To not see the point of phonics books with no words?

[Rainallnight]

DD is in Reception and and enjoying it.

She gets a phonics book sent home in her bag every week and so far it’s ones with no words - Level 0.

Teacher says that’s her level and she’s in a reading group with other kids the same level.

I’m really not pushy about this and if that’s where she is, then that’s where she is, but the wordless books just seem to me to be a waste of time. And DD is very, very bored by them. She loves books and her vocabulary is massive so the very last thing I want to do is turn her off books.

The instructions that come with the book, on the inside cover, say that the child should tell the story and you should talk about it, etc which DD is well able to do. She’s just baffled and bored by why there’s nothing for me to read to her (or for her to have a go at).

BUT I am very old and prepared to be told that I just don’t get how reading is taught these days.

So tell me what you think.

It's not a Phonics book yet. Phonics books need words in because phonemes are in words.

It's a wordless reading book. If it's not challenging her, don't worry. It's just one of the steps on the way to reading, which is usually used before children are able to read sufficient phonemes to be able to read the easiest phonic books.

She should move on to simple decodable books soon.

Ps. Keep doing what you're doing, and spend just a little time with these books, while doing all of the other lovely reading you're doing :)

Hi. DS started reception this September and form what I have gathered they have 3 bands running. DS was started off at double pink but he was very ahead when he started this September so this was not a surprise - but there definitely is a large group in wordless books - we know this because the EYFS team emailed to say that wordless books would be the default option unless their first assessment said otherwise. In other words - please don’t worry - assessments are continuous and they are continually assessing reading and every child is on their own trajectory.

I'm a Reception TA. Currently most of our class is on picture books. There are several who already know a lot of phonemes and are beginning to blend who are on words. The idea is to get the child used to looking at the pictures and making inferences, what is happening, what are the characters feeling, what are they doing, what do they think will happen next etc. This will help them massively when it comes to using the pictures in books to support their reading. It is no good giving them books with words in that they simply don't yet have the knowledge to decode. They will be zooming through the phonemes apace in school and, once your child's teacher has assessed them as knowing enough to start to at least have a good go at reading they will soon be put onto words.

Was about to write just what @solidaritea has written. It’s just the first phase of phonics. You could always challenge your daughter to expand the wordless stories (or even create her own picture books) until she has enough phonic knowledge to be able to read the first level of written word books?

She’s just baffled and bored by why there’s nothing for me to read to her (or for her to have a go at).

There's absolutely nothing stopping you reading your own books in addition to school books.
I always read at a much more advanced level than other children in my class (wasn't so great at other things so no boasting here). My mum took me to the library once a week to choose books for that week that were more interesting for me. We still did my homework but I didn't lose my love of reading.

Mine was bored to tears with this too. We just went with it. I think giving basic books would be better unless child has never seen a book, but I'm not a parent! They can infer from pictures and you then read to them, without boring them to pieces.

Sorry, I'm a parent, not a teacher!

My children were also bored with those books. We read other books.

We are currently on wordless picture books too, DS is not a fan but he is humouring me and completing the activity.

He is starring to learn to blend letters now and getting some short words home to practice so I'm sure the next level.of books will follow.

There are 2 main parts of reading- one is the actual word reading and the other is the comprehension.
Understanding what is happening in a story is so important- there are some children who read fluently who actually don’t have a clue what they are reading!
These types of books are great to process understanding with questions about how characters are feeling, what children think the book may be about, what’s going to happen next, asking them if they can relate to the situation, make up a story in their own words , retell what happened etc.
If you look up comprehension style questions for early years- there may be some more exciting ideas you could get to use alongside the books.
Also keep up with other reading books- I do find school books to be very boring sometimes- even those with words in them!

Two of the hardest reading skills to acquire are deduction and inferenceYear6 teachers pull their hair out when trying to teach these, it is a definite skill. Wordless books are the pre-cursor to work on both, which is something they will cover over and over again in more and more detail as they progress. Ask questions such as " how do you know it's cold" , " why are they putting wellies on" rather than direct retrieval questions. It will come in very useful!

