Reading - 8 .6 DD in Y4

[pilates]

My DD aged 8.6 hasn't found reading easy and is currently on stage 11 ORT. She reads her school book to me every other night and still enjoys me reading to her, which I do frequently. I have never seen her pick up a book at home (we have loads) and read to herself. I know I cannot force her to but I find this odd because as a child I used to love reading. We are members of a local library by the way and this hasn't made any difference. Should I be worried?

[gorionine]

We have the very same setting here with DD1. She was always super good at reading in school or as homework but somehow she does not like to read for pleasure like I used to when I was her age.

I think it could be two reasons:

• they have more different things to do than we used to (tv, computer...)

• they cannot see how something they do in school could actually be fun (despite all my efforts to show her it actually IS!)

[seeker]

Neither of mine read much for themselves until they were free readers. I think it's really hard to enjoy a book for yourself until you are really fluent - it's too slow and hard. I wouldn't worry - but I would make sure you carry on reading to her as much as possible, jsut so she knows the pleasure you can get from stories. She'll get there!

[maverick]

Just a suggestion, but it might be useful to find out if she's easily able to decode all the words she's reading or if she is actually memorising and guessing her way through the majority of the text. In particular, does she know the advanced alphabet code and can she read 'nonsense words'?

Use the assessments here to find out:

www.aowm73.dsl.pipex.com/dyslexics/resources_and_further_2.htm

[noideawhereIamgoing]

My kids get to read a book for 15 mins before lights out - otherwise it's lights out straight away. I get them loads of interesting humerous books from the library of vary degrees of difficulty, so they see reading as a treat.

[gorionine]

That is a good one, noideawhereIamgoing, I never thought of presenting it as a treat!

[Fennel]

You have to make their life a bit more boring to make room for a reading habit. The reading in bed (but no other activities except sleeping allowed) worked for my older two, 9 and 8 now. For ages they only read in bed, but these days they read in the daytime too for pleasure.

[englishpatient]

I think it's worth thinking about some really entertaining books that will get her hooked - really anything will do; it's not important what she's reading, as long as she's reading something.

Some of Enid Blyton's books are good - DD loved the Magic Faraway Tree stories and DS is reading them now - he has taken the book to bed with him after we stopped reading it, as he was finding it so funny, and he hasn't done this before. The language is mostly quite easy to read / understand.

[pilates]

Thanks everyone - some really good points have been made here, particularly having other things to occupy themselves with! This has made me think about what we have in our house, a wii, nintendo ds, computer, sky tv/dvd x 2, plus hobbies and afterschool clubs. Is this the norm nowadays, what has everyone else got?

[englishpatient]

No wii.

DD aged 11 has a Nintendo DS (DS aged 6 doesn't have one and occasionally gets a go on hers).

One (digital) TV but they don't watch much, mainly just DVDs, but limited watching allowed.

Computer time limited to 1/2 hr each per day.

Lots of hobbies and imaginative play!

Swimming and piano lessons for DS.

Riding lessons for DD.

[Hulababy]

DD is 7y4m

We have a Wii. DD has her own DS and laptop with internet. Nothing is limited time wise as never had to.

We have one TV downstairs in the living room. We have Sky with access to Disney Channel, etc (DD's channel of choice) and DVDs. Watches average 30/40 minutes a day max in week, and usually far far less.

DD does Piano lessons, Drama class, Brownies and Cheerleading after school; swimming on a Saturday; Violin lessons at school; piano/violin practise daily.

She has at least one play date a week. This week she has 3!

Loads of toys and plays independently with them for ages at a time. Has trampoline outside although getting less use now as weather has turned.

Has nightly homework (takes about 10-20 mins) and also is supposed to do 20 minutes reading each night for school. Some of this should be to parents and rest to self.

DD can chose her own books, so tends to curl up and do her reading before bed. She always takes a book or towo to bed with her as well. She has literally 100s in her bedroom. She has always taken books to bed with her, since being a toddler.