Why is MN so obsessed with reception reading?

[skiphopskidaddle]

It's a marathon, not a sprint. It doesn't matter if Johnny is on red and Amy is on lilac as (a) different schools go at different paces and (b) children develop different skills in different order.

I can't quite believe the number of reception reading threads I've seen this week along the lines of "what colour book is yours on?". I'm going over to the behaviour/development board now to check for obsessive posting about when children learn to walk. Cos it doesn't matter either, in general.

Mathanxiety - yes, the point is that these tiny children are doing activities 'on schedule' and go from one scheduled activity to the next. After the assemblies, numeracy and literacy activities etc, there isn't much time for them to explore and play. Children are natural explorers and learn a lot from playing 'mummies and daddies', playing in the sandpit etc etc. They shouldn't be told when they should play or be restricted in their play (which happens when teachers have to tick boxes and make sure children are achieving their 'targets'). Also children not only need interaction with other children but with adults too. Teachers (through no fault of their own) do not have time to speak to the children in their class and answer their questions or play with them. A group of 30 4-5 year old and 5-6 year olds (year one) is far too many. It is not the optimum environment.

We don't have assemblies for reception children
try excluding numeracy and literacy from your day
no talking to start

sand and water - sorry no that is capacity
block play - noooooo shape and size and problem solving
small world - nope thats literacy again talk role play
home corner - oooooooo dangerous - lots of numbers and lots of talk and perhaps some reading
book corner - give it a wide berth
painting - no that's mark making so more literacy
dough - no that could lead to size and shape and talk

I know a box in the corner until home time unless they notice it's a cuboid and use positional language to say I'm inside the box!

magdalene sorry but teachers do talk to their children and answer questions and play with them try watching the video -unfortunately our website is down but this is a neighbouring school.

phonemic awareness as a vital precursor to phonics instruction .

Funny that those of us actually using SP find that phonemic awareness develops as you teach -

It's strange that you minimize the difference between teaching a transparent language (Finnish, Italian, Spanish, Croatian etc.) and a language like English which is one of the most opaque languages there is. That's why it is so important to understand the nature of the code and gradually build from simple to complex. But you are quite evidently not a teacher.

Like many others, my dd was a voracious reader from a very young age - reading TW White Once and Future King, and most of Tolkein before she was 8, and David Copperfield shortly after - all without having been exposed to phonics. But she found languages incredibly difficult, and I was asked when she was 14 whether she might be dyslexic, her spelling wasbeing so poor. A phonics approach would have helped her with languages and with spelling and I don't think, for a second, a well trained teacher would have diminished her love of reading.

It is the bottom 20% you sweep under the carpet.If they learn to read earlier, their horizons are expandly hugely. Here in Oxfordshire, pretty much a phonics,with lecturers at the two universities no doubt too posh to push - I mean - to teach skills..., we get the WORST results in the country for SATs 1, and appalling results for SATs 2 and 3. What is more, the special school concentrating on boys with behavioural difficulties, is full of boys who can't, or can barely read. Any surprise that they have behavioural problems?

The person leading the Early Years campaign, Dr Richard House , was formerly a Steiner Head. Perhaps, like you, he ignores the inconvenient fact that we have a very opaque language. Well, Steiner schools, as a whole, have certainly created an overabundance of poor readers - yet their play is very creative up to the age of 7 - and even with the employment of cranial osteopaths, Special Needs teachers etc. they still have huge problems. I doubt if Dr House even gives the poor barely reading kids, a thought.

sorry, two errors -
penultimate para should read 'pretty much a phonics-free zone'

and it's T.H. White, not TW White.

You are misinformed about Kindergarten -- in public schools, where the vast majority of children attend school, for free, the first year of formal schooling is Kindergarten and 5 is the youngest you can attend. Kindergarten is often just a half day experience for children too but this varies by school district, sometimes by school.

This is from Wikipedia but it is true:
'Compulsory schooling laws were adopted before the widespread provision of kindergarten or preschool. In some states, it is not required for children to attend kindergarten. Mandatory age of enrollment varies by state between 5 and 8. Generally in all states, a child may begin kindergarten in the fall term only if age 5 by a state-set date, usually in the summer or fall.'

State by state compulsory attendance laws Seven states require attendance from 5 onwards -- Arkansas, Delaware, Washington DC, South Carolina, New Mexico, Maryland and Virginia. Washington and Pennsylvania mandate attendance from age 8. The rest fall between 6 and 7. (Colorado is a mystery.)

