Sorry, another reading one... how to stop DD from guessing

[Pozzled]

DD1 is in reception. Her reading has really taken off recently - her school don't use bookbands but she's somewhere around green level. The problem is that she is starting to guess unfamiliar words from the context rather than sounding out. Whenever she makes a mistake, I get her to use her phonics, but how can I get her to do this automatically? More phonics practice? Reading words out of context? Harder books so that she has to 'sound out' more often?

(Don't suggest I ask her teacher- the school would be quite happy for her to use mixed methods. I'm not.)

As I said earlier there aren't many pictures in Alice in Wonderland clattypatty

Then you need some phonics training

I don't know if one of you mixed method teachers has taught my DD - but if you are you caused an enormous amount of damage.

It took her to Y5 to stop guessing (like she'd been taught) and start reading.

A lot of her reading difficulties were directly due to being taught mixed methods.

I can't think of anything polite to say to you.

The child who guesses at 'cross' incorrectly has to sound out the word.

I am well aware that having dyslexia does not mean a child is unintelligent and I would never use the word 'stupid' about a child. How demeaning.

Dyslexic children should have more time doing phonics than other children.

I was objecting to posters claiming that no child should ever guess the meaning of a word.

What do other teachers think about the shape of whole words? I know some exceptionally musical teenagers who are dyslexic. How should they be helped to remember phonemes? Genuine question - I feel so very sorry for anyone who is dyslexic and don't understand how the problem of visual memory/matching the sound with the shape does not correlate with other very good spatial skills - eg a dyslexic engineer.

4 year olds do read for meaning and beginner readers, well my DD anyway, are/is using all sorts of things to make sense of the squiggles in front of them. Sorry, that doesn't really add to the discussion. Young children are brilliant at taking EVERYTHING on board.

I have been surprised at how she is very quick to point out or hesitate with her reading if the writer uses a word in a beginner reading book that isn't quite right- often a simple word that can be read is used to replace the "real" word. For example today a dog was asleep in his "bed" whereas the picture (yes she was looking) was of his "basket" which is much harder to read.

It's not a black and white thing is it. The pictures are there to enjoy and enhance but not for reading per se (but see my earlier comment about young children.....they don't discrimate).

You are correct, some children read a sentence and some a paragraph. None of them used picture clues because they don't need them.

"The child who guesses at 'cross' incorrectly has to sound out the word." the child who guesses at cross incorrectly doesn't know they were wrong

Chocoluvva, it is a red herring to presume only dyslexic children struggle with mixed methods. The children that do don't have any particular traits - that's the problem, you cannot predict who will and who won't.

I think the shape of shop is pretty much the shap of chop and the shape of ant is very like the shape of and and the shape of he is the same as the shape of be ... so pretty useless

They know they're guessing and the listener will ask him/her to sound it out (hopefully).

by asking questions ...how do you assess understanding?

Yes, 'shap' 'chop' etc - how does the specific difficulty arise given that the same child might have very good spatial skills and a good aural/musical memory? Is it in co-ordinating eye-movements with decoding?

Whole class for a novel.

It isn't different to answering questions with a picture book if the questions are based on the text and not on the illustrations

it doesn't unless someone has suggested that looking at the shape of the word will help them to read

There is no easy way of identifying which children are dyslexia and NEED extra phonics unless you wait until the age of seven or eight and their self esteem is torn to shreds.

What not give all children lots of phonics from the start? A good knowledge of phonics will not harm the non dyslexic child. Infact knowing phonics improves spelling.

"An able child will be working out from the picture and the start of the word what it is - quicker than sounding out cr/oss. A less able child will need to sound it out. The more able child will remember the word after seeing it once."

I think its pretty mean to describe a child who sounds out words in their head rapidly as less able.

The advice from EMTAS is to expose EAL children to the same language experiences as English speakers

Ours are 40% EAL. We just teach them phonics well!