As mentioned above, learning to read is a developmental process. There are discrete skills that work in combination to enable us to read. While these skills are used together when we read, it is important to teach them as explicit skills one at a time. As skills are learned, teachers can help students integrate them to create the ability to read fluently. These component skills are also not equally important at each level of schooling. Some are more important in early grades and others more important in later grades.
Before children can start learning to read, they need to become aware of and understand the concept of written letters, words and text. The Reading Approach presents print concepts as a related component skill of reading. Children must learn that messages can be conveyed in writing; that some written symbols are letters of an alphabet; where to begin reading on a page or in a book; what a book is and what the cover, title, and author are; which direction a text is read; and that illustrations are used to convey meaning within a text.
As learners gain an awareness and understanding of print concepts, they can begin to develop other component skills of reading. There are five components skills, as well as the skill of writing, that combine to enable children to both decode words and understand what they read.  Everyone uses these component skills when they read even though fluent and successful readers may not realize when each skill is used. 

The five components of teaching reading (plus 2) are:

 

For students to learn to read and write in the early grades of primary school, they must work regularly with the five components skills and writing. As students become more proficient readers, the emphasis placed on each of these skills will likely change, but these component skills are always the skills that good readers will have to master and use in new reading situations. Each component skill is explained below: