Learn How to Read Faster and Better
Many Children Today Cannot Read
Approximately 40% of students across the nation cannot read at a basic level. Almost 70% of low-income fourth grade students cannot read at a basic level.
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Understanding how your child learns to read is crucial in choosing the right approach for their success. This guide will walk you through the step-by-step process of how children learn to read.
Whether your child is struggling with reading or you’re looking for the best approach to get them started, this guide will equip you with the knowledge to make informed decisions.
Parents often encounter a number of reading myths and challenges when supporting their child’s reading journey.
View this list of common reading myths and misconceptions and find out more.
A common misconception is that reading develops naturally, like speaking, and children will “pick it up” through exposure. Another myth is that phonics isn’t necessary, even though research shows it’s crucial for struggling readers.
Some also believe that strong oral language skills alone will lead to reading proficiency, when in fact, decoding and word recognition are equally important.
Additionally, many parents assume children will eventually catch up on their own, but without intervention, struggling readers often fall further behind.
Other challenges include the idea that reading speed equates to skill, or that children should guess words from pictures, first letter, and context, all of which detract from comprehension and accuracy.
Reading Must Be Taught
Reading is a man-made invention. It is a skill that needs to be taught and requires explicit instruction in phonemic awareness, phonics, and decoding.
Many Reading Methods Fail to Meet the Needs of All Children
Many traditional reading methods struggle to meet the needs of all children, and 40% of children face reading difficulties today due to a variety of factors.
Here’s why common methods often fall short:
1. Print-First Approaches
Most traditional reading methods, like phonics or balanced literacy programs, begin by teaching letter names and print-based rules before focusing on sounds (phonemes). This approach can overwhelm children, particularly those with dyslexia, ADHD, or other learning challenges. It emphasizes memorization over understanding, which can result in cognitive overload and poor retention of concepts.
2. Guessing and Three-Cueing
Methods like three-cueing encourage children to guess words based on context, pictures, or partial visual clues instead of teaching them to accurately decode words. This approach doesn’t develop strong decoding skills, leaving children without a solid foundation to recognize new words or complex vocabulary. Over time, these guessing strategies fail when students encounter texts without supporting visual cues
Ebli Reads – Learning Management System
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3. Phonics Rules Overload
While phonics is critical, many traditional phonics programs focus on teaching overly complex rules (e.g., syllable types, digraphs, blends) and exceptions, which can overwhelm students. This creates confusion, especially for children who struggle to remember these rules or apply them in practice. Programs that rely on strict rule memorization often fail to accommodate children with different learning styles
Ebli Reads – Learning Management System
4. Isolated Skill Learning
Many methods teach reading skills—like phonemic awareness, phonics, reading, spelling, handwriting, writing, vocabulary, and comprehension—in isolation, rather than integrating them into reading and writing activities. Teaching reading skills in isolation is inefficient and causes a disconnect between skills and hinders overall reading development. Children may learn to sound out words but struggle to apply this skill in meaningful contexts .Teaching skills in isolation as a major reading approach is both inefficient and demeaning to students’ intellect.
5. Lack of Focus on Phonemic Awareness
Phonemic awareness—the ability to hear and manipulate sounds in words—is a critical early skill for reading. Many common methods emphasize letter recognition over sound awareness, leading to gaps in decoding abilities, especially for struggling readers. Programs that fail to integrate phonemic awareness miss a vital component in learning to read effectively
Ebli Reads – Learning Management System
Why 40% of Children Have Reading Issues:
- Inconsistent Instruction: Many schools use a combination of different methods (balanced literacy, phonics, whole language), leading to inconsistent instruction.
- Limited Early Intervention: Struggling readers often don’t receive targeted, explicit instruction early enough, causing them to fall further behind.
- Over-Reliance on Memorization: Programs that emphasize memorization of sight words and rules without teaching decoding strategies leave students unprepared for more complex reading
Ebli Reads – Learning Management System.
Ultimately, evidence-based methods like speech-to-print approaches, which focus on phonemic awareness, decoding, and integrated learning, address many of these issues and are more effective in helping all children, including those with dyslexia, become confident readers.
Speech-to-Print Method is Better and Faster
Speech-to-print is an approach to teaching reading that begins with spoken language (sounds) and then maps those sounds to their corresponding written symbols (letters and letter combinations).
This method contrasts with the traditional print-to-speech approach, which typically starts with letter names and print concepts before focusing on sounds.
How Speech to Print Works
Phonemic Awareness First: In a speech-to-print model, children are taught to first hear and manipulate sounds (phonemes) in words. This builds a foundation of sound awareness, which is critical for learning to read.
Sound to Symbol Mapping: Once children are familiar with the sounds, they learn how each sound is represented in writing by specific letters or letter combinations (e.g., the sound /k/ can be represented by “c,” “k,” or “ck”).
Practical Application: Students use their understanding of sounds to decode written words, rather than memorizing letter names and then trying to blend them.
Why Speech to Print is so Effective
Stronger Phonemic Awareness: Speech-to-print prioritizes phonemic awareness, which research shows is one of the most important skills for early reading success.
Reduces Cognitive Overload: By focusing on sounds first, the approach simplifies the learning process and reduces the burden of memorizing multiple spelling rules or letter names upfront.
Helps Dyslexic Learners: The speech-to-print approach can be especially beneficial for children with dyslexia or other reading challenges, as it aligns closely with how the brain processes spoken language and reduces reliance on visual memorization
Introduction to Evidenced Based Literacy Instruction (EBLI)
EBLI (Evidence-Based Literacy Instruction) is an innovative and systematic approach designed to teach reading, spelling, and writing using a speech-to-print method.
Unlike traditional phonics programs that often emphasize letter names or rely on rules-based instruction, EBLI focuses on teaching students to connect spoken sounds with their corresponding written symbols.
This multi-sensory method integrates auditory, visual, and tactile learning, helping students decode words more effectively and efficiently.
How EBLI Works
- Sound-Based Learning: EBLI teaches reading by focusing on phonemic awareness (the ability to hear and manipulate sounds in words) and linking those sounds directly to print. This makes decoding easier and more intuitive, particularly for struggling readers or those with dyslexia
- Integrated Skills: Rather than teaching reading skills in isolation, EBLI integrates phonics, comprehension, spelling, fluency, and writing into every lesson. This holistic approach ensures that students apply their learning in real-time, reinforcing each skill within the context of reading and writing.
- Error Correction and Immediate Feedback: EBLI emphasizes immediate error correction, ensuring that students don’t develop bad habits or misunderstandings. The program is designed to provide real-time feedback, which is especially effective in 1-on-1 tutoring.
- Accelerated Progress: By teaching multiple literacy components simultaneously and focusing on practical application, EBLI helps students make rapid gains in reading ability. Many students progress multiple grade levels in a relatively short time frame.
Proof of Effectiveness
EBLI’s effectiveness is supported by case studies and real-world applications, where students, including those with learning disabilities like dyslexia, have shown significant improvements.
We use EBLI for all our students and have found it to be the fastest and most effective program.
It works for all reading levels, for children and adults, and for children with dyslexia.