic Awareness
Phonemic and phonological awareness are key literacy skills that your little ones develop early on. Phonemic awareness, a subset of phonological awareness, is the understanding that words are made up of individual sounds or phonemes. A good example would be your child being able to break down the word 'cat' into its three distinct sounds: /c/, /a/, and /t/.
Phonological awareness refers to a child's ability to recognize and work with sounds in spoken language. For instance, your child displays this skill when they can identify that both 'ball' and 'bat' start with the same sound. Below are examples of each type of skills under the umbrella of “phonological awareness”:
Syllable awareness is the ability to break down words into their separate syllables. An example is when a child can clap or tap out the syllables in words like 'elephant' - /el/, /e/, /phant/.
Rhyming is the ability to identify and produce words that have the same ending sounds. This skill is seen when your child can tell that 'cat' and 'hat' sound similar at the end, or can think of a word that rhymes with 'dog', like 'frog'.
Segmenting refers to breaking down words into their individual sounds. For instance, your child showcases this skill when they can separate the word 'sun' into /s/, /u/, /n/.
Blending is the reverse of segmenting; it's the ability to put individual sounds together to form words. If you say the sounds /b/, /e/, /d/, and your child can tell that these sounds make up the word 'bed', they are displaying blending skills.
Deleting is the ability to recognize what is left when a part of a word is removed. For instance, if your child can tell you that 'spider' without the 's' is 'pider', they are demonstrating deleting skills.
Onset-rime recognition is a child's ability to recognize the common sound pattern in a word excluding the initial sound. For instance, in the words 'cat', 'hat', and 'mat', the common pattern or 'rime' is 'at', while 'c', 'h', and 'm' are the 'onsets'. When your child can group these words based on their rime, they're showcasing onset-rime recognition.
Substituting sounds is the skill of swapping one sound in a word for another to create a new word. If your child can change the 'b' in 'bat' to 'c' to make 'cat', they are demonstrating this skill.
The Science of Reading
The Science of Reading is an evidence-based approach to teaching reading, supported by extensive research into how we learn to read. It's like the manual to your child's reading journey! There are five “pillars” to reading. First, 'Phonemic Awareness', where your child learns to hear and use the smallest units of sound. Then, 'Phonics', where they connect these sounds to written letters. Third, 'Fluency' is developed, helping your child read smoothly and quickly. Fourth, 'Vocabulary' enriches your child's understanding of words, their meaning, and usage. Finally, 'Comprehension' enables your child to understand and interpret what they're reading. It is important to know that your child’s literacy instruction includes all parts of the Science of Reading.
Creating a Literacy-Rich Environment
Encouraging regular literacy activities helps create a positive attitude towards reading and writing. These activities can be as simple as singing nursery rhymes, playing word games, or reading together. You could also make your own family newspaper, where each member contributes a piece of news each day. Drawing pictures and writing accompanying stories can turn into a creative and educational activity. Regular trips to the local library can become an exciting adventure to discover new books [2].
A literacy-rich environment is one that encourages children to interact with print and language in various forms. Creating such an environment can be as simple as having a variety of books available, posting letters and words around the house, or incorporating language games into playtime [9].
The idea is to make language and literacy a visible, vibrant part of the child's surroundings. A home where words, books, and writing are part of daily life is a home that encourages literacy development.
The Impact of Reading Aloud
Reading aloud to children is a time-tested, powerful tool in fostering literacy skills. It not only helps children to develop language and literacy skills, but also creates strong emotional bonds[6]. Regularly reading aloud to children exposes them to various language patterns, different genres of literature, and expands their world beyond their immediate environment
Remediation: When Literacy is a Challenge
A speech-language pathologist, or SLP, can be a crucial ally in supporting your child's reading journey, especially if they're facing challenges. Using the Science of Reading, SLPs guide children to master phonemic and phonological awareness skills and phonics, helping them understand sounds and their written counterparts. They also work on language skills, improving vocabulary and comprehension, so that children can understand and interpret what they're reading. With the help of an SLP, children can overcome obstacles and unlock their full reading potential, turning reading struggles into reading success!
Conclusion
Promoting pre-literacy and literacy skills in toddlers and youth is a collaborative effort, involving parents, educators, healthcare providers, and the broader community. By nurturing these skills from an early age, we set our children on a path towards academic success and personal fulfillment. Remember that every child is unique, and so is their literacy development journey. Celebrate their progress, and remember that learning to read is a marathon, not a sprint.
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https://readingpartners.org/blog/six-reasons-support-early-literacy/
https://www.naeyc.org/our-work/families/read-together-support-early-literacy
https://icandreamcenter.com/literacy-is-essential-for-youth/
https://extension.psu.edu/programs/betterkidcare/news/2020/promoting-early-literacy
Other References:
FAQs
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According to the International Dyslexia Association, approaches that use a Guided LIteracy or Balanced LIteracy approach are not effective for struggling readers. Structured literacy is more effective for all readers, and especially necessary for students with dyslexia.
SLPs at Ruby Speech Therapy support children with reading challenges by incorporating instruction in phonics, sound-symbol association, syllable instruction, morphology and syntax.
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According to Young (2012, 2023), approximately 5-10% of children learn to read in a seemingly “effortless” way, and another 35-40% have a relatively easy experience with learning to read and write. Even for these children, regular exposure to print, stories, and reading aloud are often significant contributors to their reading journey. And for learning to spell, these children also will likely need some targeted teaching.
However, for the other 50-60% of kids, learning to read and write requires explicit instruction, perhaps including intensive and repetitive intervention. This instruction should incorporate the five pillars of literacy instruction and follow the principles of the science of reading.
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Children develop at their own pace, and that include for reading! Learning to read is influenced by a variety of factors, not least of all being the child’s natural interests. While it is common to see articles indicate age 6-7 as an average for learning to read, there are many children who begin earlier, and children who are still learning to read at age 8.
SLPs, teachers and other reading specialists may be able to identify a struggling reader before the “average age” by looking at a child’s interest and ability with pre-literacy skills. These are skills that come before the “true reading”, including print awareness, holding books in the correct direction, letter-sound identification, rhyming and so on. By looking at the whole child, and not only whether or not they can read, we can best identify if additional explicit instruction is needed and in what way to best support them.
Links & Resources for Literacy Development
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Games, Sites & Apps
There are a plethora of online resources available for children to practice their pre-literacy and literacy skills from the convenience of home. At times, it can be overwhelming to know where to start! Here are some of our favourite online resources:
Decodable books (sometimes called “Phonics Readers”) from SPELD SA (free)
App: Phonemic Awareness Bubbles (free or paid versions)
App: Partners in Rhyme (free or paid versions)
Apps by “Reading Doctor”, such as Letter Sounds or Blending Sounds (paid apps)
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For SLPs: Guiding Curriculums for Phonological Awareness Support
If you are an SLP or SLP-to-be looking for guidance in how to support how students with early literacy needs, the following curriculums are a good place to start:
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Podcast Recommendation for Parents and Educators: Sold a Story
In her podcast, “Sold a Story”, Emily Hanford tells the story of literacy instruction in schools - the good, the not-so-good, and the downright upsetting. You can listen to the podcast here. It is eye-opening, educational and very well-produced. Additionally, in her research for this podcast, she read hundreds of books and articles on the topic of reading development. She shared a list of her top 10 recommendations for books on the topic here.
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