Because I conduct research about reading, parents often ask me the same question: ?What can I do to help my child become a better reader"?
I always give them the same advice: ?Read with your children. Enjoy books together, and whatever you do, don?t worry about teaching them to read. Leave the teaching to the teachers.?
This reply draws on my research regarding the literacy practices of high-performing teachers, as well as my experiences as a parent, teacher and literacy specialist. Ample evidence indicates that a solid foundation of reading, writing, talking and playing with words fosters a love for books at an early age and leads to later success as a reader.
But what happens when children do not learn to read, or when they struggle with reading" That problem is all too prevalent. Only about a third of all eighth-graders can read at or above grade level.
Successful teachers
I have studied how successful teachers at multiple high-performing urban schools in New York, Ohio, Missouri and Maryland are helping struggling readers dramatically improve their reading fluency. Many are getting children to read passages multiple times.
Teachers and researchers have found that doing this almost always leads to improvements for struggling readers between second grade and the end of high school.
For kids, this strategy is a lot like learning a new song by reading lyrics while singing along with a music video. When children practice reading this way, they listen to and echo a...