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Think about your child reading …
Do they struggle with sounding out larger words?
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Our brains naturally look for patterns which includes words within words. If your child can break down a word into “chunks” it can help decode the larger word.
- Sometimes a word is a compound word which is made up of 2 smaller words (eg. Playground) Even if the child only recognizes one of the words, they can use other clues and strategies to decode the second word.
- See if your child can determine the “root” word which is the main word. Then they can add the prefix (added to the beginning of a word eg. un + happy = unhappy) or a suffix (added to the end of a word eg. sad + ly = sadly). They might recognize the prefix or suffix and then can decode the root word.
- Sometimes, they can break down longer words into smaller chunks that aren’t whole words or individual letters (great for longer words). Sometimes, it’s easier and makes more sense than sounding out each individual sound. Eg. t – ea – ch - er