reading comprehension



Don't you wish this panther could
tell you what he is thinking? 

Many tiny actions in the brain are taking place all at the same time when your child is reading. Getting the meaning of the reading passage is called comprehension.

Brain research is now showing us more about how the mind learns, then stores, then finds information while reading a page of print.

A comprehension tip: quit stopping to sound out words.  Tell your child any unknown word, have your child keep reading. Stopping breaks the short-term memory, thus all comprehension is lost. This is the way the brain works for everyone. 

Show your child how to keep reading using the words he does know, sliding over unknown words. At the end of the page, you ask questions - what is happening on the page, who did what, etc. Then go back to unknown words and help your child figure them out or tell him the word. In a few weeks, this method will give great results.

Put into my blog's search box - top left corner - fix reading problem which gives you step by step comprehension help for 2nd Grade - high school. First help your child get comprehension then help with: ce, ci; or ge, gi; or compound word story; or  adding ed; or tion; or silent gh, or difference between short vowels long vowels, etc.

If you want my book for your child, I use ebay. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you. All include my contact info; email or call for help.  Have a great day. Thank you, Mary Maisner

Summer reading skills loss



Oh dear, I dropped my favorite
toy.

Find a 10 minute timer; use it twice a day. Morning is for skills work, afternoon is for reading a story. You will be more successful if you do not push for more time after the buzzer rings.

Take your child to the library or to a used bookstore. Let your child pick whatever: animal books, adventures, science experiments, Ripley's Believe it or not, joke books, etc. 

I like used books because your child can write in them.

You can assign Word Hunts for tricky look alike sight words: these, those, whether, which, though, thought, caught, brought, etc. You can get large print books at libraries and used bookstores.

Tip: Quit stopping to sound out; tell your child any unknown words. Tell your child to read the words he knows, slide over unknown words. Over time, this will reap better results.

All kids want to be great at reading but schools do not have enough time. 

Reading skills become lost when they are not used every few days: short and long vowels; adding ed and ing, changing y to i, vowel blocks ous, eous, ious, tial, tion, tious, tient, etc. Knowing chose and choose, lose and loose, bit, bite, rid, ride, and more.

I use eBay as my website, people trust it. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you to consider.  Help your child have fun reading. Mary Maisner

help child read




I am smart enough already!    Don't bother me!


 

Can a smart child be in school for three years and still be wobbly with letters b and d? Yes.

Again this Saturday, a smart, quick-minded eight year old was missing the Usual Suspects: b /d and p / q / g.  Please understand: it is not a child's fault. 

Research shows it is unclear instruction. Do not panic. 

Tip: quit stopping to sound out words, tell your child any unknown word, have your child keep reading. Stopping breaks the short-term memory loop, thus all comprehension is lost.

Tell your child to keep reading using the words he does know. Slide over any unknown word. At the end of the page, you ask questions - what is happening on the page, who did what, etc. Then go back to unknown words and help your child figure them out or tell him the word. In a few weeks, this method will give great results.    

Use my blog's search box - top left corner - put in backward b. Also, sight words. My new books are sold at eBay. Search Instant Reading Help. All my books will pop up, all include my contact info; email or call for help.

Have a great day, Mary Maisner

ready for kindergarten



My owls like to look at
all the animals in their forest.

Use a picture to help your child think about the letter sounds he hears at the start of a word, like tree, bird, branch. Then practice printing the letters within three parallel lines you've drawn equal distance apart on a blank sheet of paper.

Tell your child that the letters fit inside the parallel lines like his feet fit inside his shoes. You will need to be patient; it takes a long, long time to print letters without a wobble. Do not obsess. Only letters b, d, g, p, q need to be correct. 

Ignore all other backward letters, they will not slow your child's progress, will self-correct by mid-2nd Grade, and are very rarely dyslexia.  Get an ABC letter strip from Target, Office Max, etc. Teach each letter name and basic sound: Aa apple, Bb bear, etc.

Lots of point and name is great practice. 

