Reception reading worries, sorry

[didyousee]

My dd is 4 and a half and in reception. She has got her alphabet sounds and can read simple words if they are phonically plausable. She has been put on book band 2 and is bringing home books with words she cannot possibly work out eg. fright, enough etc.. My ds who is in year 2 had the same books and just seemed to memorise the words after being read the story once or twice. He was reading fluently by the end of reception. My dd is better than he was as sounding out words but cannot seem to memorise the books as easily. I am finding it a bit hard trying to stop myself worrying that my dd is going to struggle more with reading after it all seemed to come easily for my ds. How do your dcs manage with words they do not know the sounds for yet? Does it take a while to memorise the books. Please put some perspective on this for me.

Sounds like your dd is bringing home books designed for the 'look,say' approach and she will not be able to decode words like 'fright' and 'enough' yet. Personally I would just read those for her or read them together as the main emphasis should imo be on decoding those words that she should be able to sound out and read - e.g. cvc words like cat, bag, mix.
I bought my dd the songbirds phonics books which she enjoyed. I live overseas, but they may be available from your local library.

Totally agree with Shanghai - read the tricky words for her, and don't worry. Some kids like memorizing, some kids like sounding out: it will all sort itself out.

My dd1 was like your dd, she is great at sounding out but couldn't possibly have read those words at this stage in Reception. She is now in Y3 and one of the best readers in her year: her phonics skills have served her well!

Thanks for the reassurance. I feel terrible for comparing my dc in learning to read and may have blanked out some of the earlier stages with my ds. I have seen how much he has benefited from being a good reader and really want my dd to get there too. Must relax though.

The book this week only had 6 words that could be sounded out, no repetition and was 15 pages long (only 5 words per page), but felt disheartening. She can read the songbird phonic stage 1 books by herself, so should probably buy the next stage.

I would ask her teacher for books with more de-codeable words! Very silly, IMO, to give a 4.5 year old who is just starting out a book with that many tricky words

Its not your dd, didyousee, its the book

My 4.5 year old dd will just refuse to read a book if she doesn't feel she can manage enough words to enjoy the process!

The trouble with the songbirds and phonics books is that the reliance on phonic words means that the story often doesn't read very fluently. I know my year 1 dd finds simple look say words with a mix of phonic based the absolute easiest to read. The Jelly and Bean books are brilliant.

OP in the long run, and please remember that learning to read is a marathon, not a sprint, your DD will do far better by learning to decode words that she encounters rather than trying to memorize them.

Shall i have a word with the teacher? Or should i just get the phonics books to do along side the school books?

Children use different strategies when they learn to read. Some memorise the shape of words (sounds like that was your son's key strategy), some use phonics, some use the pictures etc. There are lots of ways that they arrive at the same destination. As your daughter likes to break the words apart as she understands that sounds make up the words, tricky words will be exactly that, tricky. Just help her with them. If you like you can focus on two letters making a sound until she learns that (e.g. 'ar' makes 'ahhh' sound IYSWIM).

Don't panic, she'll get there and sounds like she's doing really well and the fact you are reading with her will make an enormous amount of difference. (pat on back).

Thanks for all the really helpful advice and encouragement.