When your child is reading, they often get "stuck" on words they don't know. This provides you with a great opportunity to help your child. Let your child know that even the best readers come across words they don't know. Help your child become a confident reader by using these strategies together.

Sound out the Word.
Start by looking at the letters one at a time and try to sound it out. Blend the sounds together. Have them do this faster each time until they can hear the word.

Look for Little Words
Help your child find little words inside of the tricky word. For example, the word “inside” has the word “in” and “side”. Or “funny” has the word “fun”. Use these little words to help your child read the larger words.

Look for Chunks
Just like looking for little words, you can look for chunks, or sounds, like ing, ch, sh, wh, ed, ink, ly, and tion.

Think of Rhyming Words
When using our toolkits, rhyming is a good way to identify a word. For example, if your child is stuck on the word “bike”, show them that they already read the word “like”. Point out that the words both end in “ike”.

Look at the Pictures
Pictures can give clues about what is happening in the story. These clues may help your child when he or she encounters a tricky word. Ask your child what is happening in the picture.

What Makes Sense
Ask your child, “What makes sense here?” Have them re-read the sentence and think of a word that makes sense.

Make a Best Guess
Sometimes a child can make their best guess and keep going. Have them use the first letter or sound to get them started. They may be able to figure out the word as they continue on.

Don’t forget that it is OK to simply tell your child the word if they are having a lot of difficulty. Let them try to figure it out with one or two strategies above, and if they still have trouble, just help them out. Show them how you sound it out, chunk it, or make a best guess. Modeling these strategies for your child will help them the next time they get stuck.