Precocious Reading

Characteristics of Precocious Readers

Precocious readers learn letter–sound correspondence at a very young age. Their rapid advancements with language allow them to “break the code” and learn to read at a very young age. Breaking the code entails recognizing letters, identifying the corresponding sound for each letter, blending sounds to create words, and determining the sound that several letters in one word make when read together. This process of decoding, when used to create an understanding of text, is what is known as reading.

It seems that precocious readers, also called early readers, have varied strengths, weaknesses, and different orientations in their reading development. Some precocious readers decode rapidly and approach reading from a “text level” in which they think most about the decoding process as they read. Others approach reading from a “contextual level,” determining whether words make sense—a process that aids them in decoding the words in any given sentence. These students use word meaning as a clue for detecting the words that belong in a passage.

Precocity in reading may be due in part to a combination of above-average intelligence and dynamic early-literacy experiences. The average IQ of precocious readers is 130, but individual IQ scores vary widely. Due to the fact that some precocious readers score well below average and others score at the highest levels, early reading and intelligence are only moderately related.

Early reading talent can present in combination with other advanced skills or appear alone. It is important to note that not all children with advanced verbal reasoning, or verbal precocity, will also read at a young age. Likewise, not all precocious readers demonstrate significantly advanced levels of verbal reasoning. Similarly, in [Page 696]some precocious readers, writing develops at a rate concurrent with their reading. In other children, reading and writing development are asynchronous, and writing development is on a more normal developmental pace.

These children usually have a firm grasp of the use of language and utilize expansive vocabularies to communicate ideas easily. They understand subtleties of language and enjoy using language for humor, as in creating puns.

Precocious readers usually enjoy the reading process; this may perhaps be because many have had pleasant early experiences reading with family members. These children often spend spare time engaged in reading or other literacy activities. These children also exhibit a wide variety of reading strategies and use them to create meaning from text. Even from a young age, these readers are able to integrate prior knowledge to create context for what they are reading. These readers think abstractly about their reading and can synthesize, analyze, and evaluate text beyond peers of their same chronological age. These students are also able to make inferences about characters and plot in the stories they read. Strategy use in reading is one of the determining factors in whether precocious readers become gifted readers over time.

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