Nursery World - A parent's guide to reading

Most of us have forgotten how we learned to read, although we may have some distant memories of school reading books. As with many other areas of development, reading doesn't just happen. Your child has to learn quite a few skills first, sometimes called 'pre-reading skills', techniques that are essential to the process of learning to read. You are likely to find that while your child is in nursery, pre-school or reception, instead of giving them a reading book, the staff will be planning activities that will help your child develop these skills. Speaking and listening

Speaking and listening

Before children can learn to read, they need to be able to express themselves and to be able to listen. This familiarity with language helps children to predict what words might be used next. This is an important skill as, rather than read each word on a page, fluent readers quickly work out what the likely structure and meaning of a sentence will be and thus 'jump' words.

Visual discrimination

Reading is partly about being able to remember and decode symbols. We may not realise it, but many of the shapes of letters and words in English are quite similar. For children, this means building on their ability to observe and discriminate between shapes. Activities such as jigsaw puzzles, observing objects closely and sorting items help your child build their memory and visual discrimination skills.

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