Learning+To+Read

=Learning to Read = = = Being able to read is being able to receive meaning from print and other symbols. According to Clay (cited in, Hill 2006) the kinds of information Marmaduke Monkey needs already to learn to read include: So this requires things we take for granted in our everyday reading practices like knowing the concepts of directionality, a word, letter and sentence, turning pages, punctuation, and even the idea that print conveys meaning. After mastering these concepts, learning to read also involves different sources of information- cues. They are crucial in enabling readers to decode and comprehend texts and are as follow,
 * ** Knowledge of the world **
 * **The possible meanings of the text**
 * ** The sentence structures of language **
 * ** Rules about the order of ideas, or words or letters **
 * ** The words often used in language **
 * ** The alphabet **
 * ** Special features of sound, shape and layout **
 * **Special knowledge about books and literary experiences.**

 **Semantic cues:** are meanings that come from the context of the word or sentences, and prior knowledge from personal experience or knowledge about the world.  **Syntactic cues:**   refers to the information understood based on typical sentence patterns or structures (VELS 2008), ie. “The syntax pattern in ‘Sam kicked the ball’ would sound correct to the reader, whereas “Ball kick Sam the” would sound incorrect” (Hill 2006, p.141).  **Grapho-phonic cues:** are seeing patterns in letters and then mapping them to sounds or phonemes. It is being able to //see// the difference between ‘bear/bare’ and know that they have different letters and also different meanings. According to Hill (2006, p.141), “Reading skills include such things as automatic recognition of high-frequency words and recognition of letters of the alphabet. Strategies are the way a reader makes use of cues.” There are of course, different stages students are at in their reading development. These stages include the preschool phases, like beginning reading- pretending to read books, joining in with predictable stories, and early-emergent book reading- looking closely at the pictures and forming an idea of the story and paying more attention to the print. Then there is reading development at school, the emergent phase, the early phase, Transitional and extending. Marmaduke Monkey could be catagorised as in the emergent phase. He knows about directionality, word to word matching and can read known words and locate new words. He is also starting to pay attention to the many features of words and letters. When he gets better and more confident at this, he will move into the early phase. He will be able to use cues to search for meaning, self correct, and change the type of reading to suit the genre- fiction or factual. When he can read more fluently and gets better at problem solving words he will move into the transitional phase of reading development and then move to the extending phase where he will be able to read quite fluently and can do silent reading by himself. 