When your child is reading to you, here are some things to say besides 'sound it out'.
To help children monitor their reading:
Wait time
Try that again
Are you right?
To help children use their meaning (Semantics):
What do you think it says?
Does that make sense?
What would make sense here?
Rad the sentence again.
Make a guess and go on.
To help children use language structure (Syntax):
Does that sound right?
Does it fit?
Can that be right?
To help children use visual cues (Graphophonics):
Read up to the word and try again.
Look at how the word begins.
Do you know another work that sounds/looks that way?
Does that look right to you?
If that word was ____, what letter would you expect to see at the beginning? At the end?
To help children cross check:
Check to see if it looks right.
Check to see if it makes sense.
It could be _______ but look at _______.
To help children problem solve:
I like the way you tried to figure it out.
Good readers keep trying. Good for you!
I like the way you worked on the hard part.
What can you do to help yourself? What can you try?
Effective readers may use all cueing systems simultaneously. It is our job to help children integrate and apply them consciously as they read.