Parents can and do send their children to a vast variety of daycare/nurseries, daycare/preschools, daycare/montessori preschools, etc., and private schools often run 'preK' classes for 3 and 4 year olds (often as a means of hooking the families into the school, and they often provide after school care facilities for children who need it too, again both to cater to the genuine needs of school families but also to increase the school's attractiveness to potential families as private schools receive no state or federal funding in the US) The preK classes only run for a few hours each day (or a few days a week) and after that the school daycare runs activities if the children are to remain in the building for the day, or parents or caregivers pick the children up if they are cared for at home.

In private schools, Kindergarten is the first year of formal education too, and 5 is the usual minimum age when a child will be admitted. A child generally has to have reached the age of 5 by the end of August or the first week of September to be admitted.

Public schools do not run 'preschool' classes. If they do, they are not free and not mandated (but I am pretty certain they do not).

Mathanxiety: A day-care pre-Kindergarten manager, writing on a US reading forum last year reported that she teaches all her little ones to read(using an extremely child friendly, carefully structured scheme). She reported that the kids are the best readers in their Kindergarten/Grade 1 class - and, please note, these are children from blue-collar backgrounds. I think that she said that she does about 5 minutes a day with each child (I'd have to check back on this).

It is chilling that you believe that the equivalent children here are effectively no-hopers. They can be if you leave them until they are 7. And unless you teach struggling readers, you have no right to dismiss the fact that by the age of 7, many will have picked up reading habits which are difficult to correct. I doubt if you have ever taught a struggling 7 year old how to read.

In Finnish, 'e' stands for sound /e/ - a direct, transparent mapping. In English /e/ can be represented by 'ee' 'e' 'ey' 'y' 'ea' etc. Of course it takes longer to pick up, more skill and more understanding of the Alphabetic Code.

Having read various research, including that of Diane McGuinness mentioned above, I came to a conclusion different from that of Mathanxiety. In addtion I do have teaching experience, of beginners and strugglers...In fact, I wonder if mathanxiety has ever taught any child to read except her own children, or any child who does not learn easily.
In my teaching experience of beginners, roughly speaking, a third of the class learns without any great effort, and needs few examples from which to generalise, a third needs very explicit instruction, and a third could go either way - maybe they will learn to decode and maybe they won't. So in my book that means that two thirds of the class need good Synthetic Phonics instruction, so they are helped to generalise from specific examples. The practice required by individuals to become automatic decoders will also vary.
And it doesn't matter greatly whether beginners start in Reception, or Y1, roughly speaking a large group separates out as I have described.

As long as a young beginner can speak and understand sentences spoken in English you can begin instruction. It is an unusual YR who cannot speak in sentences. Extensive vocabulary is not a pre-requisite to learn to decode, although good language and vocabulary is advantageous and is the reason why there is a high priority on oral language in pre-school education.

I'm afraid it is you who is misinformed just one example
Kindergarten in Wisconsin Schools
The education of 4-year-old children in our public schools has gone through many changes. Wisconsin is a leading state in the provision of universally available 4-year-old kindergarten programs as more and more districts begin these programs.

as in England children do not have to attend until they are five

www.usatoday.com/news/education/2010-08-08-preschool-preK_N.htm

On a recent morning at Walden Early Childhood Center in Atlanta, a pre-K class worked on shape and color identification by making flowers out of glue and construction paper. Afterward, the 4-year-olds broke into stations where they put on puppet shows, read books by themselves and played at a basin filled with water and toys.
sounds just like any good foundation stage class ...oh dear DI!

mrz - pre-school provision is a lot less developed, and much patchier, in the US than in the UK (and the rest of Europe). And children are much more easily "out of year" than in Europe, making comparisons on what is being taught to each age group very difficult.

mrz - no need to be so patronising am not one of your pupils! All that you list is great stuff for the children but is not what they are only doing all day and I am sure you are aware of that. If you are such an advocate of free play in the early years, why did you say on another post that being at ORT stage 2 is not ok in reception? Surely reception is NOT all about reading but of course teachers have their targets and want to be seen to be doing a good job.

Mrz, to continue the quote from where you left off:
'Yet there are still strong opinions on both sides: some favor universal 4 year old kindergarten, others think no 4 year old should be in the traditional public school system, and others think schools can lead quality services for 4 year olds through partnerships with community early childhood programs. Any school district considering operating 4-year-old programs should be fully aware of these issues before moving ahead with the program.' The advisability of teaching 4 year olds anything and the debate in the US doesn't even touch on phonics specifically is ongoing in the US, and it is not accepted as a given that 4 year olds should be in any sort of formal educational setting.

