When do you stop listening to your child read?

[emkana]

Dd1 is just six and in year one. She is a free reader now, so has finished with ORT at her school. I must admit that I don't listen to her read that much anymore, because she races through books by herself all the time, and from her talking to me about them I know that she understands them. But I still feel a bit guilty about it.

So when do you stop listening to them read?

[eucalyptus]

I stopped with my dd about 6 months ago (Yr 1, now just 6) when she was a free reader and used to read in bed by herself. She still has school reading books but I rearely bother with them as she reads so much herself.

With ds (4 YR) I don't read the books he gets sent home from school as they are horrendous but he reads lots of our own books to me

[abitworried]

DS1 is 7.5 and we still have a snuggley half hour in bed at bedtime. We use it as an opportunity to read things together which I think he might not tackle on his own, and often we read alternate pages aloud to each other.
He also reads lots on his own, but different stuff.

I like it, and will read to him as long as he wants [vision of him being 35 and me still reading to him.... )

[abitworried]

Oh, and I agree - we gave up on the school books about a year ago - horrendous rubbish.

We get about 6 books a week out of the library now instead.

[coppertop]

Ds1 was about 6.5yrs old when he decided that he didn't want to do reading out loud because it was too slow for him. With his school reading books I let him read them by himself and then ask him to read a couple of pages out loud so that I know he's okay with it.

[katelyle]

I read to both mine still - ds6 and dd 11.

As far as them reading to me, I stopped with dd when she was a free reader, but then the teacher told me that it was still important to hear reading because often good readers skip difficult words - they have read the book and understood the story, but haven't actuially read the words.

I still hear ds read - or more usually his sister does.

[Katiekin]

I learnt to read at 2 and was an avid reader so my parents stopped listening to me quite early. I am still coming across words I mispronounce and have mispronounced for years. I read alternate pages with my ds1 9 and we both follow the words, 1 chapter a night.

[islandofsodor]

Dd is in reception. I did actually listen to her read tonight for the first time in ages. Usually she reads in the car on her way home.

I always read her a bedtime story but that is chosen from one of her own books.

[Blandmum]

In y3, when she read bits of the Times to me [poncy familiy alert] The school cannot effectlivy test her reading now at 10, because she reads as an adult.

Ds struggles and I expect we will be reading with him for ages

[robinpud]

I would still want a year 1 child, no matter how able they are to be heard reading at home. It's a good 1:1 time and it's an ideal time to find out more about the child and school and what's going on in their head. It also keeps you up to date with what they can read but can't understand. Inference and deduction are really important skills and not all able readers develop those abilities instinctively.
Dd is an extremely good reader and is enjoying reading Anne Frank's Diary with me and to me. It has thrown up a lot of interesting discussion.
I know it's hard when family life is so busy, but please squeeze it in.

[SofiaAmes]

Ds is 6.5 and I stopped having him read to me a few months ago when it was clear that he could read perfectly well on his own. He still comes to me on a daily basis with interesting facts that he's learned in his books (all non-fiction), so I know he's learning lots. (Tonight he yelled from the other room ..."hey did you know Rome is in Southern Europe." And then he and dd (4) had a long discussion about where the Dead Sea was.) A few weeks ago they were arguing the origin of the earth. Dd went to a jewish nursery so was arguing the side of God as creator. Ds had read all about the big bang theory was trying to convince dd that she was wrong. In the end, dd agreed that the Big Bang might have created the a rock and all the black space that turned into the earth, but God created everything else like the cars and houses.

As far as reading to my children, I intend to do it for a very long time yet. My father read to our family every night after dinner until my brother and I went off to university. It's one of my fondest childhood memories.

[Hallgerda]

When you have to use force to stop them reading when they should be doing something more useful

Seriously, I don't think you should feel guilty. It's probably worth an occasional check that your dd is reading aloud with the appropriate expression, and talking about the subject matter and what's going on in the plot to check understanding, but you don't have to do it every night.