Over time, explain that the ABC letters in a word sit next to each other, like the toes of his foot: not tight but side-by-side. 

Using your picture pick words to practice, like tree, bird, sky, owl - tell your child the correct letters or allow your child to try spelling. At this point do not worry about correct spelling, but do aim for the correct beginning sound: bird, feather, tree, etc.

Your next target is teaching that words in a sentence need space between them, like cars on a street - they must not bump into one another. Teach your child to place his pointer finger on the paper to see how much space to have between words. And, tell your child that letters and words always go this way >>.  5 minute lessons are good, short and fun is best. 

I use ebay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you. All include my contact onfo; email or call for help.

Have a great day, Mary

ready for kindergarten

My giraffe is not small.
My giraffe is very, very tall.

To make learning to print the ABCs more fun, find a picture your child will enjoy looking at for the length of a five minute lesson. Using a ruler or long magazine, draw three parallel lines completely across a blank sheet of paper. The lines need to be about equal distance apart but they can be an inch or 1/2 an inch apart. Start large.

After talking about the scene in your chosen picture, ask your child to name one item in the picture and tell you the letter sound he hears at its start. In my picture, he might pick giraffe, tree, leaf, sand, sky, horns, hoof - you see how this works.

Let's imagine he picked tree. You ask for the sound at the start of tree. (letter t)

Show your child how to make a capital T or lower-case t using the lines you have already drawn on the paper. Tell him the top line and the bottom line are like his shoes. His feet fit nicely inside his shoes. Ask your child to try to help the letter T fit nicely inside the top and bottom lines.

Lower-case t has a line that crosses right on the middle line. Capital T has a line which fits on the line at the top. Your job is to help your child work on this in a stress-free way. It takes every child's fingers a very long time to get control of a pencil. Your child's fingers will get tired - almost right away. 

Backward letters are not a problem; do not spend energy forcing your child to get them right. Help your child learn to point and name and say all basic ABC letters: Aa apple, Bb bear, Cc cat, etc.

But being wobbly with b, d, g, p, q will cause problems. Spend your child's limited energy mastering the names, sounds, and shapes of b, d, g, p, q. By early 1st Grade, be sure your child recognizes those letters even when the letters are inside words. Be sure your child is clear: old not olb and by not dy. Confusion within words of b /d and p / q / g causes a child to fall behind.

BTW, if your child is left-handed, please do not try to change this natural feeling.

I use ebay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you. Have a great day, Mary Maisner   

ready for kindergarten reading



See the baby kittens?  yes  no  

1) Children are expert at reading their parent's mood so be calm and stay positive no matter what. Expect that learning a lesson is going to be successful over time - not immediately; show no frustration with your child.

2) If you have a reluctant child, get a 10 minute "hour" glass or other easy timing device. Show your child how it works. Be strict about stopping when the time is up. Short and sweet is best. Some parents cannot work with their children; get Grandma or Grandpa to help.

3) Start with easy lessons:  At Office Max, Target, etc. get an ABC letter strip. Learn the name and sound for 3 letters at a time. Sing the ABCs song; play "I Spy" for items that start with B, then C, and so on. 

Play memory-building games like Go Fish. Also, set a small item  somewhere in plain sight then ask your child to find it; place 4 items on a plate - look at them - then take away the plate and name all 4. 

Get a book of finger-games and play them; name items that come in pairs (shoes, socks, salt and pepper, etc.); sort the silverware for size and shape; look for round items, look for square items; soft items, rough-feeling items - talk about how items are alike / how they differ. 

Tip: Printing backward letters is natural, will self-correct by mid 2nd Grade, is rarely dyslexia, will not slow your child's progress - ignore them. However, b, d, g, p, q are crucial to success. Use my search box - top left corner - put in backward b. 

I now use eBay. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you. All books are brand new and include my contact info; email or call for help. Let's make reading fun and easy for your child, Mary Maisner

ready for 4th grade reading

Could I be lost?

