Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Self-taught readers

Something my daughter did recently got me thinking about how self-taught readers teach themselves how to read.

We were reading a story, and for various reasons related to T rex fossils, I was calling the main character "she." My daughter (still 3 then, 4 today!) corrected me and told me that the dinosaur was a "he." I realized that she must have been looking at the words as I read them and saw "he" where "she" should have been.

My kids aren't self-taught readers like many of yours are, with the possible exception of my daughter, who started before 3 1/2. She started earlier than the other two and never had to be taught how to read. She could just sound out simple words. The day care place had taught sounds, and she must have figured out how to put them together.

So now I figure that at least some self-taught readers follow along with mom or dad during story time and figure out the letter sounds by hearing the words and working out how the letters sound.

Does anyone else have thoughts about this idea? Pardon my slowness if you all figured this out ages ago....

Val

DS never sat with us when we read or looked at the books while we read. He was too busy bouncing off the walls looking like he didn't care one bit. But then the next night, when you said "now where were we?" he would quote the last sentence we had read to him exactly.

He learned to read from signs as far as I can tell. I am thinking now based on the glasses thread that he was farsighted and the books were too much trouble to look at. Signs were perfect for him. He didn't show interest in reading books to himself until he was 5, then he read chapter books.

Don't know if this answers your question....

I'm just wondering; I like to figure stuff out.
Val

It really is interesting how children learn to read in such a variety of ways. I am sure that many read along and follow the words. Some parents point to the words as they read. I never did that, and was surprised to find that my DS was following along at a really young age. Now he corrects me all the time when I am reading fast or half asleep and say the wrong words, so he still follows along at times. my DS4 completely taught himself to read, but interestingly he seemed to learn from a variety of ways..some from memorization of words, and others phonetically. He seemed to do it simultaneously at a very young age. Whenever he learns a new word, he never forgets it in reading, it's all very interesting. And I work with elementary children in an inner city school and some struggle significantly with reading. It is amazing how reading comes about in all different ways at all different times.

I consider DS6 self-taught, he learned his letters and sounds from preschool, but he figured out how they formed words all on his own. But, he's a whole word reader, so I'm not sure exactly how he made the leap. Just before he turned 5 he just picked up easy readers and started reading them, then a couple of months later he was reading beginner chapter books.

What he does now, and it fascinates me to watch him, when he comes to a word he doesn't know is he compares how it looks to something like a "database" in his head of words he's heard and he works it until he matches them up. I'll hear him sound the first couple of letters to help him decide what word group to start with, he'll say the first few sounds of a couple different possibilities until finally all the blocks fall into place and he knows the word. He never stumbles over it again after that. If the word is just too strange to match up phonetically, he'll come up with some very interesting pronunciations, lol (segue is segoo). I don't know, maybe all kids do this, but it's still pretty cool to watch and I think it might be a part of how he learned to read.

There was a point when DS was three that he suddenly wanted me to read him very very easy books over and over and to hold them where he could see. Then he would spend hours (hours!) studying books he knew pretty much by heart, and picture dictionaries. He always claimed he was "just looking at the pictures" but then he slipped up every so often and let on that he could read... so I'm pretty sure I know what was going on there.

KG's a self-taught reader ... we taught him letters and sounds when he was very small (he loved it -- his dad would push him on the swing and say "A", KG would say "B!" dad would say "C!"), but he turned out to be a whole-word reader.

Yes, I do think he learned by watching us read. We never pointed at words as we read them, but when he got to be 2ish we'd pause in our reading of familiar books and let him fill the word in from memory; at that point, he'd be following words with his eyes as he read. I think he put the whole thing together, letter sounds to help him out, and just solved the reading puzzle that way.

He's a big-time whole word reader, though; he didn't ever have a "sounding out" phase, which saved him a lot of time becoming fluent and expressive. I've never heard him sound out a word; if he comes to a word he doesn't know, he mentally breaks it into groups and just takes a stab at pronouncing it aloud. But he was 4.5 or so before he started that approach; I think his sight-word box was full! He started reading around 3 and was at fourth-grade level before he turned 5.

Like your son, Erica, he read the same books over and over (lots of picture books) when he was learning to read, which I think drilled those sight words into his brain. And he had several favorites that we'd read every other night or so ("Chicka Chicka Boom Boom," "Are You My Mother," "Freight Train," "Goodnight Moon," stuff like that), so he became very familiar with those words and just *knew* them. In fact, I think the very short and simple book "Freight Train" was the one that made reading "click" for him. Very few words in it, but it really held his attention and he loved following along.



That's just exactly what KG does now, at 6. It's fascinating to watch! And like your ds, once he knows the word, he knows it. I find it so interesting how kids learn to read in different ways. Luckily for us, it was pretty much effortless with KG. I think it would be really difficult to have a child who really struggles with reading.

DS learned the sounds from a children's alphabet video when he was two. By the time he was 2 1/2, he had figured out how to sound out simple words like CAT, DIG, etc. It never occurred to me to teach him to read because I wasn't expecting him to read that young!

I taught my kids to read in my native language, it was fairly easy as my language is very phonetic. Then DS picked up BOB BOOKS and started reading. Just like that. Bob Books were followed by Dr. Seus, and then chapter books. Never an issue, never a problem. He is actually a speed reader at this point. With DD it was a process, but fast and absolutely painless.
I have always read to my kids tons, I still do.

I did bedtime reading when they were younger. I started with pointing at the words but stopped because they would brush my hand away as I was blocking them. :P

Ds8 started reading Bob books when he was 2.5yrs old. He went on to read Clifford The big Red Dog and Dr Seuss . His favourite "I can read" series was Amelia Bedelia! We read and re-read them so many times! He moved on to Magic Treehouse series when he was 4yo. Another series he loved was Sideway stories from Wayside school. Hilarious! I have not figured out how he learned to read. It just happened. I remembered when he was in KA, he drew a pic and wrote "Mr. Lewis is in spase". I was told by he teacher that he self-corrected his spelling and canceled out the "s" & replaced with a "c" because "It didn't look right". He was not taught phonics at all but when he was in grade one, he could spell words like "encyclopedia" phonetically.
I should continue to read to them daily....
Somehow the ritual stops as they get older.