I lost it trying to help dd to read - feel awful

[scattercushion]

Feel so bad - dd is in reception, one of the youngest in her class, and is struggling with reading. Thing is, I'm also struggling with helping her! I get so impatient because day after day we are back at square one, she does not seem to recognise letters, let alone words, and every one is sounded out. Turn over the page - the same sentence is repeated and we have to start from scratch. No recognition that we have just read it.

I know that one day it will just click but I can't bear it, it's like pulling teeth. I feel like tearing my hair out and this morning I actually threw the book across the room and stomped upstairs I was so fed up. She started crying. I apologised profusely and she seemed ok but I feel so guilty. I am a monster. I'm scared I'm going to make her phobic or have low self-esteem. Oh I feel awful.

She is simply too young to learn to read. This is why so many other countries wait until children are six or even seven before teaching them to read, and then they pick it up very quickly because they are ready.

Drawing and crafts are encouraged at earlier ages to help brain and co ordination in preparation for reading.

I wouldn't push her into reading; in fact I would leave her totally until september.

I agree with Belgo - she's just too young at the moment. DD1 was exactly the same, she was the youngest in her class and was just hopeless with sounding out anything. I still remember losing it with her over the twentieth sounding out of "ball" even though she's now 19 and at university. She learnt to read easily once she was in year 1.

Indigo is absolutely right. She should be getting little stories with the 's a t p i n' words exclusively.
i. beginner readers should not be asked to blend ' f l ' - much too hard
ii. pp - they haven't even had enough practice with a single 'p'...
iii. 'y' - this is sinful! why should a 4 year old understand that 'y' at the end of a word represents the sound /ee/in some words, sound /ie/ in others.
iv. she should be concentrating on blending single syllable 3 sound words - this is a 5 sound word /f/ /l/ /o/ /pp/ /y/ and has two syllables

Jolly Phonics have recently produced really attractive Activity Books for little children - I think they cost £3.95. One of these might be a treat for your daughter - but don't touch the school books yet.

Lots and lots of teachers don't have a grasp of how to teach young children to read. They are often given little or no training in College. It's not the teacher's fault - it's horrible to be 'undertrained' or 'mistrained' but your daughter shouldn't suffer.

Good luck!

You know 6 is the average age for actually being able to read? (whatever happens on MN!)
So don't worry about her not getting it.
Just read the book to her.
We got on MUCH better with reading practice when another parent who is a teacher told me that it is best to read the book and then each page to them first, then get them to read it if they can, but as soon as they can't do a word, say it for them.
Otherwise it is tortuous and they get miserable - as do you!

DS didn't really read until the beginning of Yr 2, and by the end of Yr 2 he got a 3 for reading in his SATS.

7 in our house

I'd forget about trying to get her to read and concentrate on reading to her and making it fun. Just read normal books rather than the reading scheme ones. If she loves books then the desire to read them herself will kick in when she's got more confidence in what she knows. Reading normal books together you can still pick out the very simple words for her to sound out if you are both in the mood. When my DD was learning to read they didn't use a reading scheme at all. In some ways it did make it harder but on the other hand it really did help encourage her love of books. I remember that frustrating phase very well and DD (also a summer baby) did seem slow to start but once it clicked she progressed so rapidly the teachers barely knew what to do with her. I only say that to encourage you that a slow start doesn't necessarily mean it's something she'll struggle with always.

Scatter, teaching is hard, doubly so when you have an emotional investment as a parent. There isn't a parent alive who hasn't lost patience. My parents did with me. I lived to tell the tale.

I would recommend the online reading programme Headsprout. I am involved in evaluatiing its use as part of a major research initiative. (I don't work for the company though!)

It is based on watertight research, is really good fun and will do 95% of the hard work for you. Costs about £90 for approx. 20 hours of impeccable instuction that the child completes in 80 episodes, each lasting about 20 minutes.

Idea is to do 3-5 episodes a week.

I have also used it as a parent. My kids loved it and it made a huge differnece ot them.

I am truly shocked.
I wrote an almost identical post though no book throwing but lots of frustration.
The shock is how you said what I wanted to say but gave up trying to express yesterday.

Now I am going to read peoples helpful advice

I love you all

Bigbuttons your thing about symbols really struck a chord. I will try and remember that. Oh shit I'm in tears. I've been really stressed about dd she struggles with other stuff too and I hate to say it seems a bit dim. I know she's not really but not only is she an august baby she was born 3 months early too. I have to keep reminding myself how far she has come and not compare her to her above average brothers.

So everytime she can't remember from page to page I will try and say to myself you go and learn Persian then Bronze

Scatter I would love to hear how things go.

I think we've all been through this to some degree so don't feel bad. I know that I had this with my older two and it seems to me that kids just have a "switch" for reading where all of a sudden they just get it and it starts making sense. I found that when I started to get frustrated it was a good idea to just back off for a while and just enjoy story time together instead of formal reading instruction. Once they know a word or two (the, at, and, is) you can point to those words in the stories you are reading and let them read those to build confidence. I'm in Canada so not sure if you have them there but there is a series of Leapfrog videos that are fantastic for teaching letter sounds and building words out of sounds. I think they are called "letter factory" and "word factory". I also love the old ladybird readers featuring Peter and Jane and their dog, Pat--VERY repetitive but I find them to be fantastically confidence building via word recognition. I always get a giggle from them because they are a bit sexist etc. but my kids always want to read those over the more modern readers.

The Starfall website is also fun for them to explore with or without you.