Reading takes a big step up in 4th grade. The basic tricky letter teams need to be instant: teams such as ce, ge, ph, silent gh, etc.

Your child also needs to be in control of adding endings like ing, ed, y, s, es, ies, etc. And, changing y to i.

The complex vowel teams are now going to take center stage: tion, cian, tious, cious, ous, ious, etc.

Words in the stories and informational reading are much more challenging. A strong comprehension method is very important. Do this:

Today: quit stopping to sound out words, tell your child any unknown word, have your child keep reading. Stopping breaks the short-term memory, thus all comprehension is lost.

Show your child how to keep reading using the words he does know. At the end of the page, you ask questions - what is happening on the page, who did what, etc. 

Then return to unknown words; help your child figure them out or tell him the word. In a few weeks, this method will give great results. Lots of words cannot be sounded out but your child can get the meaning and keep reading. Look: canoe and chaos cannot be sounded out but your child can get their meaning and continue reading. This method works. Comprehension and vocabulary will increase. Most words are not new to your child's ears but they are unrecognized in print.

 

I use ebay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will come up for you.

All my books give you a systematic review of the critical lessons: ce, ge through tion, tious, changing y to i, etc. Both the struggler and the star reader will gain the power needed for success.  Your child will answer questions and write responses on the workbook style pages of the book. 

Thank you, Mary Maisner 

multi-tasking reading help

Are these puppies thinking about taking a
tiny nibble? 

Your child's brain is always multi-tasking. It is always monitoring: whether he or she feels scared or secure, hungry, too hot, have to go to the bathroom, how long the lesson is going to be, an argument overheard at home, what is going to take place later, whatever else is happening in the room, or to people close by. 

At the same time all of the above self-monitoring is going on - your child is trying to learn a new lesson plus remember the old ones: letter sounds and words which may be wobbly.

Add to that, remembering what is happening in the sentence or the story.

This is why it is so important to have the basic reading tools deeply embedding in your child's long term memory. The lessons below need to be ready for instant recall:

1) Sight words - all sight word lists are the same no matter what your school calls them: Snap, Instant, High Frequency, etc. (In my books, or download.)

2) Names and basic sounds of each ABC letter; mastery control of name, sound, shape of b, d, g, p, q so that your child does not confuse b / d and p / q / g when he starts reading words in early 1st Grade. Ignore all other backward letters; rarely dyslexia, will not slow your child's advance, and will self-correct by mid 2nd Grade. Better to hit the critical lessons.

Tip: Quit stopping to sound out. Stopping breaks the working memory. This is the way the brain works for everyone. Tell your child unknown words. Tell your child to keep reading onward using the words he recognizes.This will build your child's connection to comprehension.

3) 2nd Grade: phonics teams ce, ci, cy, ge, gi, gy, sh, ch, th, wh, blends like br, bl, cr, cl, etc. and higher level sight words: thought, through, bought, brought, etc.

This is a ton to learn; do not feel overwhelmed as a parent. Reading stories to your child as your child runs his fingers under the words is very important. After the story, go back to look for one sight word at a time (the, saw, was, is, in, it, to, etc.). Also look for individual letters b, d, g, p, q, and so on.  Have fun!

My blog has 160 lessons. But you might like a book full of help, I use ebay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you. All books are new and include my contact info. Have fun reading with your child,  Mary Maisner

phonics need to be instant

Do you think our lion looks like the king of the jungle?
Albrecht Durer painted this lion for us in the year 1521.

Most of what adults do all day is done on automatic pilot, meaning instant and without thought. Even the framework of what we do at work only needs that we plug in the details.

Our young children do not have much on auto pilot. They have to learn even the smallest parts of a job before they can get near finishing a task. 

Even 1st Grade reading requires that your child get into his, or her, auto pilot 26 basic letters plus the 1st 25 sight words. In the brain, auto pilot is called long-term storage memory.  Keep in mind, that working memory calls up into action those lessons from storage memory as your child's eyes move along a line of print.

