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Toddler recited an entire book without looking

63 replies

PurplePansy05 · 10/05/2024 21:18

My DS (2y9m) recited an entire book to me this evening. I was pretty gobsmacked as the book is 20+ pages long and it doesn't rhyme much. It includes words I never knew my DS could say as well. He did it without looking at the text or the images in the book - I opened it to read to him and he was just laying in bed reciting the entire book alongside me reading it to him, he knew it before I read it out.

His vocabulary is very good and he's able to communicate in simple and complex sentences now. He also uses modal verbs correctly. He is brought up bilingual.

I was a very early reader and I wonder if he is gradually getting there - he is very interested in learning about letters.

Are there any resources and activities suitable for his age that you could recommend to further encourage him to develop his reading skills, please?

OP posts:
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user1471481356 · 11/05/2024 16:53

both my sons could recite books from aged 2 as well. I have many videos of my just turned 2 year old son reciting full books, singing full songs with no mistakes etc. my older son is 6 and reading at a 9/10 year old level now. I did absolutely nothing, just read to him every day.

teaandtoastwithmarmite · 11/05/2024 16:55

My dd used to do this at the same age. We did read her the Julia Donaldson books on repeat and she used to say ‘I’ll read it, I’ll read it’. DH and I were like ‘surely she isn’t reading that’ 😂

movingnorthsoon · 11/05/2024 18:22

Can you recite the book(s) from memory too, OP?

I remember reading somewhere (don't cite me on this though) that as we learn to read and write, we gradually lose our memorising skills. After all, we don't have to remember, we can just read it up! So we stop exercising our memory muscle, so to say, and lose some of the amazing ability some toddlers have.
From that perspective, I wouldn't push the reading so much :) Enjoy this stage while it lasts.
Age 2-3 was DS' Julia Donaldson phase. He could recite, word-perfectly, The Gruffalo, Gruffalo's Child, Room on the Broom, and A Squash and a Squeeze. He knew precisely when the Gruffalo says 'Amazing!' and when he says 'Astounding!' etc. Reciting doesn't actually do him justice - it was more of a performing thing, of diving fully into the story.
The year after, so age 3-4 was his dinosaur year. We looked at lots of dinosaur books together and went to museums etc. Eventually he knew about 100 dinosaur species, and could tell you all sorts of things about them. E.g. which period, diet, how many digits, whereabout in the world they could be found, genealogies, and famously, he'd go around explaining to people that there is no dinosaur called Pterodactyl. Since a) dinosaurs were land animals, flying relatives of the time were pterosaurs. And b) there is a species of pterosaurs called Pterodactylus. With ...us at the end. No Pterodactyl though. But many people just use Pterodactyl as a shorthand for 'flying dinosaur'. (As a 3yo he'd explain this to adults, explaining how they'd got it wrong but that it was all right as though it was not scientifically correct, it was a common misconception and popular shorthand)
What I'm saying is, maybe see if your DC is interested in applying his amazing toddler memory skills to other 'genres'? Space, trains, ... some non-fiction, find a topic that catches his/her interest? We also read some children's poetry, 'poems to perform' was a favourite book. Also songs.

DS was a good way into phonics when he started school but by no means a fluent reader. (Learned from alphablocks, teach your monster, and from reading Songbirds books with me). By end of reception, he'd cracked it, and was reading a book a day. Voracious reader until about age 9 when it got replaced by gaming... In that time of reading, picked up lots of knowledge (eg in depth Greek mythology) and also explored all sorts of stories obviously.

So yeah, no need to push the reading, it will probably happen naturally, and a few months earlier or later makes no difference.

Meanwhile explore what else your DC enjoys finding out and memorising!

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PurplePansy05 · 11/05/2024 21:54

@movingnorthsoon Weirdly, I can still recite book extracts which I memorised when I was in school (I used to perform on stage/in various competitions). I remember one I did 29 years ago and one from 22 years ago 😅 I can also repeat conversations word for word weeks or months after they took place. I still have very good memory professionally, less so in other areas of life. I feel overloaded with information since DS arrived, my memory isn't as good as it used to be.

To be clear, I'm really not in a race for my DS to learn skills sooner than other children or any imaginary deadlines. I can just see his strengths and genuine enjoyment he has when it comes to books and letters and am trying to keep it up.

OP posts:
Compsearch · 11/05/2024 22:31

OP you sound like an intelligent person, so the question “how do I keep up my toddler’s enjoyment of books?” shouldn’t be difficult to answer - just read to him, and talk about what you’ve read. That is it.

