Teaching children to read is not difficult.

Parents are a child's first teacher. Teach children that alphabetic letters have sounds heard all around us in our environment and in words heard in speech when we and others speak. Those same sounds represented by alphabetic letters are ones we use to read. Reading comes easy when teaching your child to read using a good explicit Phonics Method: Beginning to Read, Write, and Listen by Pleasant Rowland, a very successful K-1 program that can be found on Amazon....However, an avalanche of requested orders soon makes it unavailable. Just keep being persistent to watch for its availability for ordering. Once upon a time; Beginning to Read, Write, and Listen by Pleasant Rowland was a reading program offered in public schools for K-1 children. Reading Mastery, another great read and Phonics is an old classic masterpiece especially for children coming to school with no prior literacy skill development. I once attended an updated workshop training on Reading Mastery whereby there weren’t very many teacher attendees at the training. The Workshop Trainer mentioned that school districts were beginning to phase out Reading Mastery. It had become a victim of its own success. It’s still Available on Amazon. The Writing Road to Reading by Romalda Bishop Spalding is based on intensive research of how children learn. It is a multisensory in that it is visual, auditory, speech, and tactile faculties incorporating spelling, writing Including handwriting/print and cursive; listening/reading comprehension.

The Writing Road to Reading shows parents/homeschoolers, teachers, other literacy specialists and tutors how to use the Spalding Method with their children. As children begin with learning to put alphabetic letter sounds together to read/decode; followed by combining words into sentences to read/decode. Moreover, children learn how language works; the emergence of children’s creative minds and reasoning skills evolve. Thereby, allowing children a pathway of progression for absorbing and enjoying good literature: First Graders enjoy Where the Wild Things Are; second graders devour The Velveteen Rabbit; third grades feast upon Charlotte’s Web. In my many years of experience, I taught reading using the reading programs mentioned above. As a reading teacher/ reading specialist, now, librarian, I felt conflicted and uneasy about the number of students entering the doors of my library who couldn’t read all the great books within. Even though in my role as librarian, my role was oriented to build readers. Yet, as the reading teacher within actualized, I questioned: “How can you build readers who cannot read?” That is how the idea began percolating to write an ABC Book familiarizing students thoroughly with the letter names and sounds of the English Alphabet as a first look; or as a review. While simultaneously Building a repertoire of books in children’s mind as a way to instill the culture of reading to grow readers! My ABC book, R is for Reading Books is infused with knowledge garnered from having taught the varied excellent reading programs as specified above. I feel immense gratitude from having taught children to read using these quality reading programs available in the public schools during the times I taught children to read. In my quest to write my ABC Book, I desired a simplistic, teaching device for parents, teachers, librarians, other literacy specialists wrapped together in the guise of a pretty pictured ABC picture book with rhythmic language teaching about reading to become internalized, innately; naturally and informally while reading aloud to children over and over again. Encouraging whole group of children to read along with the adult modeling the reading; to next read chorally as a group; to then read with a partner; finally, to eventually read alone. You see what I mean . . . . . . There was not an ABC Book like this in my library or elsewhere; so, I wrote one! Give your child the forever gift of reading. "R is for Reading Books" is an ABC picture book to teach children how to read by familiarizing them with the letter names and sounds of the alphabet corresponding with names of favorite children's books matched with rhythmic fun language for listening and gorgeous pictures for viewing.

Book can be purchased from Amazon, click the link R is for Reading Books

My daughter inquired, “Mom if you are no longer with me and a parent approaches me to ask me about how to get their child reading bare bones and cannot afford any wonderful learning to read programs to use as guidance, what would I say?”

Me: Tell them if they simply taught the consonants sounds and short vowels, their child will become empowered to read 66% of the English language.

So begin there.

B, *C, D, F, *G, H, J, K, L, M, N, P, Q, R, S, T, V, W, X, *Y, Z.

Short vowels

Aa as in Apple

Ee as in Elephant

Ii as in igloo

Oo as in octopus

Uu as in umbrella

Extra information to distinguish for ages 6 and above.

*C ( hard C as in can and soft C as in cent

*G ( hard G as in get and soft G as in gem)

*Y can sometimes be a vowel

Draw pictures or cut pictures from old magazines and newspapers to match alphabetic letter sounds representing consonants and vowel. Use a generic composition notebook. Teach children to blend rhyming word families to include silly make-believe words for increased practice.... Have children identify real words from silly words.

at, bat, cat, dat, fat, gat, hat, jat, kat, lat, mat, Nat, Pat, rat, sat, tat, vat, wat, yat, zat

bed, ded, Ed, fed, ged, hed, Jed, Ked, led, med, Ned, ped, red, sed, Ted, ved, wed, yed, zed

bit, dit, fit, git, hit, jit, kit, lit, mit, nit, pit, quit, rit, sit, vit, wit, yit, zit

bog, cog, dog, fog, gog, hog, jog, kog, log, mog, nog, pog, rog, sog, tog, vog, wog, yog, zog

but, cut, dut, fut, gut, hut, jut, lut, mut, nut, putt, rut, sut, tut, vut, wut, yut, zut