When lessons are not ready for instant recall - your child's brain will retrieve them too slowly, or not at all. (Think how you react when you cannot find something in your own brain.)

This is not the child's fault, it is the way the brain operates. 

Phonics is the set of letters which stand for sounds: f stands for the sound at the start of fish. The ph team and the gh team also stand for the f sound: phone and laugh. Other phonics teams are the ce in center, gi of giant, ch of chair and ache, etc.

Unknown to our conscious mind, our eyes see which letters and words are going to be needed next. The brain starts searching in storage memory before we are aware it is doing so. When the item can't be found instantly, a cascade of trouble starts for the helpless little reader.  

Teachers want to do it all but there is not enough time at school for the repetition required to get the essential lessons sweetly embedded in storage memory. Parents must help.

My blog has 160 lessons. Use the search box - top left corner - put in: backward b;    sight words; compound word story; short vowel long vowel;  ce;   ge;  oy;  ou;  or any reading topic.

I use ebay as my website, people trust it. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you. All are brand new and include my contact info; call for help. Sometimes parents and children do not work well together - very common -- hire a tutor or grandparent to teach my books. You will be glad you did.  Thank you, Mary Maisner

Should my child repeat kindergarten?

Any parent can find themselves in this situation. Research shows 1 / 3 struggling readers have college graduate parents. Rarely does a child lack ability; instead the child lacks maturity.

1st Grade lesson-learning requires a child stay in his chair, follow directions, and complete assigned tasks. Observing this, a kindergarten teacher will talk to parents about repeating kindergarten. This is a truly difficult decision. Consider two factors: 

1) Doing well in 1st Grade is high-stakes. Leaving 1st Grade with less than grade-level reading skills makes it really difficult to ever get to grade level reading. Research shows most children graduate high school in the same class placement the child had in 1st Grade. It is better to repeat kindergarten than later repeat 1st Grade.

(Teachers believe a child will "catch up next year." Research shows this is not true; only 6 out of 50 children ever catch up from a slow start in 1st Grade.)

2) Whether you decide to repeat or not - your child has had a rough kindergarten year. Therefore, he has weak letter skills.  Please start today - below I tell you what to do - to build your child's letter skills. Depend on no one else. Starting 1st Grade with a specific set of letter lessons is crucial for every child. 

Use my search box - top left corner - put in backward b, later, working memory. 

And, you need a book for structured support.  I use ebay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will come up. Get the book with the panda on the cover. 

If you do not have the time, get a grandparent, or tutor to teach my book. Some parents and kids do not work well together - common problem. My books include my contact info; email or call for help. Best wishes, Mary Maisner

is baby talk OK

Would it be fun to pet these sweet puppies?
This painting was done by Benno Adam (1812-1892).

Baby-talk is good for young children because the adult is speaking slowly and stretching out the letter sounds.

Your child learns to speak by imitating the sounds within the words he hears. It is alright for your child to have his own way of saying words. And, it is such fun to hear.

About the time your child is nearing age 3 - 3 1/2 years old it is best to slowly shift into being clear with letter sounds. Be sure you are putting the final letters on the end of words. Don't obsess, just be aware.

It will be much easier for your child to learn to read words if he has heard all of the letters he will see in the printed words.

And, extend your child's word awareness. For example, use grandma (gramma), grandmother, even granny. Using a wide variety of words will help your child more easily recognize them in print, and more quickly gather comprehension. 

A big "speaking bank" makes it much easier for your child to gain a big "reading bank." Being aware of complex words and complex ideas helps your child be ready to work with them in print.

You might like to look at the books I have created for your child. I use eBay as my website, people trust it. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you.
Have fun with words, Mary Maisner

kindergarten reading, 1st grade reading help

Little owl is a watercolor by Albrecht Durer.

Kindergarten and 1st grade are the most important years of your child's reading life. A wobbly start decides a child's path because new lessons just keep coming; no way to catch up. 

Being bright should protect your child but it will not. 

