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Essential Prerequisites for Future Classrooms

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learn to read

Explore Square Panda Series: Know The Reading Readiness Skills

July 15, 2019 1,130 views No Comments
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Learning comes naturally to kids, but when it comes to reading, the process slows down. Reading is an important element for early learners with a structured process which needs to be taught. It gradually seeps inside a young mind. Mostly, Educators have extensive concern for the achievement in initial reading experiences in kids. Today’s educators need the ingredients of effective educational programs to teach kids to read.

Yes, the teachers’ require to place reading instruction on solid footing. Reading is subsumed by early literacy. Here, a few substantial approaches have shed light on the reading acquisition processes and effective instructional approaches.

WHAT IS READING READINESS?

Reading readiness is the first step a child takes towards understanding early reading skills. It is the stage in development when, through the learning experience and maturation, they learn to read effectively.

According to the Ontario Government (2003), the acquisition of language is natural, but the process of learning to read is not—reading must be taught.

Did you know, that there are multiple methods and skills to determine when trying to build reading readiness capabilities in kids? Let us help you identify that the child is reading ready.

Learn Early Reading Readiness Skills

Learn Early Reading Readiness Skills

YOUNG MIND NEEDS TO LEARN THESE READING READINESS SKILLS:

Kids should be well-versed with these six critical skills before they attempt to master formal reading.

Improve Print Awareness Concepts: Kids know that the text represents spoken words. They become aware of the directions, left or right. Do kids know, how to hold a book or pen? Foster their fascination with book reading, developing a sense of rhythm and rhyme, analyse patterns. Their reading skills are emerging and they learn to predict word patterns.

Understand using Phonological Awareness: It is sensitivity to the sound structure of language. Phonological awareness has an ability to listen and identify special sounds (syllables, onsets and rimes, and phonemes) and letters in spoken words. Kids understand letters, vowels, constants, and two letters words to make new sounds. Phonological awareness increases their skills by playing with words; changing sounds or syllables. Little learners will eventually stump us with their literacy achievement.

Explore with Phonemic Awareness: Having phonemic awareness helps to create reading readiness skills in early learners. It is the first thread in the tapestry of reading. Here, the child’s ability evolves, as they listen and know how to manipulate the smallest mental units of sound—phonemes in the spoken language.
For example: When a child plays Lagoon Game, in its exploratory mode; they identify familiar sounds across a group of words, like color, cake, candy. Even can create a new word, recognise all individual phonemes in a single word, like a dog -> d,o,g.

How Does Phonics Instructions Improve Reading?

Reading fluency will foster confidence in the students. The main focus of phonics is to make children aware of the relationship between the letters of written language (graphemes) and the individual sounds of spoken language (phonemes). These instructions can be given systematically or incidentally. Children will learn to recognise words accurately and decode new words.

Discover the Alphabetic Principle (Letter Knowledge): It is an abstract concept where students receives clarity about the symbols i.e. letters and combinations of letters to represent the speech sounds in their elemental forms. The sounds are anchored to letters or strings of letters is known as the ‘Alphabetic Principle.’ In the reading development, children learn to use the alphabetic principle fluently. Using explicit phonics instruction—they understand the primary purpose of reading. The students’ grows and gains knowledge using the phonogram techniques further, they are shown, how to blend phonograms into words. After that, they’re trained to create blending practice using one-syllable consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words. Systematically, they learn how to read by recognition and naming of letter names and letter sounds.
For instance, Little learners can touch, feel and lay the ‘Smart Letters’ in the Square Panda Playset. It even engages kids in an ergonomically important ‘look-away’ time-span. Kid’s are placed in the optimally learning zone, to challenge their potential.

Motivation is the Key: There are various signs which reflects the kids are more interested in reading. If they frequently request for more read-aloud time and show enthusiasm for books or worksheets. Teachers and Parents can include various activities in kids daily routine to develop their interest in reading. Make reading an interactive and fun learning experience, which sparks their attention. Kids have short attention span- so read short story books with illustrative elements like bright colors, flags or different textures are good for keeping them engaged and motivated.

Display Listening Comprehension: Kid’s should be able to retell the story, answer the simple questions and ask more questions during the read-aloud.
For instance: In the mid-story section, a Child asked the Teacher; Why did the Panda laugh? It gives us an insight that child was paying attention and listening to the story.

