Hello. I volunteered for English tutor and I had first meeting with a 2nd grade student today. It’s my first experience in the US. Actually, I taught English middle and high school students in Korea as a foreign language, but it is very different teaching American Kids.
What would be a good way to improve children’s reading skill??
There are many answers to that questions but it can certainly depend on why the child is reading poorly. What’s the underlying problem?
Without knowing that, you can always forge ahead by simply going through primer books with the child. You read some, he/she tries to read some. Try to see if he/she can sound out words at all. First, you could gently make sure the child knows the alphabet and the sounds that go with individual letters. If the student does know that, you can encourage the blending of sounds and see how many one syllable words this child can recognize. While you’re doing that, you’re building a sight vocabularly. Stick to basic words.
And to have some fun, you might want to spend some time together reading an interesting book outloud to the child. Something the child could definitely not read themself. Something fun and exciting that helps the child to know what fun reading can be once you really know how to do it.
Good luck.