I 'm begining to think I must be thick!

[Creole]

I have read almost all posts on teaching our little ones to read and I still do not get it. I am getting so frustrated and worried for my ds. I would really like to know how to use this synthetics phonics thing but from most of the post I have read, I still don't understand how to use this method.

Can anyone please give a simple and straightforward guide on the best way to teach my ds please?

there will be an off..dont push though or they might fall over!

and learning well soapbox?

Auntymandy, of course for lots of children it is like this, but as Soapbox says, for some kids there is no 'off'. I suspect my son would learn using any method, but he's not every child. And before you think I'm just boasting, he has his own problems of a different kind. And what's more, he never crawled. That particular 'off' never happened for him.

Only after a major intervention by the SENCO with a healthy dose of synthetic phonics

of course all learn at different speeds. I have no argument with anyone so why do I feel I am being 'got at'?
If there is a problem talk to staff thats what they are there for.
One of mine was a slow reader..had extra help in school with it etc, so I know how you feel if your child is a bit slower than his mates

Oh and I have a DD who is older to compare him to!!!

She picked it up so quickly it was unreal - OTR 9 by the end of reception! Poor DS didn't even make it off the starting blocks until thank God he was picked up!

What really fails me, is that when his ability changed virtually overnight, his class teacher said - oh well the way the SENCO teaches it never fails to make a difference!

So why in Gods name do they not teach it like that from the start

Not getting at you- there is another thread running at the moment and this one seemed to be a riposte to it - that's all

because they cant spend that amount of time on all children. luckily it is there for those who need it.
My children all learned at different rates. My eldest was reading Roal Dahl at 6 and as I said I have one that only got off the tree in year 5.
The problem was found and sorted

hot chocolate anyone?

I've got some champagne actually

Celebrating a promotion at work tonight

well done...
Why are you chatting on here then. You should be getting heady on bubbles and celebrating with hubby

He's gone to bed already

Maybe he's waiting for me

get up there!!
I am waiting for mine to come home!

pinch and a punch!

its the first of the month

Ca't believe its October already

I know..its flying by!
DD's 13 on 13th then we have Christmas to lookforward to!!!

OK, another thick question. This week ds brought his reading diary home There was a box for comments by "parent/pupil/teacher but I didn't have a clue what to write in it. "The pupil" obviously couldn't write anything in the box either, so I just put it back in his bag and returned it to school without comment.
Was I supposed to do something with it????

Mixed you are supposed to write something like - 'little Johnnie read from pade 2-4 and sounded the words out nicely' or whatever observation you might like to make

mixed - I just write things like

"sat and look at book, T pointed at words as he said them, looked at pictures and talked about them"

I just think it's so hard to know what makes the difference when kids take off with reading though. I don't have any answers but do tend to think it's mostly about readiness myself, rather than particular approaches. You see, I took pretty much the exact opposite approach to soapbox (for once- I usually agree with everything she posts to the letter, I find!) when one of my sons was slowish to take off with reading. Made a concerted attempt not to intervene at all, just tried to be as encouraging as possible and treat reading as a fun activity (as I'm absolutely sure soapbox did too, of course, in conjunction with the phonics). And there was certainly no SENCO administering doses of synthetic phonics to my boy, because he was not seen as in any way abnormal within the context of his school, just in the half of his class that weren't reading yet. And he too took off and is reading really well now. Just unrecognisable from reception and the early months of y1. Possibly he would too have responded brilliantly to synthetic phonics but, on the other hand, maybe young Mr soapbox would have read when he was ready even if he had not studied the old synthetics. Hard to know really but I'm unclear how research filters out kids like my son, whose reading turned right around naturally with no intervention whatsoever, but would presumably have been claimed as a synthetic phonics victory, had he studied them.

I also understand that rates of illiteracy in the UK have actually remained pretty much constant over time, independent of the favoured teaching method.This is funny on the "inflation" of illiteracy rates. Apparently, according to a 2001 House of Commons research paper on social indicators I found, there there are estimated to be about 8 million functionally illiterate adults in the UK, the vast majority of whom are in the lowest income/social class groups. There is a higher proportion of over 45s in the lowest skill groups apparently, so the laissez faire 70s and 80s have by no means produced the worst results of all!

Mixed - if you really can't think of anything to write, just sign and date the book to show that you have looked at books with your child.
Our school reading diaries have the following in the front:

Suggestions for useful comments (by Ann Preston)

S/he enjoyed this book so much that s/he's really looking forward to another story about these people/this family.

S/he was stuck on ... and ..., but has really remembered ... and ...

S/he knows all the words in this booke except ... and ....

S/he seems to be looking carefully at the beginning of the word for clues, but sometimes needs reminding to look at the endings.

I'm encouraging him/her to guess/try the words s/he's getting more confident at doing this.

S/he's makign good guesses using the letters at the start, but not really understanding the story, so the guesses don't always make sense.

S/he's really getting used to reading past a word s/he doesn't know and then coming back to work it out.

S/he read all the book as you asked and then told me the story in her/his own words.

S/he read the book silently as you told her to and only asked for the words ... , ... and ...

S/he pointed to the words and she named the characters on request.

S/he was very tired tonight and not concentrating very well, so:-

• We only did ... pages
• I read it to her/him
• We read a page each
• We talked about the pictures
• S/he picked out words s/he knew

S/he is really not enjoying these books and I'd appreciate some suggestions as to how I can deal with this.

HTH

Those are brilliant, roisin. I'm going to give them to my son's teacher and see is she wants to distribute them among parents. Thanks.

Scummymummy

Roisin - thanks for those - they will certainly add a bit more variety to my home/school commentary

this is an interesting link (I hope) to the scottish study which shows the huge advantages of phonics, especially for boys