What goes wrong? Parents believe great preschools and kindergarten will prepare their child but there is not enough time for the required practice of b, d, g, p, q.  

Do not panic. Use my blog's search box - top left corner - put in backward b and working memory.

Then, relax. Teach those letter lessons. And, point out one sight word at a time while you are reading stories together. 

Stick with that word until it becomes instant.  1st ten sight words: the, of, and, a, to, in, is, you, that, it.  All sight word lists are the same and in the same order.

My blog has 160 free lessons. If you want a book, I use eBay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you. All are brand new, none have grade level printed on them, all include my contact info; you can email or call with questions.

Have fun reading with your child, Mary Maisner

repeat 3rd grade reading help



This is such a tough situation. Reality is that a small set of letters and sight words must become instant; a child is going to stumble around forever without these lessons. 

Use my search box- top left corner - put in backward b, then working memory. Download these lessons. Download the 1st 100 sight words. (My books include 300 sight words.)

Take your child to a used bookstore (Goodwill, ARC, etc). Get whatever books appeal to your child. Ask your child to find and circle the 1st sight word - the. Work down the sight word list.

Tip: quit stopping to sound out words, tell your child any unknown word, have your child keep reading. Stopping breaks the short-term memory, thus all comprehension is lost. This is the way the brain works for everyone.

Instead, show your child how to keep reading using the words he does know. At the end of the page, you ask questions - what is happening on the page, who did what, etc. Then go back to unknown words and help your child figure them out or tell him the words. In a few weeks, this method will reap great rewards. (Many words cannot be sounded out. Plus, growing comprehension gathered by continuing to read the story will strengthen your child.)

Whether you hold your child back or not, start today - get a personal tutor to teach my book if you do not have the time, or do not work well with your child. (Common problem.)

I use ebay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will come up. You do not have to use my books but get a book from somewhere to give you support and structure! My books include my contact info; email or call for help.

           Thank you, Mary Maisner

boost short term working memory

We can hold a phone number in our minds for about one and one-half seconds. By repeating it, we can hold it a tiny bit longer, if we keep ourselves free of interruption.

This is an example of short-term memory, also called working memory. Whether you are reading, speaking, listening, or doing a task, your short-term memory is a series of connecting loops that are 1 and 1/2 seconds in length. An interruption breaks successful looping.

The brain is fast. It understands the meaning of a spoken word in 1/ 5th of a second (even before the speaker is finished saying it). 

A capable reader pulls the meaning of a word from his long-term memory storage in about 1/ 8th of a second. 

Big problem for the brain: uncertainty.   Why does this matter to you?  

Your brain and your child's brain likes to be sure. Being sure lets the brain operate at its preferred speeds. You want to be sure your child is certain of: 

1) basic letter sounds and letter sound teams like sh, wh, th, ch, bl, br, cl, cr, ce, ci, cy and later ous, ious, tion, tious, etc. 

2) sight words, and 3) smart comprehension methods. 

My blog gives you 160 free tips; my search box is in the top left corner.  And, you may want to look at my books for your child. 

I use eBay, people trust it. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you.

In all my books, the tricky letter teams are in bold or underlined so your child sees them as he reads stories. 

Cheat sheets for parents and lots of tips make it easy for you to remove uncertainty from your child's reading skills.     The brain-speed examples used in this blog were researched by Steven Pinker.  This artwork is a woodcut done by Japanese artist Kitagawa (1798-1861). 
Have fun reading with your child, Mary Maisner

high school reading help



This gorilla is tough but he can be ambushed.  

Smart students get ambushed everyday. The method below took two of my struggling 7th Graders and a 5th Grader to the Honor Roll at their schools. A 3rd Grade struggler got the highest score of his entire class on a social studies test.

Tip: quit stopping to sound out. Stopping causes the brain to drop collected meaning; it is self-defeating. Everyone's brain works this way. It is better to tell your child the word and try this method: 

1) Use a few pages of a story your child can write on and has not read before. (Used books are great, or download and print a mystery or adventure short story your child might like.)

