WHY IS THERE A READING PROBLEM IN THE UNITED STATES?
The
United States is the most affluent and technologically advanced of all the
industrial nations on earth. With its “free” compulsory education for all, a
network of state-owned and state-operated teachers’ training colleges, strict
teacher certification requirements, and more money and resources dedicated to
education than any other nation on earth, the appalling illiteracy rate of the
country is a disgrace to
educators. Teaching children to read should be the foremost responsibility of all parents. Well, sometimes
you cannot blame the parents, because they themselves may be poor readers to begin with—it
is something like the blind leading the blind.
Even if parents are educated, they may not want to spend quality
time with their children. It is not surprising to find some parents
with the notion that their only parental responsibility is to bring their
children into this world, leaving them to fend for themselves in matters of education
and learning, or simply relegating the intellectual well-being of their
children to their teachers.
In addition, many people may erroneously believe
that in this day and age, information can be readily obtained from the visual
media, such as the television, such that there is little need to turn to
the written word, and hence the general indifference to developing reading
skills.
WHO SHOULD TEACH
CHILDREN TO READ?
Reading
should always begin at home, and parents should be children's first teachers.
Ideally, teaching children to read should be the joint efforts of both parents
and teachers. It has always been a wrong presumption that teachers alone should
do the teaching of reading and that teaching should be conducted only at
school. Contrary to popular belief, educational researchers have found that
important aspects of intellectual behavior are often acquired at home rather than at school.
Parenthood is not just a moment; it is an
ongoing process. It would be wrong for parents to assume that they could ease
their responsibility of teaching once their children attend school. At best,
the nursery or kindergarten should be an adjunct
to, not a substitute for,
the home and the role of parents.
Since parents teach their children to talk,
it is only natural that they should
teach them to read as well. If parents think they should educate their
children, they should shoulder the responsibility of teaching their children to
read. To teach their children to read and write is the greatest gift and enjoyment of all parents. If
you do not enjoy your
child, why did you bother having one in the first place?
WHY CAN ALL PARENTS
TEACH THEIR CHILDREN TO READ?
Parents, who are interested in their children's intellectual development and
who are responsive to
their children's interest in printed language can teach basic reading
skills. They not only can but
also must if they want
their children to become early and
proficient readers. Children
are born learners; and
parents are natural teachers
and main educators of their
children in reading and writing in their early years. Parents do not need a course in reading instruction
before they can effectively teach reading and writing. Parents often have the
following advantages over their teachers:
They
understand much better the temperamental
climate of their own children—their interests in certain activities and their readiness to learn.
They
can provide consistently daily
reinforcement in developing their reading skills—something that
may not be possible at school.
They
can afford the one-on-one relation with
them, which is virtually impossible in the classroom.
They
can create a learning environment that
makes learning easy and possible, since parents already provide for them all of
their basic daily needs.
This 117-page is based on how I taught my daughter to read some
30 years ago. She learned how to read at two-and-a-half. If I could do that, so could you -- what you need is the how.
Stephen Lau
Copyright© by Stephen Lau
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