The reference to a long history of teaching 4 year olds that you quoted is a reference to the establishment of America's first Kindergarten, in Watertown, Wisconsin, back in the 18somethings and the vogue for Kindergarten that existed until the early 1900s. From the early 20th century to the present century, Kindergarten attendance was not even mandated.

It remains the case that children do not have to attend any kind of school in Wisconsin until they are 5; the change to 5 from earlier policy will happen only during the 2011-2012 school year. Up to now, school attendance was mandatory only from 1st Grade on (age 6 on) in Wisconsin. The new law makes attendance in 5 yo Kindergarten mandatory (as well as attainment of age 6) for admission to 1st Grade. Parents can opt their children out.

Any 'Kindergarten' classes in operation for 4 year olds in Wisconsin are envisaged to be primarily community based and run in conjunction with school districts. Funding details are outlined here. Wisconsin is apparently broke. 'Based on the reductions in the 2009 state budget process, and the number of districts applying for funding, it is anticipated that no funds will be available for Cycle 3-Year 1.'

Though states in the US may legislate whatever they wish for the individual state education 'system', it is up to individual districts to form their own policies in line with the legislation wrt attendance, exemptions, age requirements, length of school day or days a class meets per week. Preschool programmes vary enormously.

This was published in 2000, but at that point no states required attendance in preschool. Some states (36 in all) required districts to provide Kindergarten and some states (12 in all) required attendance in Kindergarten in 2000. 24 states therefore didn't even require attendance in Kindergarten even though Kdg was offered. With Wisconsin's recent legislation there are at least 13 mandating attendance now, for 5 year olds. Three states in 2000 offered universal preschooling and at least one state (Connecticut) had individual districts that offered preschool (again, Wisconsin adds one more) but it wasn't mandatory. A discussion paper from the Minnesota House of Representatives Legislative Research office on preschool provision including how it operates in various states.

And to reiterate, Kindergarten, the year before 1st Grade, is for 5 year olds. Until education is mandatory for a certain group, accurate statistics on educational attainment or even attendance are not collected by the individual states, and the content of preschool programmes is not scrutinised by the states. (So Project Follow Through data can only be applied to 5 year olds and only to disadvantaged 5 year olds at that -- which is the context of the discussion of what children go to Kindergarten).

Again, Malaleuca, what is the research showing that universal attempts to teach all 4 year olds phonics/ reading is advisable? Why Reception? (The importance of a wide vocabulary reveals itself later in the educational process when children can perhaps decode, but cannot comprehend what they are decoding owing to vocabulary and other deficits.) Children who come from disadvantaged families have been shown to have approximately half the vocabulary (see the studies cited here) of advantaged children at various ages; additionally there is no way phonological awareness and phonemic awareness cannot be impacted by the relative lack of exposure to words among the different groups. I would personally go so far as to say that 'disadvantaged' really means nothing except in terms of language exposure. Yes, children can be taught to read using phonics of any kind at age 4, but is it optimal, and is it ultimately a waste of time, putting the cart before the horse?

mathanxiety you seem to have the ability to read things that I haven't written. Where did I mention a long history? The point is some states have an admission age of 4 years

A study by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign shows that children who are older when entering kindergarten do score higher on achievement tests not only in kindergarten, but also through the eighth grade. Interestingly, their study shows that children with a delayed kindergarten entrance age are not more physically mature nor do they have a higher learning capacity than the other children in their grade, but that the students who entered school later may achieve better because of other outstanding factors, including parental income level. In their study, it turns out that students with a higher kindergarten entrance age but lower household income level do not perform as well.

A report by Kristie Kauerz of the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) furthers the point that increasing the kindergarten entrance age hurts the development of children who do not have access to pre-kindergarten learning programs (most likely lower income children) and spend the extra non-kindergarten year without any development activities.

magdalene no you are not one of my pupils and I can promise you I would never patronise them.
If you are such an advocate of free play in the early years, why did you say on another post that being at ORT stage 2 is not ok in reception?
Of course reception isn't all about reading but if my children can achieve much higher reading standards through learning by play (and they consider what we do to be play and fun ) rather than by formal drill surely it is a good thing.

Mathanxiety:

Perhaps you could spend a little time with a 7 year- old non-reader (and only last week a reading volunteer here in Ox.commented that her latest referral is a 7 year old boy who doesn't know how to decode c-a-t ergo, can't read).

A 7 year-old who can't decode will usually (yes, usually):
look at you for the answer to even the most basic word reading
try to use letter names
guess wildly
use picture clues
use whatever diversionary tactics he/she can muster

faulty - yes. A silly observation, no.

What's more he/she is likely to suffer from very low self-esteem, later from bullying, boredom ...

