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Original poster

I think my daughter finds reading boring.

42 replies

pongonperdy · 27/01/2011 22:40

My DD is in reception. She is doing well with her reading and phonics and seems to be able to read the books tjat she brings home. The trouble is tryingto get her to read them. She will read the first few pages and then ask me to finish the book. I dont kow if she finds it tiring or boring or what.

Any experience of this and hpw to encourage without being over strict.

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TwoIfBySea · 27/01/2011 22:48

Is it those god-awful Kipper books? With Kipper, Biff, Chip and Floppy the bloody dog. Those books, which last over many a year, are enough to drive out any desire to read.

My dts hated them and because they were separated into two classes working at different speeds I had to repeat the damn books. I have to admit that dts read them simply to fulfil their homework, they hated them but knowing that I would read them a proper story later on that night was enough. We always ended up concentrating on what we read more and the Kipper book was just a chore that had to be done.

seeker · 27/01/2011 22:48

I would suggest reading a page each. It is tiring and sometimes boring for them at this age, and that way it becomes a properly cooperative effort!

Oh, and if she doesn;t want to read one night don't make her. It mustn't be a chore at this age.

Original poster
pongonperdy · 27/01/2011 22:51

Yes, kipper, biff, bob bug and some damn rabbit.

Not surprised that she is bored but it seems tjat if we dont read the book to death she doesnt get a new one.

Should i mention it to the teacher?

OP posts:
RoadArt · 27/01/2011 22:52

Do you get her to read other stuff apart from the school books.

Ths would be a good way for her to realise that not all books are boring.

Also make a game out of the reading.

Can you find a word that sounds like ....

show me speech marks, full stops, etc (if she is at that level)

look for words she is learning with her spelling

talk about the pictures. what does she see. make up her own story from the pictures. describe what the characters might be feeling (happy sad)

sorry about lack of capitals, i am being extremely lazy.

stillenacht · 27/01/2011 22:55

You are not alone...my son (11) hates reading and always has. For book reviews we have to offer him mini rewards to get through the books. It is v hard when you have a child who hates reading as it seems such a preoccupation (understandably) at primary school. I have found getting him to read more stressful than dealing with my doubly incontinent autistic other son at times.

Original poster
pongonperdy · 27/01/2011 22:58

We read other books together. Some she reads and some i just tead to her. I have been reading the faraway tree to her which she loves. Maybe i should not put too much emphasis on herschool books. I am concerned that her ability to read is judged on these books so we do have to make an effort.

OP posts:
TwoIfBySea · 27/01/2011 23:06

You know, pongonperdy, I think that whole series of books should be binned. They are utter rubbish. I hate to say this but they don't really improve over the next few years either! Dts2 just wrote on his literary circle s homework, on the question of how did "Grandma's Indian Summer" make him feel that he felt bored and the story wasn't very interesting! It is a true opinion as both my dts enjoy books.

Encourage her to read by going to the library, see which books she would chose.

My dts (age 9) have always preferred to read factual books by themselves, especially nature and astronomy books. When we have our reading time together then it is always a story - we bought a whole series of Michael Morpego (sp?) from The Book People or rather from Santa. We are reading those just now.

When they were your dd's age they liked picture books such as those by Debi Gliori, anything featuring an animal. We've gone through TinTin and Asterix. So although school books drain the will to live they don't necessarily mean your dd will hate reading forever.

evolucy7 · 27/01/2011 23:14

You say that she can read the books she brings home, my experience is that they take minutes to read. Why is this a problem? If she can read them why do you need to be strict? Actually though for the sake of a few minutes, if there may be a few words that are new, I would be strict to ensure that she can read them at her level to school the nest day.

squidgy12 · 27/01/2011 23:17

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

evolucy7 · 27/01/2011 23:19

next day

sethstarkaddersmackerel · 27/01/2011 23:25

I struggled with my dd; people on MN gave me plenty of good ideas all of which I tried and none of which worked.
Then eventually (on MIL and MN's advice) I stopped making her do it at the start of Y1. I was reading her Pippi Longstocking at the time and she was obsessed by Pippi and wanted to read it herself. Having complained that Biff Chip'n'Kipper were too hard she now insisted Pippi Longstocking was easy. (It's not - it's far too hard, but that doesn't matter because I would just do the hard words and she would do the easy ones.)
The moral is that motivation is everything. If I were you I would do the minimum of forcing, possibly don't even do it at all, and continue to read fun stuff with her, as I'm sure you are doing. She'll make progress because of what she does in the classroom and sooner or later she'll find something she wants to read and then you can step in and do loads with her.

evolucy7 · 27/01/2011 23:29

I'm sorry but I disagree with all this don't force her stuff, the books take a few minutes to read, I think that young children do need to learn that sometimes they have to do things that they may think are boring. The OP says that she can read the books so really she should understand that she needs to take a few minutes to read them!

sethstarkaddersmackerel · 27/01/2011 23:33

sure, I'm just recounting what worked for us. Forcing her upped the stress levels; taking the pressure away was the best thing I ever did.

