Importance Of Reading Difficulties

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Chapter 1: Introduction 1.1 Background A teacher’s perspective on how to assist learners with reading difficulties. Reading is a fundamental skill for every individual in today’s literate societies where the written word carries most of the communication between individuals and societies. Reading is the basic tool for education. Children who have the ability to read, learn easier and therefore do better at school, With regular reading, the child develops its mind; it develops language skills; it develops the imagination, and it also improves spelling (by learning to sound out words or letters) (Davis 2014). Reading also expands the child’s vocabulary and trough reading the child will discover new worlds (Davis 2014). The benefit of regular…show more content…
The examples of these reading difficulties observed were: a) Poor spelling – Learners tend to confuse the Afrikaans language with English and it has come to light that they have a limited vocabulary (and cannot distinguish between) for which they use words indiscriminately. b). Trouble with their handwriting – Because the learners have a poor vocabulary, they do not copy the words correctly from the board and end up scribbling in an illegible handwriting. c). Difficulty in reading fluently – When the learners exercise their reading, they do not recognize the words and express the words wrongly or give them a different meaning in the sentences. d). Problems in reading with the correct expression, such as intonation, volume and tempo – Learners tend to read without any enthusiasm, no confidence and is not comfortable when reading individually. They do not develop a passion for the…show more content…
It may assist those teachers lacking the skills to help learners overcome their reading difficulties. The study may also give guidance to the teachers on how to assist learners with their reading difficulties and improve the learners’ confidence and also boost their self-esteem at school. With further investigation, the researcher has been informed that at Hermann Gmeiner Primary School, if a learner would fail one subject, he/she fails the grade. This is of great concern, because there are a lot of learners of foreign origin and learners with different cultures whose mother tongue is not Afrikaans. Struggling with reading hampers the learners’ ability to study Afrikaans, resulting into slow academic progress and an annual rise in grade
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