Tell your child to look through the 1st paragraph putting a quick dot under words he knows, slide over the words he does not know.

Next he should read his dotted words to himself, sliding over unknown words. You may hear him, do not interrupt, do not fix mistakes, do not tell him to sound out incorrect words.

 

Now ask your child, "What is happening so far in the story?  Now ask him to read to you the paragraph he has been working on. If he has not figured out his unknown words, tell him the words as he comes to them. (Example: canoe means boat - your child will get the meaning but not a word that cannot be sounded out, like canoe, or chaos, etc. Over time, both getting the meaning and getting the word will improve. Be patient.)

Move onto the next paragraph.  Same steps: look through and dot the known words, slide over unknown words - read the known words to himself - tell you what is happening so far in the story.  Ask your child to reread this paragraph to you and you help with any words necessary.   Work through one or two more pages of the story using these steps.  At first, it will be bumpy. Ten minutes a day, for a month will reap big rewards. 

Dealing with weak letter skills: find my blog's top left corner search box. Search: ce, ci, cy  and ge, gi, gy,  and working memory, and adding ed, ing and tion and tious and compound word story.

Also, I use eBay as my website, search: Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up.   All are brand new, do not have grade-levels marked on them, and include my contact info; email or call for help.     Have a great day, Mary Maisner

pick books for your child


  

A pair of toucans having a chat with each other.
What do you suppose they are talking about?  

Choosing an interesting book is much more important than choosing for difficulty-level. Go to a used bookstore. It is good to have a book your child can write in - doodles in the margins, or circling big words, etc. This gets your child more engaged in reading. 

If your child wants to read about snakes, he or she will reach up for hard words. If animals are most interesting, take that path. Or mysteries. Or space travel. Ripley's Believe it or Not, even joke books.

 A reading tip: quit stopping to sound out words. Tell your child any unknown word, have your child keep reading. Stopping breaks the short-term memory, thus all comprehension is lost. This is the way the brain works for everyone.

The brain likes to make sense. If your child practices this method, over time more and more of the unknown words will come. It is the way the brain works.  Many words cannot be sounded out; young readers do not have the letter skills to deal with unknown words. Likely the word is in your child's speaking bank, but not recognized in print. If your child keeps reading onward, the rest of the sentence, and paragraph, can help your child connect with the meaning of the word.

Use my blog's search box - top left corner- search: working memory, or backward b, or short vowel long vowel, or compound word story, or ce, ci, cy, or tion, or tious, etc.

 And, if you are looking for reading skills help I use ebay as my website, people trust it. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up. All are brand new, none have grade levels marked on them, all include my contact info; email or call for help. 

Have fun reading with your child, Mary Maisner

muscle

When you look at a mouse does the word
muscle come to your mind?
Surprisingly, the word muscle comes from mouse.

Very likely the Roman soldiers took the word musculus with them when they invaded England before the birth of Christ.

If you flex your arm or leg muscle and watch the tissues under your skin dance back and forth, you may see how the people of long ago connected the idea of a scampering mouse with the idea of the moving muscle.

The ancient people in England shortened musculus to mus - their word for mouse. Over hundreds of years, the word muscle came to be used to talk about the tissues moving under the skin.      Say muscle, mus'l. 

Look to the right side of this blog to see other lessons. And, you might like my books for your child.

I use eBay as my website, people trust it. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you. All books are brand new and include my contact info; email or call for help.
                      Have fun with words. Thank you, Mary Maisner

fix reading trouble

Can your child see the creature hiding here?

A child having reading trouble believes there are millions of tricky lessons and that he will never learn them. Luckily, there are only about a dozen.

1) Quit stopping to sound out words, tell your child any unknown word and have your child keep reading. Stopping breaks the short-term memory, thus all comprehension is lost. This is the way the brain works for everyone. 