LoisSanger · 27/01/2011 23:34

The ones with Bob Bug in are very boring. And make no sense. I listen to children in Reception reading and now a new lot have just atarted there will be more Bob Bug again Grin.

TheFallenMadonna · 27/01/2011 23:37

I have never insisted my children read their reading book from school (this is much frowned upon by MN btw, but fortunately not by my DC's teachers). The school teaches them really well, and I just want them to love reading. We read to them until they were on the brink of reading 'proper' books (not chapter books, but ones with a real story at least), and them bribed them with a bedside light for reading to themselves after bedtime. We do still read to them btw, but they can carry on reading afterwards, thereby discovering one of the world's greatest pleasures Smile

TwoIfBySea · 28/01/2011 00:08

evolucy, that is one good thing about the books, it is an important life lesson - sometimes we have to do something we don't like to!

Mashabell · 28/01/2011 07:47

Most school reading schemes are very boring, but not all children need to plough through them.

The ideal way to learn to read is children getting obsessed about a book as a result of having it read and wanting to read it for themselves. (For my granddaughter that is currently Dr Seuss?s The Cat in the Hat.) But some children don?t get to stage until much later. (My son was 8 before he really took off, after we had read loads of books to him first.)

The school readers are all pretty boring because they are specially written for teaching children to read. In English, this consists of an easy and a hard part. (Explaining this to your child, might help to make those boring reading books more palatable for them.)

The easy bit is learning the sounds for the main spellings with regularly spelt words like ?an, and, hand?, ?fish, ship, shop?, ?chip, chat?, ?action, fraction?, ?station, carnation?.
The much harder part is learning to read the words with tricky spellings ?here , there?, ?one, once, only?.

School readers are specially written to use mainly just regularly spelt words to begin with, and gradually using more and more hard words (through, although, rough...). It?s hard to write exciting stories with controlled vocabulary, and because real books often contain too many tricky words on a single page, schools don?t use them for teaching reading.

But if I child can cope with reading real books, and learn to read the tricky words too, without being too put off by them from wanting to learn, they don?t need to read those boring books at home as well. They?ll score well when tested on them at school anyway.

The best way to learn to read is simply to read a lot, and if a child is ready for that, that?s absolutely fine. It can be helpful to point at the words when you read to DD or DS, when they show an interest in wanting to learn. With stories that they already know well, they often soon want to do a bit themselves, then letting take u over again, until they can to most of it. THE MAIN THING IS TO KEEP IT FUN.

I have said quite a lot more about this on my blog englishspellingproblems.blogspot.com

(The links may not work because this website often inserts extra spaces into them, but my blog has an index with links.)
seeker · 28/01/2011 08:24

Remember that, hard though it is to believe, lots of children really like Biff and Chip et al and find them really funny and slightly anacrhic. Particularly if they don't get "OMG this is sooooo boring" signals fro their adults

Children are different to us!

OffToNarnia · 28/01/2011 09:16

My 5 year old [year 1]loved the Biff and Chip books especially 'the magic key' ones. He is sad that has has read them all and misses them. All last summer played magic key games with an old key. He loved the pictures and finding the 'glasses' etc. Each to their own!!

PatriciaHolm · 28/01/2011 09:45

DD, yr1, loves Biff and Chip Grin! We bought some of the read at home ones and she would read them in bed at night.

Do you have a good library? Ours has lots of different scheme books, so I supplement the school ones with those. Fortunately school also uses lots of schemes so we don't get bored.

Seville · 28/01/2011 11:07

I pretend that I find Floppy's antics hilarious. That I can't wait to see what Floppy does in this book. Or is it Dad that's going to make everyone laugh this time...

DS has fallen for it :)

Elsjas · 28/01/2011 11:21

I would definitely press on with the school reading books. They are specifically designed to teach children to read and help with spelling, writing, basic punctuation etc which all form part of early literacy learning. My dc loved the Biff and Chip books and they do get better as you go up the scheme and their adventures become a bit more exciting.

chocecclair · 28/01/2011 11:37

i love Biff & Chip :)

CharlieBoo · 28/01/2011 11:39

My ds loves the Biff and chip magic key ones too! He in year 1 and those books are a bit more exciting than some of the early reception ones.

When ds was in reception I used to let him have a treat after reading (tiny packet of Haribo's, something like that) that he could have after reading the book as beautifully as he could...

He is a good reader now, but he doesn't go mad for it...I'm hoping it will come with maturity. I am reading him Matilda at the moment which he is loving and has started following where I'm reading on the page. I'm finding the longer stories also help with his comprehension which they focus more on in year 1.

seeker · 28/01/2011 12:08

I've done a lot of helping in class ove the last 10 years and I have never yet met a child who didn't like Biff and Chip. And I have met very few parents who don't complain about them. On balance, I think it's better if the kids like them........!!!!