I can remember exactly this stage with my oldest child and now, at 9, we often have to tell her to stop reading to go to bed so don't despair!

Bronze, persian sounds cool glad to be of help

bronze my MIL, a very experienced teacher, always said she felt very sorry for the children who ended up in a school year through being born early and felt it was quite unfair for them. So I'd say your dd is not alone in her struggles there. It's a huge ask to effectively put her a year ahead right from the start so it's really not surprising if she's finding it hard. It must be very difficult for you to watch as a parent.

Would it help someone like my dd?
I honestly don't know what to do.
After reading this thread I thought instead I will focus on the phonic sounds. She has a lovely cd and book with all the songs they use at school.
First sound goes fine then she's stuck so I start say what are they doing in the picture she starts saying the sound then grabs the book shouts at me 'I don't need you' and storms off with it. A minute later she is back says to be in a whiny like aggressive sounding voice 'What does that say?' So I said please ask me nicely. She does then ask me nicely though reluctantly so I tell her (all very calmly) she then reverts to aggressive shouty person again shouts 'I don't want you to do it stupid money and storms off again' After a third such time I take the book away and giver her time out to calm down
We got nowhere and this is what it is often like. when she is calm she just acts (or truly doesnt) as if she doesn't understand anything I am asking of her.
She regularly has me in tears and I don't know what to do.

I understand that some children have a switch. Ds2 definitely did. I had to do lots of sly reading of really excitingly acted out Dr Seuss books to his older brother (who was in on it) to get him interested as he said he hated reading and was rubbish at it. He's not a brilliant reader and chooses to buy the beano and books with his pocket money

Sorry Scatter I seem to have taken over. I have been absorbed into the downy softness of your cushiony thread

bran I had a look at the headsprout thing, had a look at a demo lesson. It's a great shame it is in an American accent. I know dd3 would not understand his pronunciation of "AN" at all and it certainly wouldn't help her to read. I can just imagine her copying the "eannnnn" sound instead of our "an" and I would be well pissed off.. Do they do a version for English English speakers?

I used to find it very frustrating when they just didn't get something like reading. I still find it hard when one of my dc doesn't just get a concept effortlessly.

I used to just walk away, and say let's do more reading another day. Anything rather than show them I was irritated. Or I'd say, how about I read to you for a bit. or we'd read one page each turn by turn.

but anyway, it is early days, she must be only 4. Loads of 4yos are struggling with reading. surely most of them? (apart, as Blu points out, on the surreal world of mumsnet).

2 of mine were not anywhere near getting reading at that age. all 3 are now keen fluent readers who devour a book a night.

'Scatter, teaching is hard, doubly so when you have an emotional investment as a parent. There isn't a parent alive who hasn't lost patience. My parents did with me. I lived to tell the tale'

This is exactly why I leave the teaching up to the school. I listen to dd1 as she practises reading, and I sometimes correct her, but I have never taught her, as I do not consider that my job as a parent. It's just as well that I haven't, as I would probably teach her wrong anyway.

Things like sewing and cycling, which she doesn't do in school, I teach her myself (and sometimes get annoyed with her, and myself!)

Just wanted to add my voice of posters, saying I've been there too (and still am to a certain extent).

Do cut yourselves some slack...I'm beginning to realise its like potty training in that they all get there at their own pace (and its deeply frustrating along the way) but they all get there eventually....

What Belgo has been saying. Your DD is too young. If she was living anywhere else they would be fingerpainting still, with no effort made to teach reading or even letter recognition. And all learning in their own good time up to age 7.

I have no advice (other than to mention that the jolly phonics activity books mentioned earlier are available on amazon, I got the whole set for under £8)

But just wanted to say it's so sad that a little girl is being put under so much pressure. Not OP's fault, not at all. Just the obsession coming down from govt with targets and "earlier = better" when it comes to learning these skills. Really Unfair. :(

Can you see if you can arrange with the teacher to hold back and wait?

I have not read the other posts, but just wanted to add my two cents. My ds went to nursery in England and then we moved to usa. He had a terrible time learning to read (it's done a little, but not much later here in usa). He finally mastered reading around the end of 1st grade (about 6 - 12 months later than his peers). He is now 10 and a voracious reader who gobbles up books for teenagers and adults at a scarily rapid pace (thank god for libraries). He was just not ready to read when the school wanted him to. He was also completely uninterested in the reading materials that were being used to teach him and ended up learning to read with the Goosebumps series (which his teacher was convinced was too hard for him...but it's what HE wanted to try and read, so was much more motivated).

That's great to know Bran!
American accent makes no difference to be honest (I'm a s/lt so know plenty about letter/sound correspondence). My kids did say things like 'vAHN' for a few episodes but it faded out.

Please don't worry OP
My sister was frustrated when her August born son was unable to read in reception. She was frequently on the phone in tears.
He still couldn't read a word when he started Year 1, despite the fact that my sister 'read' with him everyday.
About a month ago, my dnep picked up his older sister's book and began to read it.. He is now reading confidently, my sister cannot believe it.

oh i have done this with dd1-the whole reading thing was driving me crazy. For ages dd1 didn't want to read at home at all, from time to time i would try and make her and we'd both get in a tizz. I really just had to back off totally and leave it alone for quite a while. She is much better now, she can read simple words and is better at remembering words she has seen before and can sound out words but she still drives me a bit nuts when she is stumped by the word 'am'. I am just impatient i guess-i had fond visions of of her being keen to learn and wanting my help...the reality has been somewhat different! But I think she is gettting there, bit by bit.