Show your child how to keep reading using the words he does know. At the end of the page, you ask questions - what is happening on the page, who did what, etc. Then go back to any unknown words. Help your child figure them out or tell him the words. In a few weeks, this method will reward you with great results.  

2) Use the search box at the top left corner of my blog. Search for: working memory,   or backward b,   or high school reading help --- even if your child is in 2nd Grade,  or  short vowel long vowel,   or compound word story,   or ce, ci, cy,    or ge, gi, gy,   or adding ed, ing,   or tion,   or tious,   or silent t,   or silent gh,   or rules for special teams.  

This page is telling you to do two things: 1) quit stopping to sound out, instead help your child gather meaning and keep reading, 2) strenghen your child's letter / sound skills.

BTW, the creature hidden in the photo above is the deadly Gaboon Viper.  I now use eBay as my website: search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you.  All are brand new and teach lessons through stories and include everything you need.  Mary Maisner

reading skills, reading help

Owls hunt at night. Their eyesight and
hearing is much better than ours.

This page is divided into 1) preschool - kindergarten, 2) 1st Grade - 2nd Grade, 3) 3rd Grade - all upper Grades. Tip for all ages: quit stopping to sound out; tell your child unknown words and build comprehension connections.

Preschool - Kindergarten: get a ABC letter strip from Target, Office Max etc. Work on recognizing 3 letters at a time. Build instant see / say for letter name and sound.

Ignore backward letter printing, it is rarely dyslexia, will self-correct by mid-2nd Grade, will not slow your child's progress; your energy is better spent getting instant with crucial letters b, d, g, p, q.  

Goal: be sure your child starts 1st Grade correctly identifying letters b, d, g, p, q within words. Confusing the shapes of b /d and p / q / g within words is the major cause of falling behind. 

Use my blog's search box - top left corner box- put in backward b and working memory.

1st Grade- 2nd Grade: 1) read the above Kindergarten advice. 2) Teach my letter rules to put your child in control of b, d, g, p, q: Use my blog's search box - top left corner - put in backward b and working memory and sight words and short vowels long vowels. 

Do not panic; 10 minutes a day will boost your child because your child is getting one-on-one with you and the most important skills. The bottom of this page tells you how to get my books, if you want one.

3rd Grade - all upper Grades. Even if your child is in 3rd Grade, put into my blog's search box (top left corner) high school reading help.  That lesson will show you how to help your child connect to comprehension.  After that: short vowels long vowels and ce, ci and ge, gi and ce, ci, cy and tion and adding ed and changing y to i.

Also search my blog's 3rd Grade reading skills or 4th Grade reading skills, or 5th Grade reading skills. Do not panic - you can do it. If you do not have time, get my book for your child's grade level and hire a tutor to teach it. (Personal tutor, not a group tutor company.)

I use eBay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help. All my books will pop up. My books use stories to teach the skills your child needs plus a strong comprehension method. None have a grade level marked on them, all come with my contact info; email or call me. Help your child have fun reading. Have a great day, Mary Maisner

phonics



Millions of tiny fragments work together when
the peacock fans his beautiful plumes.
The fragments of phonics work in the same way for your child.

Your child learned to speak words by imitating the sounds you say. 

Phonics is Greek word meaning sound. Your phone is a tool for you to hear the sounds of someone speaking, and now text enables you to read what someone would say to you. 

Written language is the total collection of agreed upon letters and letter teams which stand for the sounds in spoken words. This collection is called the phonics code.

Some bits of the phonics code are easy; some are tricky. The letter for the sound of m is always the same: mouse, camel, arm. But, the written f sound can be: frog, photo, laugh. 

Letter c can say k (cat), but if e, i, y came next after c, the teams ce, ci, cy always say s: cent, decide, bicycle. BTW soccer is slang invented by British boys to refer to soccer instead of rugby. Sometimes slang abides by the phonics code, sometimes not.

Your child starts learning the code with the simple ABCs. By 1st grade, he is being shown some of the code's teams, such as th, wh, also the parts of the code called short vowels and long vowels. Eventually ous, ious, tion, tious, etc. New lessons never stop coming. 