@CharlieTPatteson

There are 2 main parts of reading- one is the actual word reading and the other is the comprehension. Understanding what is happening in a story is so important- there are some children who read fluently who actually don’t have a clue what they are reading! These types of books are great to process understanding with questions about how characters are feeling, what children think the book may be about, what’s going to happen next, asking them if they can relate to the situation, make up a story in their own words , retell what happened etc. If you look up comprehension style questions for early years- there may be some more exciting ideas you could get to use alongside the books. Also keep up with other reading books- I do find school books to be very boring sometimes- even those with words in them!

This is all useful stuff, but couldn't kids do that with a normal picture book with words so kids gain those skills, enjoy the activity and get a story too?

Mine were bored with this too.

There used to be a really bad teaching point .... guess the story from the pictures .... or even worse .... guess what's going to happen next. My dc hated this... talk about ruining a good story with over analysis.

We just had a quick skim through the books which came from school and continued with our home reading books.

We struggled these as well although they were slightly more bearable than when Biff and Chip had words. They were soul destroying.

Just read other book and stick a squiggle in the reading diary.

Yep this is the boring part. It doesn’t get better for a while.

I’d go with 80/20 rule. Spend 20% of your reading time on school books and 80% on books your child has chosen.

Thanks all, food for thought.

Sorry, when I said ‘nothing for me to to read to her’, the house is stuffed full of books and we read other books all the time. I meant that there’s nothing on that particular page of that particular book!

I totally get the value in making inferences, talking about how people are feeling etc, but we do that with normal, better books anyway. It doesn’t feel to me like a gap for her at the moment, IYSWIM.

There are some good ideas here to make a bit more of it. I’ll definitely look up the early years questions to see if I can make it a bit more interesting.

Just catching up - @notanoctopus has put my issue with it all much better than I did!

Just catching up - @notanoctopus has put my issue with it all much better than I did!

Mine were bored with this too.

There used to be a really bad teaching point .... guess the story from the pictures .... or even worse .... guess what's going to happen next. My dc hated this... talk about ruining a good story with over analysis.

We just had a quick skim through the books which came from school and continued with our home reading books.
School in those days did look-say and at home we did phonics!

Mine were bored with this too.

There used to be a really bad teaching point .... guess the story from the pictures .... or even worse .... guess what's going to happen next. My dc hated this... talk about ruining a good story with over analysis.

We just had a quick skim through the books which came from school and continued with our home reading books.
School in those days did look-say and at home we did phonics!

As a pp said, it's to practise familiarity with books, gaining inference etc. It's often better to discuss using pictures than words as the children can be stifled in their imagination and inference as they look for the 'right' answer when they are words.
We use inference from pictures all the way through school for this reason.

It is also because parents are often unable to use phonics properly so don't know how to help their child to read in the same way it's taught at school. This can muddle the children. It's better if they are given time to learn the phonics before practising it at home.

I can understand it's frustrating but more often than not, I wouldn't consider reading books a big enough problem to mention. As pp said, you can always read your own books too.

God, are they STILL doing this? DS (5) had those Biff & Chip books with no words when others in his class were onto the ones with short sentences per page. When I queried it with his teacher I was told that his reading wasn't advanced enough to get books with words but they helped him make up his own stories (he'd no problems on that score). Our argument was, how can he learn to read if the books don't have words?

DH and I are both voracious readers and read with DS every day, I can still recite all the Little..... Colour Vehicle. books 20 years later. We knew for sure the teacher was talking bx on 11 September 2011 when I picked up DS from school and he read the ticker tape along the bottom of the news report verbatim!

We moved back to Scotland the following year and his new teacher couldn't understand the previous teacher's report as "he can read just fine".

Sorry OP this has turned into a rant but for what it's worth my DS is now 25 with his own business. Turns out he just thought the Biff & Chip books were boring, that's the problem with our "one size fits all " approach.

Keep reading stuff your DC enjoys, funny stories out of the paper, cartoons etc. They're provably more advanced than the school thinks.

Mine are both KS1 and it took me a while to work out that sending the reading record book back with a note along the lines of 'X is bored by this, could you please send home the next level' is perfectly ok.

@MiddlesexGirl

Mine were bored with this too.

There used to be a really bad teaching point .... guess the story from the pictures .... or even worse .... guess what's going to happen next. My dc hated this... talk about ruining a good story with over analysis.

We just had a quick skim through the books which came from school and continued with our home reading books.
School in those days did look-say and at home we did phonics!

@MiddlesexGirl

Exactly this! You said it so much more succinctly.