How do you teach your children to read using phonics if they are bilingual?

1. 74

   Susana Suarezposted 12 years ago

   How do you teach your children to read using phonics if they are bilingual?

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2. 72

   ImYoungAtHeartposted 12 years ago

   I am a preschool teacher and there are a few tips that I used teaching my children to read.  My daughter could read simple books at age 4 and Little Women by first grade.
   I always pointed to the words as i read a book to them so that they would realize that the words were connected to what i was saying when they were young.
   
   I like rhyming books like Hop On Pop by Dr. Seuss.  There are many others out there now. But it makes it easier to read words that are in the same family.   You can do the same thing making your own flip cards  in which the last page has a different ending like "at" and each half card stapled to front has different consonant so that each flip changes the starting consonant or blend of consonants like "b", "c", "f", "h" and "th"  for example.  You can also add pictures of the words to get them started.
   
   Practice sounding out the words showing how each letter has it's own sound.
   I love the new Fridge Phonics magnet with all the letters of the alphabet and when you push on the letter it sings their sounds. 
   
   We also had a photo alphabet book so that everyone in family had their picture on the page of the letter that starts their name.  When we had a page of the alphabet that we had no photo for we used magazine pictures or some from the internet to supplement.  I always tried to include pics that were some how meaningful to our child, a place we had visited or a favorite toy.
   
   We also wrote small vocabulary words on little note cards that we kept on a binder ring either once they learned the word so they could watch their own reading vocabulary grow   or just the practice words they wanted to learn that week. 
   
   We also sang the vowels a stepping up the scale with the notes  with long vowels "a,e,i,o" and step down on "u".   Then i would sing the short vowels down the scale.  This helped emphasize that even though the vowels were written the same that they had 2 different sounds.
   
   I am sure there are many more tips to help teach phonics and how to sound out words, but these are what helped with my children. 
   
   READ  READ  READ to your children and from books.  IMO  the kindle or nook should never replace actual books for children.

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