Teach phonemic awareness skills. These skills are generally mastered during the preschool years, but struggling readers may need additional assistance. Readers need to hear similarities and differences among sounds and words, so practice discrimination using word sorts and games. List words that begin with /b/ or have the short /a/ sound in the middle. Say rhyming couplets and challenge the reader to provide an ending rhyming word. Say words slowly, voicing one sound at a time, and see who can guess the word that was said. Challenge students to count sounds or syllables within words. In the home-schooling setting, it is easy to address underlying skill problems with older children without calling undue attention to them.
Develop sound-symbol correspondence. Have students match printed letters to sounds voiced in isolation and words beginning or ending with the target sounds. Complete sound sequencing activities, such as having the learner arrange letter cards to spell in response to the sounds they hear in words. Match pictures with target beginning, ending or medial sounds to the correct letters. Practice exchanging sounds on cue, changing "rat" to "hat" to "mat" or "bag" to "ban" to "bat." Be sure to show the matching visual representation of each word as you complete these activities with students.
Use recorded books with page-turning cues to help students make the connection between printed and spoken words. Encourage the reader to point to each word as it is spoken on the recording and to turn the pages on cue. Be sure to watch your home-schooled student carefully to make sure this activity is completed correctly. The one-on-one or small-group situation makes it easy to give the immediate feedback that facilitates quick learning.
Use unison, choral, dramatic and partner reading techniques to help auditory learners improve reading proficiency. Pair struggling students with able readers or assist them yourself for these activities. Blend reading practice with music by providing printed lyrics for familiar songs and ask the children to point to words as they are sung.
Continue to read aloud to your children at all stages of reading development. Oral reading helps students learn to create meaning and improve comprehension. Encourage discussion and have children answer questions about the text. Engage higher-level thinking skills by having students summarize, critique or evaluate stories or information that has been read aloud to them. Take advantage of your control over curriculum, activities and scheduling to make reading aloud an integral part of lessons.