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?

Dd is in Y6 and now falsifies his own reading record to save me the bother.

He does read plenty in a week, he just averages it out so it looks like he read every day. I read to him every night. I really don't have a problem with the falsification...

My DS Y4 teacher named and shamed anyone who hadn't written in their reading diaries every day in front of the whole class! In a way it got my DS into the habit of doing it but he is also terrified of being told off so now on holidays, weekends, christmas he'll get into a right state if he hasn't written anything in his bloody diary (he still reads). He is now in Y5 and his new teacher isn't that bothered but my DS still frets.

I think that's absolutely hideous. How many 8/9 year olds have complete control over their parent reading with them and writing in their journal?

How to put kids off reading for life!

My 7 yr old dd is supposed to read every day and fill in a full page of a reading diary herself with her thoghts on what she has read and draw a picture. And do homework. And do her clubs like swimming and beavers and now Spanish. It's all too much! Dh and I both work full time and would like some of our time in the week spent doing nice things like playing games or watching a movie or making meals together. Or reading something other than the awful crap she brings home! (She can only write about school books in her reading diary. Not the books sgee reads because she likes or the graphic novels she likes or the whizz pop bang magazine we read together and do experiments from)

YANBU I do this all the time! My daughter has lots of out of school activities and spends a lot of hours each week at dancing, gymnastics and singing which I think are equally important as school. Along with all these activities, practising dance at home for comps and exams, higher priority home work (she is in y6 and has her sats this year so has recently been bringing home practice sats papers to complete) and practicing her weekly spellings for spelling test every Friday, we are finding it impossible to read EVERY night. She does love reading and sometimes on a weekend she will sit and read to herself for over an hour so I think that makes up for it sometimes. Kids are under so much pressure from school these days I do feel sorry for her at times, I don't remember having this much homework when I was 10!

Also we were told at the beginnig of the school year that either the teacher or teaching assistant would listen to our child read at least once a week... there is about 4/5 diary entries in her reading record by the teaching assistant since September! If the teachers can't be bothered then why should the Children and Parents stress about it!

Bloody hell. Some schools seem to be going out of their way to turn reading from an enjoyable pass time into a horrible chore.

My Son's YR teacher is the opposite - she's forever trying to stress that you shouldn't get into a battle over reading books, if they're not in the mood read a book to them instead or just leave it to the next day.

I remember one time I wrote that DS had refused to read the book he'd been sent home with, but had read two chapters of a book he got for Christmas. It was never commented on, so I wonder how much notice they actually take of parents comments. He is 15 now and Secondary expect him to have a book in his bag at all times. They have a spot check every few days and get a behaviour point if they haven't got one,

After years of fighting with my DS about reading. An hour for 2/3 pages (15/20 words) I've given up. If he doesn't want to we don't. We probably ready for 2x half hours a week. But when he wants to and when he enjoys it. His reading and general attitude to learning have improved massively as has my sanity!!!

Argh! This whole thread is a bit sad. I'm not a big fan of reading diaries...because families who read will read anyway and families who don't probably won't be badgered into it by a disapproving teacher.

Enjoy reading with your child and don't feel guilty.

Our school doesn't do reading diaries. We read every night and DS reads to me. Usually he reads 1 book from school then chooses 3 more to read together. But life happens and so sometimes we don't read for a whole variety of reasons. I hope that I would be brave enough to stand up to the teacher rather than falsifying the record. I would not want my DS to learn that deceit is a way of dealing with a problem. I would absolutely talk to the teacher and if she didn't understand my POV I would write it down instead.

Dd1 in year2 reads well but prefers books from our collection. I hive a vague comment in her diary. At the start of the year I gave lots of information about how she'd done,how much she understood etc. One particular book went right over her head, I noted this in her diary but got no feedback so now I let her read what she wants to.

Dd2 in year1 is ahead of dd1 in book bands and enjoys reading the assigned books. I give detailed comments and I also get great feedback on how to help her etc. I use these tips with dd1 too.

I think sometimes pretending they've read a particular book is in the best interests of encouraging that child to enjoy the books they're interested in. It totally depends on the child. I'd rather falsify a diary and dd1 continue to enjoy reading than force her to read the assigned book and put her off reading completely.

My 7 yr old dd is supposed to read every day and fill in a full page of a reading diary herself with her thoghts on what she has read and draw a picture. And do homework. And do her clubs like swimming and beavers and now Spanish. It's all too much!

With respect, the clubs are extra-curricular, eg. they are optional. That's something you've decided to have her do. The reading and homework is for school - so not optional. Why should the reading be the last priority then?

Kids are at school all day. Personally, I think swim club, beavers, time with family is also very important. Vital to a healthy well balanced upbringing in fact. Reading is crucial - endless book reports, picture requests....less so IMO.

We made all ours up. My kids read what they want to read. And then we read together. And we still do now they're all teenagers. It's how they learn to bounce ideas, challenge what they're reading and learn how to enjoy books in this crazy world.

My daughter's head is never out of a book, her old deputy head once said she's the only child he's ever had to tell off FOR reading and he was the reading coordinator! I never checked she was reading because she was always at it so I used to sit down with her once a month or however long the chart lasted and ask her to list books she had or might have read. We had great fun. Added comic stories into it too because she liked those. I'd never have done it if it was to get her out of reading though, she knew it was (forgotten the word I'm looking for, symbolic?) of the reading she had already done and not me covering for her.

FixitupChappie we aren't talking huge amounts of time here. 20 minutes a day or so? That can't be fitted in around swimming/dancing/soccer/Guides/etc?

Once a child gets older, the amount of homework they receive increases, so the ability to balance this with other activities needs to learned early on. Once they get to secondary, the excuse 'oh, I just don't have time to do it as I do swimming four days a week' doesn't fly.

What annoys me is in my DS's school he has only read to a teacher once this year and the rest he's read to me. He is on level 10 now and he has only started bringing home a reading book everynight this yeqr but the teachers dont listen to them reading in school anymore and tried to tell us he should be on level 4, i asked them how they knew when they havent listened to him read at all this year

Same in our house 😂

I do this.

I'm a teacher.

Good way for schools to put children off reading! 🙄 Maybe it works for some families who wouldn't otherwise put books in front of their kids, but the one-size-fits-all box-ticking approach really bothers me. I'd probably write the truth (total reading done on a couple of nights rather than across the week) but I think your way is stress-free and reasonable.

My sons school has stopped with reading logs for this very reason 🤣.