4 Steps to Becoming a Better Reader – LearningRx | LearningRx Blog

How do we learn to read? It isn’t as simple as you might think. In a recent article, Sabra Gelfond, Speech-Language Pathologist and Executive Director ofthe National Speech / Language Therapy Center, compared the way we learnto read to the way a house is built. There are four major steps to both,she points out, and in both home-building and brain-building, laying astrong foundation is critical.

Learn to Read: Building Readers, Step by Step

Ms. Gelfond says”You can compare the process of learning to read to building a house.A well-built structure requires a strong foundation or the underlyingweakness will cause problems over time. The same is true in “building”a better reader. Without the right foundational skills, learning to readcan be very difficult. For some children reading comes easily becauseunderlying skills develop properly, but for the children with weak skills,reading difficulties become evident as early as grades 1-3 and can remainfor life. Foundational skills are critical for your child’s readingdevelopment.”

She goes on to outline the four steps, which are:

1. Laying the foundation with sound awareness, or phonemic awareness. 2. Raising the structure, by combining sounds, which involves blendingand coding / decoding (this is typically referred to as “phonics.”) 3. Finish the house, or allow phonics to become automatic, with practiceand refinement. 4. Enjoy the finished home, by developing comprehension skills.

Learn to Read: Foundational Skills

But what if your child did not learn to read because one or more of thesesteps was too difficult to master? Very often, students who do not learnto read have had trouble laying the foundation with sound awareness andphonics. Many tutoring programs focus on repeating these steps, but withmany children who struggle to read, the problem is not a lack of exposureto phonics, or poor teaching methods. Usually, it’s a lack of abilityto understand phonemes, or an inability to match sounds to the words onthe page. These types of problems cannot be fixed by repetition or re-teaching.The problem must be attacked at its source – the child’s cognitiveskills are most likely weak and need to be strengthened before progresscan be made.

Auditory processing is the main cognitive skill that affects a person’sability to learn to read. That skill, along with others that support andsupplement reading (like memory, attention, and so forth) can be trainedand strengthened with brain training. This is what the LearningRx programdoes. Once the cognitive skills are strong, the foundation can be built,and the child begins to “get” what they read. In fact, manyof our students have enjoyed a book for the first time after going throughour program, which is very exciting!

For more about how LearningRx can help you or your child learn to read,please visit us at ourLearningRx brain training website.