What Are The 6 Basic Reading Skills?

What are the 6 basic reading skills?

  1. Decoding is a vital step in the reading process. Kids use this skill to sound out words they've heard before but haven't seen written out. The ability to do that is the foundation for other reading skills.

2.Fluency To read fluently, kids need to instantly recognize words, including ones they can't sound out. Fluency speeds up the rate at which they can read and understand text. It's also important when kids encounter irregular words, like of and the, which can't be sounded out.

3. Vocabulary
To understand what you're reading, you need to understand most of the words in the text. Having a strong vocabulary is a key component of reading comprehension. Students can learn vocabulary through instruction. But they typically learn the meaning of words through everyday experience and also by reading.

4. Sentence Construction and Cohesion
Understanding how sentences are built might seem like a writing skill. So might connecting ideas within and between sentences, which is called cohesion. But these skills are important for reading comprehension as well.

5. Reasoning and Background Knowledge
Most readers relate what they've read to what they know. So it's important for kids to have background or prior knowledge about the world when they read. They also need to be able to "read between the lines" and extract meaning even when it's not literally spelled out.

6. Working Memory and Attention
These two skills are both part of a group of abilities known as executive function. They're different but closely related.