Put Reading First

Put Reading First is a series of informational packets composed by the National Institute for Literacy.  It is designed for teachers and parents alike to know the necessary, foundational skills for literacy in the early years. 

The report discusses five main areas of concentration: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and text comprehension. 

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Phonemic awareness is the ability to notice, think about, and work with the individual sounds in spoken words.  Before children are able to read written words, they must understand the concept of how sounds work.

Reading comprehension is essentially the goal of reading in general. This skill can be learned through comprehension strategies that are taught through instruction, cooperative learning, and the combination of strategies.

Fluency is the ability to read a text accurately and quickly.  This skill is essential to a student’s reading comprehension.  Fluency is developed by model reading in the classroom. This can be practiced by engaging students in repeated oral reading.

Phonics instruction helps children learn the relationships between the letters of written language and the sounds of spoken language.  The instruction of phonics is important because it leads to the understanding of the alphabetic principle; the relationships betw

een written letters and spoken sounds.

There are four types of vocabulary. These include listening vocabulary, speaking vocabulary, reading vocabulary, and writing vocabulary.  Each of these are important to reading comprehension. Children learn the meaning of words through everyday experiences, oral, and written language. 

The information summarized here is from the  PDF file of Put Reading First.