To falsify my child's reading diary?

[bookworm80]

This year our school has made reading every night compulsory homework. The children have to read at least 5 times a week and enter it into a reading diary.
We are big book lovers in our house and I don't want to put my child off reading by insisting she do it when she is not in the mood. She does sporting clubs 3 times a week and is often tired after school. I don't want it to seem like another thing to get through or a punishment. I still read to her on a night which she loves, and she is a great reader herself so I really don't see the need for pushing it.
At the start of the year she was in trouble with her new teacher for not reading as much as she should. I went to see the teacher to explain my views. She totally didn't get it. So since November we have been falsifying my daughter's reading diary. She reads a good chapter twice a week but we enter it into her diary as 5 different entries. My daughter is happy and her teacher is happy, but I feel guilty (have even name changed as wouldn't want anyone to know). What do you think? AIBU?

The problem is that you obviously feel it is unreasonable to expect reading every night for perfectly understandable reasons. I would guess that there are other parents who feel the same. If you all raised the issue with the school you might get things changed. By falsifying the readng diary you are just allowing the school to think that what they are asking is reasonable and fine. It won't actually change anything and will only encourage the school to continue. I can understand why you are doing it, but it will not do you, your daughter or any other children any favours in the long term.

It also shows your daughter that if they have a problem with something they shouldn't raise the issue, they should instead just lie about it. Not a great lesson.

I wish I had thought to do that. I religiously filled it in, putting comments about what I thought he found difficult etc...only to find that they hardly bothered reading it and rarely put any sort of comment. Wish I'd never bothered. Part of the reason why we are now home ed.

I do a similar thing. Our school has a reading challenge, the kids have to read every day (in addition to usual school reading) for about a month I think. We have to sign a record to say they've done it. First time they did it, dd was very enthusiastic and read every day. I think we're on about the 7th one now and she's well and truly over it.

She's also a good reader. One week she's devour a book, spend every spare minute reading it, then she'll have a break for a bit before starting another. I think that's fair enough and just continue to sign all the reading records as though she's reading every day.

I don't complete the bloody thing. At the start of the first term I wrote "LittleEE reads every night" and left it at that. Sometimes she reads to me, sometimes I do to her, every night she reads in bed before lights out. No one has questioned me about not signing it daily.

Life is all about doing things you don't want to do. Rules you don't think warrant your compliance will often appear. What you're telling is, she's above all that and if she doesn't fancy it: lie

Front it out if you don't agree.

I'd make her do it. I'd do it in the morning when everyone is fresh.

I do too, you aren't alone. The books DS (6) gets sent home with are boring as shit and he can't stand them, and he reads for hours left to his own devices. Encyclopedias, Road Dahl, David Walliams etc. So I just fudge it!

By the start of year 4 dd was perfectly happy reading to herself so I just wrote that in her reading record and the teacher never pushed it. Currently trying to get ds whos in reception to read more than twice a week and failing miserably!

I have to say though, they don't get rewarded for filled-in reading diaries in his school. If they did I'd probably feel quite guilty.

Do schools really set out such prescriptive tasks? I guess it may be because some people don't value reading and encourage their kids but it's truly onerous and takes the joy out of it. It would irk me so much that I'd probably challenge the school. I have all this to look forward to with DD then...changed a bit since I were a lass!

Without reading to an adult who know how to say words, you end up with kids reading (and then saying) words incorrectly.

Our teachers weren't ridiculous, so I didn't lie on mine. But we did what you do about reading. Mine are also very keen, very good readers, so if I'd had any kind of pressure from the teachers to do otherwise I would have lied too.

Sometimes I lie, sometimes I leave it blank. Occasionally I forget to complete it even when we've read all 3 school books. As long as my kids are reading, I'm happy. They enjoy reading their own books and there just isn't time to read them plus the same 3 books 5 nights per week. We don't get home until 6pm. The youngest also reads menus, ingredients, road signs - it's non stop. I choose not to turn the youngest off reading by making her read school books every night (many of which are too easy/boring).

I have discussed this with various teachers but they don't agree. They also don't seem to understand that some nights we won't do any reading at all. I'm a single parent, working full time, 2 kids in different schools, juggling various before and after school plus weekend activities. There is also the weekly homework, spellings never mind occasional project work/prayer bag etc. Kids need time to play or to switch off.

Do it. I'm a teacher and I know which parents care if their kids are reading enough but I'm told to text parents who don't sign the reading records. Family life can be hard, everyone knows they should make time to read with their child but it doesn't have to be every night- we didn't and we can read!

went to an autism thing recently and they (ed pyschs/assistent to) gave us a list of research which shows that reading for pleaure is the best way to ensure reading sucess. I may be careful with my use of language when signing ds's book diary.

I would challenge the school, and if they didn't budge I would politely tell them that we weren't going to do it. Repeat a few 'reading for pleasure' phrases with a smile. I wouldn't lie.

At DD's school they have a competition each week to see which class has read the most times. I write "reading done" every day, whether she's read to me or i've read to her.

Nope, YADNBU. I think making a child read every night is a sure fire way to turn a lot of them off reading for pleasure altogether.

Our dds will both happily read, but sometimes life is just too busy. I explained this to dd1's teacher when he commented about how few entries there were in her reading diary.

DP and I both work full time and the kids go to after school club until nearly 6pm four days a week. Totally unfair to compare them to the kids getting picked up at 3 every day.

I'd rather they read less often but enjoyed it rather than every day but loathed it.

Keep strong OP, the guilt only lasts a little while

I think that modelling to your DD how to skirt around unnecessarily onerous rules is actually quite a good life lesson. I know that others have called it 'teaching your child to lie'. But the adult world is massively supported by white lies and omissions. Kids have to learn that eventually.

hang on - no need to falsify your DD is reading her own books too at night so put this down in the reading record it will help her to move onto free reading and away from Biff Kipper etc - (pp hilarious comment!). the AR scheme does help as teachers and TAs can see that a child is understanding what they are reading and so move onto something more interesting. a mixture of reading to children as well as them reading is all good too!

Yanbu. Forced reading and reading books chosen by the teacher just put kids off. I would just write the name of the book either you or her have read and sign.

My youngest D's has been able to forge my signature once he was 8

I helped him.

I don't force my DD to do any homework. I encourage her to but if she is shattered and doesn't want to do it I'm not forcing. She's above her levels in everything and at 5 yo they're being given maths homework (2 pages), reading 5 times a week and spelling homework, at least 10 spellings of seemingly irrelevant words. You are not BU. I'm not going to make my daughter resent school either

A lot of teachers don't live in the RW or rather Ofsted inspectors who are on teachers backs to insist that they insist that children read everyday.
Forgetting that not every child's circs are the same, and. Not all children have the support at home.
So yes. Its a case of telling them what you think they want to hear, so
No YNBU. Its not like you're saying.
Mary-Lou read the book fluently. Whereas she's struggling. You're only lying about the quantity rather quality of reading.

At DD3's last parent's evening (year 5) I questioned the value of completing her reading record. I asked her teacher if he realised that I hadn't listened to DD3 read for years, since she could read properly herself. He said that was fine but that the record needed updating regularly as that was school policy. He said no need to sign or write comments, just initial where DD3 tells me to. So that's what I do

DS falsifies his himself.
They are suposed to read over 5 days detailing what pages they read each day.
He reads the book the first day they get it, or over the weekend.
He then retrospectively makes up the pages he has read.