Monday, February 6, 2012

Sounding Out Words


            Children often believe they are in the habit of sounding words out, when they do not know what they are. This is one of the most common know strategies for learning how to read, even though this method focuses on a individual word rather than the overall meaning of the text. Our society often focuses on “reading accuracy” rather than gaining meaning from a text. 

        When looking at this subject it is found that “children use a range of strategies to solve words while reading”. Parents sometimes feel that sounding out words is their main tool when teaching their children how to read. Children take meaning from their readings to figure out words they have difficulty with. They think about what is going on in the pictures and text to solve the puzzle of the unknown word. Another way they find out a word they may not know is through using the structure of the sentence as clues. Children also use visual clues such as looking at the letters to figure out the word they are stuck on. Children are using other strategies when they may think they are just sounding out words. 

          Children have to do more than just sound out words because “sounds change with context”.  Children often go beyond sounding out words to become successful readers. When looking at how children learn to read there is much more to this process than just sounding out words. 

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