Reading Lyrics to Songs

Find your child’s favorite song lyrics, the one they don’t know all the words to.

My kids Love Hannah Montana songs.
Break the song into parts, make words larger if that helps.

Go over lyrics with child together
Give lyrics to child to go over alone and with friends.
Have child read it to you periodically
Offer a reward for learning the song
This helps with fluency and is motivated by your own child's interests.

Example: Hoedown-Throwdown by Miley Cyrus

I found this song to be too long for my first and second grader to try to learn. Additional idea - break the song down into segments. Cut the words out and paste them onto blank pages. Have students draw pictures to go with each song segment (or download pictures online). In so doing, they can make their own book - and remake as many times as they want.

Right now my girls are really annoying me with the song from Taylor Swift, "You Belong to Me." They sing "typical" like "ticable" and get many words wrong. So this little book-making exercise might help with reading and word correction. To be really cool, they have to sing it right.

Reading - in 10 minutes a day

After teaching my 5-year old how to read in 10-minutes per day, I became a firm believer in the need for parents to spend quality time with their children reading. Even parents that cannot read themselves can make a huge impact on their child’s life in this way.

- Choose a book on an appropriate reading level.
- Set a timer for 10 minutes
- No stress!
- Give the child time to look at the pictures and make observations as you go.
- Pictures add context for beginning readers to add meaning to their words.
- Remember that one has to review a word at least 7 times to get it into the working memory. Just because you tell them what the word is one time does not mean that they will remember it.
- If your child really struggles, offer to read together in unison. This is called “Paired Reading,” a research proven technique for helping children learn to read very quickly.
- Idea: make flashcards of words your child struggles with. Include pictures on the flashcards. (5-cards/time is good.) Review the cards now and then or in the car.
- Repeat readings, allowing child more independence

Some parents think that school is going to teach their child how to read, so they do not need to put the effort in. However, most students receiving special education services do not have parents who help them with their homework. This gives children the message that reading is not that important after all.