Teach your child letters in order for him to learn and recognize the alphabet. An effective method is by singing the alphabet song. You can make the song into a fun activity by dancing or clapping hands while singing.
Practice letter recognition. Show your child what each letter looks like and how they are formed. Have your child write the letters as you say them. You can make the task more challenging by saying the letters out of order.
Encourage your child to practice daily. Incorporate identifying letters into your routine. For example, while eating dinner, ask your child to name letters visible in the kitchen
Review the alphabet sounds with your child. If he is having difficulty making the sounds, have him watch your lips as you say the letter slowly.
Practice letter sounds with flashcards. On one side of the card have a picture. One the other side have the first letter of the picture. For example, "A" is for apple
Play the "I Spy" game to build sound fluency. For example, while taking car trips, look out the window and say "I spy something that starts with the sound 's'."
Teach phonemes to your child, such as distinguishing between same and different sounds at different parts of words. For example, the words "sun" and "sock" both begin with the same sound, while "pat" and "coat" both end with the same sound. This exercise can be done by using pictures and stressing the sounds when naming them. Ask your child to point out the similar sounding ones.
Practice sounds with a camera. Allow your child to take pictures of objects that start with the same sound. After you develop the film, let your child make a sound collage.
Teach segmenting skills. This is the ability to put sounds together to produce words. While reading to your child, point to words and sound them out slowly. You can do this with any word or activity.
Read with your child to develop reading readiness skills. Expose him to different types of books and genres. Allow him to see the words as you read.
Teach your child the basic conventions of print. This includes knowing the location of the title and author. Show your child how to properly orient a book, and where to begin reading.
Ask your child questions about the story as you read. This will help build reading comprehension skills.
Actively engage your child in the stories. Show him that reading can be fun. Set aside time to read daily.