Children cannot figure out the inventory of phonics bits without help. The code is not based on what makes sense. The code is a collection devised by our ancient forefathers. Letter shapes were invented and assigned to stand for sounds for the purpose of sending accurate messages to military captains, etc. And for record-keep: how many silver plates a king possessed, how many sheep a duke owned, etc. 

Your child needs to see each part of the code and practice it within words. Repetition is the key.  Lessons have to be learned well enough to be deeply embedded in the long-term memory storage part of the brain.  Our eyes look ahead and alert the long-term memory to pop into place the next needed phonics bit. Thus, children well-prepared with the code do vastly better. (This alert system is a fabulous byproduct of the eyes' saccades function.)

Anyone can teach a child the phonics code; you need a pencil, paper, and clear instruction.

My blog has 160 free reading lessons. Use my search box - top left corner - put in backward b or working memory or short vowel long vowel or ce, ci, cy or compound words or silent h, or gh, etc. 

You may want to look at my books for your child. I use eBay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all of my books will pop up for you. 

The tricky phonics are in bold print in the stories in my books. Seeing the tricky phonics within words as your child is reading makes it easier to learn the tricky phonics. Sight words and a special comprehension method are always included at every level. My books are challenging, not dumbed-down; your child will soar with them. Includes my contact info so you can email or call.   Thank you, Mary Maisner

tch match catch itch witch

This drawing gives us a peek at life in the 1400-1500s.
About 400 years later, a Scotsman designed a safe matchstick.
His friends used a slang word for the new match: a Lucifer.

Letter t melts into ch so that t is nearly silent: itch, twitch. 

Tell your child this is a rhyming family. Then tell your child the first word: batch. Ask your child to point to each word as you read, then let your child try each word: 

batch      hatch     match     snatch

catch      latch       patch      scratch

Important word watch is not listed with this rhyming family because watch has a slightly different a sound; a as in wall. 

Let's try:

itch        hitch      witch     switch

ditch      pitch     snitch     twitch

One of our meanings for match is a narrow wooden stick dipped in sulfur for igniting a flame, but the ancient people thought of maache as the candle's wick.

When a candlewick is not aflame, it can lean over and dangle. Long ago, someone imagined the dangling wick had the look of a drippy nose.  The candlewick came to be known by the same word as a drippy nose, maache.

An ancient word from India, meug, meaning slippery and slimy, had been picked up by the Greeks and Romans. They changed meug to myxa and mucus.  The Old English changed meug to maache; the Old French, meiche.

As you see, in ancient times, match did not have a letter t.  I have not found a good explanation for how we ended up with t in match, or the spelling pattern: tch.

Possibly the letter x which says ks in the Greek word, myxa (say mi k sa) may have sounded a bit like letter t to an ancient scribe somewhere. Not wanting to be accused of misspelling the word, he may have stuck in a letter t before the ch.

About the drawing: A Belgium man, Simon Bening (1483-1561) drew miniature pictures which he colored with brilliant pigments,often adding details in gold. They were hand-painted on pages about 5 1/2 inches by 4 inches in size; then bond together in a book. 

In addition to fabulous tiny pictures, the books included the Catholic prayers one should be sure to say each day. Only the very wealthy and royal families could afford to buy one of Simon Bening's books. This picture is from The book of Hours (Da Costa Hours). The pages, called leaves, are on display at the Morgan Pierpont Library in New York City. 

I now use eBay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you. You can extend your child's reading and comprehension skills with my books.   All books put the tricky phonics in bold print in the words of the stories, so that your child becomes instant with the sounds of the tricky teams. 

About the drawing: A Belgium man, Simon Bening (1483-1561) drew miniature pictures which he colored with brilliant pigments,often adding details in gold. They were hand painted on pages about 5 1/2 inches by 4 inches in size; then bond together in a book. 

Have fun reading with your child. Thank you, Mary Maisner