Originalusername89 · 12/05/2024 07:42

I have a similar toddler, same age, who LOVES books and has been reciting her favourite stories for several months now.

Obviously the first step to actual reading is phonics. She had one of those 'puzzles' where you put the wooden shape into the right gap on the board. It was an alphabet one with pictures so when we'd do it together we'd say 'A for Apple' 'buh' for ball etc.

I didn't really realise at the time but she started doing it herself and I suppose over time has learnt all the letters. (She's made up a game where we say a letter and she tells us all the words she can think of that start with it 😂)

Anyway that might be a good way to sort of naturally teach him the letters. I've just bought a book called 'bob bug and other stories' to see if we can start stringing together some three letter words.

Withswitch · 12/05/2024 07:44

Octavia64 · 10/05/2024 21:42

Mine could do that with the grufflo at that age.

Alphablocks tv programme might be good?

I was going to say this, my DD did the whole of room on the broom, with accents 😂

junebirthdaygirl · 12/05/2024 08:10

Britinme · 10/05/2024 22:13

It's quite good fun to make your own books with photos and very very simple repetitive text (think Ladybird Peter and Jane) - it's not phonics but it gives them some basic sight words that crop up frequently. We used family pictures and text like "Here is (picture of child)" "Here is mummy" "Here is daddy" "The cat is here". "This is our house". "This is our garden". And so on. It's not interesting linguistically obvious, but they do like looking at pictures. Easier to create on a computer nowadays than it used to be when it involved sticking photographs into a scrap book and writing very carefully.

My little grandson loves signs such as warning signs and traffic signs and always wants to stop and look at them. I made him a book with pictures of signs and he loved it. Homing in on something they really like works well.

Edited

This is exactly what l did for dd at 2 as she was mad to read books seeing her brother starting to read at school. We had an old-fashioned copy with blank at the top and wrote little sentences about each day. She gradually wanted to add more. We would reread previous pages and she would add her own drawing. By the time she went to school she was a fluent and avid reader.
She was eventually found to be a gifted child.
Saying that her brother was dyslexic and now as adults he has a far better job and she finds it difficult to find that area that suits her as her brain is going too fast. Sometimes having a middle of the road kid is best!

CaptainMyCaptain · 12/05/2024 08:15

It's quite common and a good thing. I'm a retired teacher and used this strategy a lot in Early Years - have a look at the work of Pie Corbett although it's probably gone out of fashion now as these things do. I once read The Gruffalo in KS1 assembly (Book Week) except I didn't need to because the while lots of them (6 classes) recited it with me word for word.

It's good for early writing not just reading as children experience how to tell a story.

WonderingWanda · 12/05/2024 08:17

Just keep reading lovely books to him and talk about the stories and the pictures. Play with him lots too and do things like gardening, baking, cleaning, craft, trips to the library, going on public transport, rock pooling, walks in the woods. I don't think you need to do anything beyond that, he sounds bright and bright children are like sponges but it doesn't need to be formal education at this stage....he still has so much to learn about the world and it doesn't need to be formal learning at this stage.

Benjaminsniddlegrass · 12/05/2024 08:22

I remember my DD doing the same at a similar age, think it's quite common. She is an avid reader now, we just kept reading to her and supporting her love of books - nothing more than you would normally do.

MissMelanieH · 12/05/2024 09:21

Are there any resources and activities suitable for his age that you could recommend to further encourage him to develop his reading skills, please?

Yes, books...there's millions of them out there...read them, talk about them, role play the stories. Your child is two, sounds lovely, bright, interested. There's no need to start preparing flash cards or anything more formal. This is the quickest way to snuff out the flame. Let him be a little boy who loves story time with mum, that way you will nurture a lifelong reader. Far more important than being briefly able to show off that your kid can "read" before other people's.

CaptainMyCaptain · 12/05/2024 09:29

MissMelanieH · 12/05/2024 09:21

Are there any resources and activities suitable for his age that you could recommend to further encourage him to develop his reading skills, please?

Yes, books...there's millions of them out there...read them, talk about them, role play the stories. Your child is two, sounds lovely, bright, interested. There's no need to start preparing flash cards or anything more formal. This is the quickest way to snuff out the flame. Let him be a little boy who loves story time with mum, that way you will nurture a lifelong reader. Far more important than being briefly able to show off that your kid can "read" before other people's.

This. Just lots and lots of books. Read the same ones over and over again and let him recite the story along with you or by himself.

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