Teaching Parents How To Teach

How I’m using ‘Teaching Parents How To Teach’

I am an Orton Gillingham tutor, tutoring students with a variety of reading and writing needs. I also have begun teaching two 4 year olds some early literacy skills out of my home once a week. Having two 4 year olds myself I thought it would be a useful and positive experience I could share with my children as well. Jill’s book, Teaching Parents to Teach, has been an inspiration as well as a great resource for me as I embarked on this journey. It has not only given me the tools and guidelines of which to base my lessons but also reaffirmed my belief and passion in multisensory teaching. I have had incredible results with my students over the last 6 months. We are thrilled that they are excited to come to our sessions and have begun reading cvc (consonant-vowel-consonant) words on their own. Their finger grasp and penmanship skills significantly improved through Jill’s lessons of line tracing. I introduce one letter per session with as many kinaesthetic opportunities as I can imagine. It is wonderful to see their excitement as they wonder what letter will be today. Some of my lessons included a Tea Party for ‘t’ and a Pancake Party for ‘p’. We read Nursery Rhymes, make letter scrapbooks, finger trace in sand, sew, build words with magnetic letters, review sight words, have fun with mazes, puzzles, dot to dots, bingo and practise letter formations are some of our exercises. It is a lot of fun for all and my children get to repeat the lessons and enjoy the materials. I want to thank you Jill for sharing your excellent expertise through your book. It is a great resource for parents and a reminder for all of us teachers on how important the teaching of phonics are and how equally important it is for children and students to form positive fun relationship to reading and learning.

Holly Ryan