In the child-centered dominated Inner London Education Authority of the 1970s and 1980s there were many attractive aspects and schools tended to have a wonderful stock of childrens' books. Reading skills plummeted. For the thousands of children concerned, the effects were catastrophic.

Have I missed something (I haven't read the whole thread)? Are there countries with an opaque language like English, where children exclusively have child-directed activites until the age of 7?

Dolfrog

Thank you for your explanation of ADP.

However, you haven't answered my query about children obtaining at least a level 4 at the age of 11. Surely ADP might prevent some/all of them doing so?

Oh come on mrz - you can't backtrack! You seemed to think it was a low point to have children on ORT stage 2 in the second term of RECEPTION! If reception is so play based, then why the need to introduce ORT in the first place? I hardly think guided reading and reading of Biff and Kipper and writing etc warrants as play based activities.
Allchildrenreading - reading skills are hardly sky high are they? 1 out of 5 children comes out of primary school not being able to read and dear god look at the teenagers at the end of their GCSEs. Only 50% of them achieve 5 GCSES (including maths and English). Also children in other English speaking countries do start learning to read and write later (6 or 7) - SHOCK HORROR! And they do cope - really! Don't be worried!!!

I'm not backtracking in the slightest I consider ORT stage 2 to be low at this point in the year in reception because in a class of 30 children many from disadvantage backgrounds and using a child centred (learning through play) approach we can achieve much higher levels ...and for your information we don't have Biff & Chip or guided reading and writing in reception.

In fact we don't have Biff & Chip or guided reading and writing in any year group from Reception to Y6.

Then how do you teach reading in reception without guided reading and writing and Biff and Kipper? You can't say that there aren't scheduled times where the children HAVE to sit and complete some writing or reading or numeracy task (one of those pointless activities where the children write numbers in words). I am not attacking you or teachers, I am against the prescriptive syllabus for children as young as 4. It is crazy. Of course you are loyal to your profession. You may achieve higher levels in reception at your school, but is this sustained? Not meaning to sound rude, just an honest question. You can't honestly believe that teaching reading to 4 and 5 year olds is really the be all and end all.

magdalene, I think you're assuming EY teaching is 'all or nothing' - you imply that children have no teacher-led activities at all.

Early years is play orientated, but many of the activites will be carefully designed to achieve curriculum aims by exploration, AND will also include small teacher-led instructional groups.

mrz has not said that reception classes are ONLY play-based. EY planning is extrememly complicated!

I think quite a few of you need to visit an infant school!

allchildrenreading
Those who have APD and like any other disability will have been developing their own coping strategies to work around their cognitive deficit since birth, or if they acquired APD as a result of Otitis Media with Effusion (Glue Ear) when their auditory procesing problems began.

There are two factors regarding living with APD, first is the severity of the APD, and second is the cognitive ability to develop coping strategies to work around the auditory deficit.

All of my family have varying severities of APD, and all have different cognitive abilities and methods of coping with their deficit. All very complex, and difficult to explain on a forum.

Those who have APD, and also have a high IQ are very good at developing coping strategies to work around their information processing deficit, that they are for much of the time able to conceal the true nature of their disability. Most tend to develop their visual learning skills including lipreading, and reading body language to best guess to fill in the extra information processing gaps.
the best coping strategy is to anticipate all that may happen tomorrow in the hope that your coping strategies are there when you need them.
All coping strategies have to be run in the working memory, and all humans prioritise how we use our working memories subconsciously. So if we anticipate what will happen tomorrow then we may have our coping strategies available when we need them, which is a good day.

So there is no definitive answer to your question it really depends on the individual, and the quality of the support to develop the type of coping strategies which each individual may require.

We are all different, but some are more different than others.

Then how do you teach reading in reception without guided reading and writing and Biff and Kipper?
No wonder you are worried if you think that is how children learn in reception
Simple answer is quite easily ... we learn the sounds that letters represent, then we put them together to make words and we break up words to spell words... we have rampaging dragons leaving footprints throughout the unit and we use our imagination. We discover a lost toy in a tree and wonder how it got there, we go on voyages and are captured by pirates or take a rocket into space. We find a giant key and speculate on the owner and a thousand other experience but we do not do guided reading or guided writing or open a single Biff and Chip book!
You can't say that there aren't scheduled times where the children HAVE to sit and complete some writing No I can't usually for 5 or 10 minutes a day children write supported by an adult mostly by choice but for the few who don't choose are encouraged to do so...
or reading No...or numeracy task (one of those pointless activities where the children write numbers in words)^. Sorry we don't...I can honestly say in 15+ years of teaching reception I have never asked a child to write numbers in words...why would I?