[singersgirl]

I listen t0 DS2 (5, in Y1)two or three times a week. He has been reading fluently since just 4, but there are still lots of vocabulary words he doesn't know, so I think it's a good idea to have him read out loud. He also reads a lot to himself, but I wouldn't have known that he didn't know what 'perilously' (for example) meant if he hadn't been reading to me.

I still try to listen to DS1 (8 and in Y4) once or twice a week - just a page or two.

[Lilymaid]

DS1 and I pair read (is that the right term) the Hobbit when he was around 8. He then decided to read Lord of the Rings and I couldn't stomach having to read half of that out loud. He was a very good reader and off the chart in tests at primary school. Such good intentions - he is now 20 and never reads a book. DS2 was never interested in reading, though competent so we read together a little all the way through primary school - school was keen that he read aloud with expression to show he understood. Naturally, like his elder brother, he doesn't read anything apart from his GCSE Eng Lit set books.

[abitworried]

You can also get them to read to you without it having to be a 'sit down and read' session IYSWIM... Sometimes if I am busy e.g. cooking, I will say to DS1 - what's that letter in your schoolbag about - can you read it out to me - then they don't realise they're also getting reading practice!

I think once they are about 5/6 reading together becomes as much about sharing books/ time together and a chance to discuss things which otherwise might never come up in conversation

[slondonmum]

I try to listen to my DD every night. She's a free reader, and gets through books very quickly, but I make sure she understands what she's reading and we discuss the meanings of more complicated words. She's 8, Y3.

[tortoiseSHELL]

I asked ds1's teachers about this as he is very fluent, and reads Horrid Henry and Roald Dahl in bed in his head. She suggested reading through to the end of Yr2, but not necessarily doing the whole book, just checking a few pages, as they do skip words otherwise. She said you can still really tell who is doing reading at home, by how they progress.

[Blandmum]

although I don't listen to dd read, we do talk over stuff that she reads.

[Balls]

I have a boy aged 9, a girl aged 6 and a girl aged 3. I read to each of them for half an hour in turn every night. They then spend another 15 mins reading something else by themselves. The older ones read to me a couple of times a week, sometimes more from their school library books before school in the morning.

Our evening reading time is their special time when they get one-to-one, can chat about topics that come up in the books, can explain new vocabulary. Also it introduces them to different accents and issues e.g. Last year I read Tom Sawyer to DD1. I'm reading The Cuckoo Tree by Joan Aiken to my son at present which has several regional accents and highwaymen which was something he had never come across before.

I still love being read to and occasionally dh and I read to each other. It's delicious.

[emkana]

Well I listened to dd read a bit today, and she did very well.

cat64, I'm like you, I switch off when being read to, can't help it. I was hopeless in lectures at uni, had to read it for myself!

Balls, do you really spend an hour and a half every night reading to your children! WOW! I take my hat off to you.

[Balls]

emkana - the domestic chores take a big hit from the homage I pay to our special story time. I live in a pigsty - verily.

[lexcat]

I've ask this question of myself every night in the term or so. dd 6.3 is a free reader and has been for about 1/2 a year.
The school like them to read for 15-20 mins a night. She started book tracker just after her 6th birthday and always reads the library books at bedtime to herself.
So far I have alwayes got her to read her school books out loud as the school like them to do this. The only problem is now that she is getting faster a reading to herself she is becoming very fustrated at having to read aloud to me. The worst thing is that having talked to a parent with a child in y4, the school like them to read aloud till y3 and she still in y1.
they say read aloud is a different skill to reading to them self.

[foxinsocks]

Either myself or dh listens to dd (yr2) 3 times a week (reading homework) and ds (reception) twice a week. Apart from dd's spelling, it's the only homework they get.

Even though dd is a free reader, I still get her to read to me because like someone said further down, there are still words she encounters that she doesn't know the meaning of.

[foxinsocks]

and I don't get her to read for long. Maybe 10 minutes.