Year one son and the horrors of reading at home

[papulacandin]

DS1 has just entered year one having done fine in his reception year. I've hit the buffers this week with the reading books he brings home. He's just not interested, won't concentrate, won't try, whilst I'm trying to be the conscientious Mum and have him read most days as requested by the teachers. That Gareth Malone show has spooked me as well. Any tips for making boys interested in reading and avoiding an inevitably destructive battle and reading becoming a boring chore rather than something to be enjoyed. Thanks

Make it fun, so :-
Each time he's read a page / two pages, he gets to bounce 20 times and laugh a lot.
Tell him if he finds a word in the book (that you've already identified) then he'll get a treat at the end.
Don't do it for longer than five minutes to start with.
Once he's read to you, you reward by reading a book of his choice to him.
Maybe also do a sticker chart, so if he reads well without arsing around each day he gets a sticker. If he's got 5 by the weekend he can have a treat - comic maybe (ie more reading!).
Oh and always say it's the first thing you have to do when you get in, so come in sit straight down with a snack and do it. No playing or anything else until it's done, otherwise they string you along until bedtime and turn you into a nag.

we have an abacus and everytime dd got a new or tricky word right, dd moved a bead on the abacus. Once dd had got 10 beads in a row, she wanted to keep reading to see if she could get 20 beads in 2 rows etc etc. She loved this method and it seemed to work for us...

ORT Biff, Chip and Kipper books by any chance?

Thanks for the great suggestions. Am on the Biff, Chip, Kipper books (strangely named children I think every time!)

Should have added, that have tried doing the reading in the morning - much improved things!

We had exactly the same problem. DS just had no interest in the books he had at school.

You could try taking him to the library so he can choose something which interests him. In our case DS much preferred non-fiction books about wildlife rather than stories.

Also Gareth Malone took his boys on a treasure hunt, which we used to do with DS too. It really works! We had a set of cards with different locations on them (ie on chair in bathroom, by the TV) and we put them out in a different order each time.

Good luck, I'm sure you will get there in the end

Am on the Biff, Chip, Kipper books (strangely named children I think every time!)

There is actually a reason why they're called this (it's buried in one of the teachers' guides to the series and yes, I'm sad enough to look it up because it had bugged me). I'm sure it's something like Biff's real name being Barbara and I think Kipper was because he couldn't say Christopher or something... it's in the teacher book anyway and I've long since forgotten the exact wording of it.

Boys often prefer non fiction books - they love finding out amazing facts to do with dinosaurs, space etc. Read those books to him first if he can't yet read them to himself. When children start reading they are usually just decoding the words rather than fully understanding the story/information. My DS1 didn't enjoy reading until he was confidently reading and understanding, when he suddenly told me "I really see the point of reading now!"

As someone of the Back to the Future generation I always think that Biff should be a boy!

As for reading, my son has just gone into Year 2 and we have problems getting him to read the books at home. In the end we turned to non-fiction and he loves the Usborne First Encyclopedia books and after we've read him a story at bedtime, he reads a page to himself and then calls us up when he's ready to go to sleep and tells us what he has learnt.

We occasionally get him to read some of his school book, but as long as he is reading something then that is what the school is concerned about (he reads at school everyday)

It really isn't worth turning it into a battle at home. If he was in my class, I would tell you to back off the boring school reading books at home, and just read something fun to him, or let him choose his own books from the library. Reading scheme books at the early stages are deathly dull .

Will he read to the teacher at school?

He needs to discover a love for reading. Reading fantastically interesting or exciting books of his own choice to him, sitting cuddled up on the sofa, or in bed at night is one way to do this. Also, make sure he sees you reading at home for fun.

Hiya. Go to the library and choose 10 really colourful action packed books with just a few words on each page. Choose three a day to read to your son for the first week. Then let him choose three for you to read together and let him fill in any words he can. Just let him volunteer- don push him to read. Third week ask him to choose three that he would like to try to read to you. You give him any words he can't remember. Return to the library but allow him to keep five of his favourites and just change five.This book box idea worked for my children and many of our friends so good luck and enjoy the reading process. Choose factual books too about dinosaurs, spiders, sharks and some nursery rhyme books for him to learn a rhyme as you are walking to school or going along in the car. Rhymes help children to learn to read because of the repetive word string which reinforces memory attack. this is why Cat in a Hat is such a popular book . Hope this helps. Don't worry to much about the reading scheme. Read it to him over and over until he can use pure memory to read it, first at the same time as you, and then on his own. Keep the pressure off and just let him be your friendly apprentice JPNS

If it's any consolation, I found Year 1 reading a very tricky time too, and often felt like throwing DD's book across the room and shouting "but you knew that word last week...aarrgghh!"

DD is now in Y6 and while not exactly a bookworm, has pretty good reading ability. It's just a frustrating stage - they want to be better at it than they are, so they get cross instead of just taking a deep breath and trying again.

Keep plugging away - and best of luck

Oh dear, Biff, Chip and Kipper. Oxford Reading Tree. Lovely stories and pictures, but...

Do you think your son IS learning to read? or does it seem that he is trying to memorise all the words in the book?

Oxford Reading Tree series does not use synthetic phonics, which is the recommended (by the Rose review) way of teaching children to read. It relies on the child memorising sight words. I've seen so many kids fail with this.

Well, when I had the same problem when DS was nearly 6, I ditched the deadly-dull books sent home from school (so bad they would make Biff and Chip look interesting), tried a few Usborne phonic-type ones, then found some Scooby Doo early readers (DS was heavily into Scooby Doo at that age). Those and some Dr Seuss nonsense books gave him some confidence, and he went straight from those to reading Harry Potter (aged six and two months, if I remember correctly). Really.

So if there is a character or theme that your DS is interested, I'd suggest having a scout round Amazon as well as your library and see if there are any basic readers that might capture his interest a bit more.

My dd, year 1, is feeling like this, she is saying she doesn't want to read, after having done so well in reception.

She has forgotten some words she knew by sight in reception, for example "said."

So my idea is to just read for enjoyment, she chooses the book, I read it while following the words with my finger.

She enjoys the Usborne Pocket Scientist books as we can find out all sorts of stuff such as how the clouds get up into the sky etc.

I did the same thing with ds, he didn't want to read in year 1, now he's year 4 and above average for reading.