Learn Reading Readiness Skills With Square Panda

Learn Reading Readiness Skills With Square Panda

After following the quick analyses, determine how the child is moving from learning to read and slowly towards the goal of reading to learn. Be sure your students are getting comfortable with these concepts before beginning the actual reading instructions. Reading readiness isn’t just about early literacy skills. It covers a set of four major competencies such as social, emotional, cognitive and physical development of the child. Build a culture at school and home, which evokes their interest in effective reading. Focus on making enjoyable reading activities rather than it being only academic centric.

QUICK TIPS TO RAISE STRONG READERS:

Prepare your students well, make them aware of the sounds of the phonograms, letter names, etc. They should be able to:

  • Recite the alphabets, rhymes, etc.
  • Recognise the alphabetic letters
  • Re-tell a story
  • Make them familiar with blends
  • Place the letters
  • Read there name
  • Practice reading words aloud
  • Use correct sounds when speaking the letters
  • Understand the progression of text is placed left to right and top to bottom
Tips To Raise Strong Readers: Mother and Daughter Reading Time Together

Young minds are going through major development changes, in such a situation grasping reading skills quickly might seem impossible. Understanding reading readiness will enable you to teach more calmly and successfully turn your reluctant learners into avid readers for life. Most kid’s don’t develop the basic foundation of reading skills by themselves, Square Panda’s multisensory reading platform strikes a good balance here. With our tailor-made curriculum, now every child can learn to read well.

 Phonics Instructions For Early Learners

Phonics Instructions For Early Learners

Learn more about how to augment reading readiness into your child’s play. Square Panda can help you access using the multisensory techniques. Take a look at our library of games to engage early learners.

If we’ve hit your nerve and you require more insight about how to develop reading skills in your kids, leave us a comment below. Connect with us on our Facebook and LinkedIn to know more.

–Nidhi Parikh, SEO Content Writer, Square Panda India

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How To Get Your Child Excited To Read!

April 23, 2019 675 views No Comments
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If you have ever wondered how to teach a child to read, then this article, written on our global blog, is for you. With simple tips and easily available book suggestions, this article will make sure your kids learn to read English, taking them from pre-readers to confident and fluent lifelong readers.

Read the full article here.

Little excited baby sitting with a book

Start your kids on their learning journey, with Square Panda.

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Reading And The Early Learner

April 5, 2019 954 views No Comments
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Crack open a book and it can sweep you away to fascinating new places all over the globe (and some that exist only in the author’s mind).

Turn that page to figure out something you never knew until today.

Read the next sentence, and see a new word leaping out at you.

Whether it is a best-selling fiction novel, a popular self-help book, a cookbook full of delicious recipes, or even the latest issue of your favourite magazine, each page fills your head with knowledge and facts, both obscure and ordinary.

Reading and the early learner

Numerous studies have been conducted on the importance of reading in everyday life. Special research highlights a crucial fact–reading instruction needs to start early on in a child’s education, to have the greatest impact.

Watch this article in blog format here.

Every educator out there knows this, which is why most schools across the globe and in India, start phonics teaching in preschool and kindergarten.

Square Panda Smart Letters

We’re certain that you, being an educator yourself, do the same, incorporating phonics education early, into your curriculum.

Did you ever stop to wonder how your instruction is taken by them? What exactly goes on in a young learner’s brain as you teach them reading skills?

To enlighten you and hopefully give you more insight into an early learner’s reading brain, we have compiled this list of facts and research from our own in-house team as well as experts in the field of early childhood literacy.

Let’s take a peek into the reading brain with this infographic:

How reading helps kids infographic

How reading helps children infographic

Watch our Vice President of Curriculum and cognitive neuroscientist Dr. Vera Blau-McCandliss, talk about the research and science that goes into early childhood education.

Watch guest speaker and cognitive neuroscientist Dr. Nandini Chatterjee Singh speak about biliteracy and its effect on shaping an early learner’s brain at the Square Panda India Launch.

Stay tuned for our next post, which will focus on the neuroscience research conducted, both by our own researchers as well as those not affiliated with Square Panda, into early childhood education, literacy, and language acquisition.

