Read To Succeed: Tips for Improving Reading in Children and Teens Reading skill is essential to learning all other subjects taught in school. The better the reading skills children have and the earlier they have them determines how rapidly and how well they will achieve in school. Failure to be able to read at grade level by 8 years old is predictive of future learning and behavior problems. There is no reason why a child with average intelligence cannot achieve this goal with early and appropriate reading instruction.
Parents are the first and best teacher.
The first teacher any child has is his or her parent. Children develop language skills by listening to and mimicking their parents. When children are born they have the capability of producing any sound made in any language spoken in the world. During the early years, they hear the sounds and make the sounds that make-up the language spoken in their culture. The more time parents spend talking with their child the richer the language development of that child.
As children begin to say their first words, feedback from those around them help them to learn the meaning of the words and begin to use them to get things they want and to please those around them. They gradually learn how to put them together to form phrases and later sentences. Thus, they gradually learn how to speak and listen with fluency and understanding.
The process of reading and writing is simply “talking on paper.” The only difference is that written symbols are used rather than sounds. The child must learn the sounds letters and combination of letters make and how they string together to form words. That is what is called decoding. Once a child learns to decode they can understand communication through written language based on the skills developed through their development of oral language. -->
About Learning Disabilities Learning disabilities are present in at least 10 percent of the population. By following the links on this page you will discover many interesting facts about learning disabilities as well as uncover some of the myths. You will also be provided with practical solutions to help children and adolescents with learning disabilities greatly improve their academic achievement as well as their self-esteem.
What is a learning disability?
Interestingly, there is no clear and widely accepted definition of "learning disabilities." Because of the multidisciplinary nature of the field, there is ongoing debate on the issue of definition, and there are currently at least 12 definitions that appear in the professional literature. These disparate definitions do agree on certain factors:
- The learning disabled have difficulties with academic achievement and progress. Discrepancies exist between a person's potential for learning and what he actually learns.
- The learning disabled show an uneven pattern of development (language development, physical development, academic development and/or perceptual development).
- Learning problems are not due to environmental disadvantage.
- Learning problems are not due to mental retardation or emotional disturbance. -->
The Importance of The Creative Arts In my years in the classroom, I have had the pleasure of teaching several children who have either one or two artists as parents. These children, who have a higher than average exposure to art and the media for creating it, possess some qualities that many other children do not have: in addition to their artistic talent, I have observed that they usually read and write better than their peers. My conclusion, based solely on this anecdotal evidence, is that their exposure to art affects other aspects of their learning.
This led me to a discussion with Aiko Cuneo, an artist who works with children in public schools, to flesh out the benefits of arts education, both in and out of schools. We offer to you these highlights of our conversation.
First of all, we suggest that parents expand their definition of art. If you are a baker or a cook, if you like to arrange flowers, if you enjoy the harmonious arrangement of objects in your home, you are an artist. These expressions of creativity are as legitimate and valuable as those of painters and the other people we call artists. If you are a scientist and enjoy inventing and experimenting, you bring an artistic sensibility to your work and may include yourself in the definition of artist. -->
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