Down on the Farm

I love reading and writing now, but this was not always true. As a young child I struggled with reading, many nights were spent in tears. I grew up in a time before Phonics was practised in schools. Readers had key sight words and a big reliance on the picture for you to decode the rest of the words in the sentence.

Phonemic awareness is important because English is not a phonetic language. It always appears to break the rules which then leaves children confused. By teaching them how to decode words you are handing them the magic key that unlocks the hidden world contained in every book.