What are your thoughts on reading and the early learner’s brain? Comment in the section below.

– Sanjana Shukla, Content Writer, Square Panda India

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Square Panda’s Focus Is On Phonics. Here’s Why…

March 18, 2019 1,176 views No Comments
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The sizzle of butter in the pan…

The pitter-patter of raindrops against your window…

The constant chatter of your neighbour on the phone…

Present all around us, sounds are an integral part of our lives. It comes as no surprise then, that ‘sound’ is one of the first things taught to children.

Specifically, the sound of letters.

Letters of the English alphabet

WHAT IS IT?

Called phonics (or phoenics in British English), it is one of the best ways to simplify reading English, by teaching learners what each letter of the alphabet sounds like.

WHY LEARN WITH IT?

Research conducted shows a link between phonics instruction and learning to read correctly and with confidence. Children comprehend the written word more easily and accurately when letters are introduced via phonics than through any other method. Early beginners in phonics instruction (between the ages of 3 and 8) often show the best results. Research goes so far as to show that learning to read via phonics increases the enjoyment of the learner, thereby increasing their chances of becoming lifelong readers.

The National Reading Panel (NRP), US, had issued a press release, stating: “In the largest, most comprehensive evidenced-based review ever conducted of research on how children learn reading, an independent panel has concluded that the most effective way to teach children to read is through instruction that includes a combination of methods.” The panel determined that effective reading instruction includes teaching children to break apart and manipulate the sounds in words (phonemic awareness), teaching them that these sounds are represented by letters of the alphabet which can then be blended together to form words (phonics), having them practice what they’ve learned reading aloud with guidance and feedback (guided oral reading), and applying reading comprehension strategies to guide and improve reading comprehension.

Kid playing with Square Panda learning games

PHONICS IN INDIA

Many schools across India start their phonics instruction young, in preschool itself.

This instruction can include:

– teaching the sound of letters (‘a’ is said as ‘ey’, ‘b’ is said as ‘bee’, and so on)

– teaching letter combinations (‘sh’, ‘ab’, and more)

– ‘blending’ the above two together to create words. (/sh/o/p/)

– Guessing or ‘decoding’ what new words mean, based on the students’ knowledge.

PHONICS AND SQUARE PANDA

The above reasons are precisely why we at Square Panda created a learning system that puts the spotlight on phonics. Backed by our own extensive research,

Dr. Vera Blau-McCandliss, Vice President of Curriculum and Research, Square Panda

Meet Dr. Vera Blau-MacCandliss, PhD, Cognitive Neuroscience, and VP of Education and Research at Square Panda

we created educational games that have elements of phonics instruction woven so seamlessly into them, that children don’t think they are studying at all!

Our characters spell out words phonetically (watch it here) and even learn songs, the phonetic way (watch it here).

Adapting to a user’s learning level and age, each game gradually increases in difficulty, moving from three-letter words to four-and-five letter words. The composition also changes, from CV/VC (At/To) words—‘C’ stands for ‘Consonant’, ‘V’ stands for ‘Vowel’—to CVC (Hat) and CVVC (Read) words.

Games like Bubbles reinforce letter sounds, while games like Lagoon (above) and SquareLand teach common consonant blend and blend phonemes. (Phonemes are the smallest units of speech that differentiate words, e.g., pin and pan. Here, ‘i’ and ‘a’ are different.) Even decoding skills—which occur when a student uses phonics to accurately read a word—are focused on, in games like Space Cows.

Focusing on developing confidence in children—while speaking, while reading—our learning system eschews negative feedback altogether, instead relying on prompts and positive reinforcement even if a learner has gotten something wrong. Our adaptive engine records areas where the learner needs more practice, regularly repeating that letter/word at periodic intervals, spacing it out with new letters/words to avoid boredom.

Combined with AI technology and a neuroscience research-based curriculum, our phonics learning system greatly increases a child’s phonics literacy. Not discriminating between backgrounds, nationalities or even race, our games are the perfect tool to employ while introducing or reinforcing phonics to your children/students.

We’re hoping to empower children using phonics, and also, in a larger sense, languages and literacy.

Watch this blog video here.

Child playing with Square Panda playset.

– Sanjana Shukla, Content Writer, Square Panda India

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