“Travel stories teach geography; insect stories lead the child into natural science; and so on. The teacher, in short, can use reading to introduce her pupils to the most varied subjects; and the moment they have been thus started, they can go on to any limit guided by the single passion for reading.”
DR. MARIA MONTESSORI
Language in the Montessori classroom is first introduced through an enrichment of vocabulary with classified cards and sound games. Classified cards are used to present the child with various categories of items found in the natural world. With sounds games, the children learn to isolate and identify the sound at the beginning, end and then middle of the word. From here we introduce letter sounds via the Sandpaper Letters. It is crucial to note that the letter sound is given not the letter name. In order to read the child must know the sound the letter provides verses the name of the letter. Once the child has memorized most of the vowels, 10-12 consonants and can isolate the beginning and ending sounds of a word, we then introduce the Moveable Alphabet. This material is used for the thought process of writing and "building" words. This concept is introduced prior to any reading material. Children who can build a word successfully can always read it successfully but the reverse is not true. We see signs that a child is ready for reading when they begin to ask "What does this say?" or "What did I write?". When this occurs we begin with an introduction to phonetic reading.
The greatest aid the adult can provide in the process is to keep reading at home. Maria Montessori noted that the range to develop the skill of true reading is large. Some children do not truly read beyond a phonetic level until age 6 or 7. Since there are not many phonetic words in the English language the child will also be introduced to phonograms and the irregularities of English. Sight words (referred to as Puzzle Words in our classroom) will also be introduce at this later stage so the child has already developed the skill of bending the sounds together to form a word verses memorizing them. Sight words are simply memorized. The combination of phonetic reading, phonograms and sight words aid the child on their path to total reading. If you are anxious for your child to read, keep reading to them! They will all get there!
