Reading Road Signs: How to Know if Your Child is on the Road to Reading Success
Article by Amy Pedigo
The road to reading can be a long one. It is important to start recognizing some of the signs of reading skills long before a child actually begins to read. These signs will indicate that your son or daughter is on the right track. Language development begins from birth, and the process just keeps developing over the years and naturally extends right into reading. Some scientists say that the final language process needed to learn to read is called phonemic awareness; the ability to distinguish sounds one from another. This skill is necessary to sound out words, a crucial part of beginning reading. Those same scientists usually agree that phonemic awareness doesn't fully develop until the age of five or six years of age. However, several other processes are involved in the complex task of learning to read. You can recognize some of them in your child from the list below. Keep in mind that every child is different and reading is not an exact science.
Ages 3-4
Ages 4-5The child may babble words in sentence form imitating regular speech. You may even hear them babble something with the intonation of a question.
The child will usually respond to the facial expressions of others. You may see the child sympathize with some one who is hurt or crying. By this age the child will listen and enjoy books being read aloud, alone or in groups.
A child will choose favorite books and may like to hear them over and over.
A child will point to objects in pictures, like animals and people, "Where is the cow?" "Point to the farmer."
Ages 5-6This child will enjoy listening and discussing stories.
He or she may think about story characters above and beyond the story, "Maybe they all went home after the story was over."
This child should be able to name people in a story, "He is a policeman!"
A child should be able to name objects in pictures, "That's a fork."
A five-year-old child should easily identify their first name in print.
Understand how to hold a book and turn the pages the correct way.
This child should be able to retell a story.
This child should begin to use more advanced vocabulary than past years. They should learn to name things in a more succinct manner, like learning to say television instead of TV.
A child of this age range should certainly be able to print their first name legibly and possibly last name as well.
A child of this age should begin recognizing familiar words like exit, or mom.
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