DD2 is really struggling with learning to read, is there anything I can do to help?

[ThreeDaughtersLoveSandwiches]

DD2 is in YR and very much still on the pink level. I try and get her to read at least four days a week and we go through the high frequency words in her reading diary but she is just not getting it!

Tonight she managed to read about 4 pages and whinged and whined the whole time saying she didn't like it (though I think that was more to do with the fact her friend was playing outside and I made her come in). I read stories to her every night before bed which she loves but is not really concentrating when reading herself.

She knows some words now by sight but still has to sound out quite a lot of them, even if she has literally read the word 2 seconds before.

She is not 5 until the end of August so is she just not really ready for it to click or is there something else that I can do?

TIA

Oh she's tiny, give the poor love a bit of time. Keep doing as you are, but try not to angst about it, 4 is so little to learn something as mind boggling as reading. I bet she'll suddenly be amazing in the aautumn.

She's not ready. One day she will be. Don't make her hate reading. My DD2 struggled so much that she would panic and cry if presented with a book, then at the beginning of year 2 it all clicked and she went up five reading bands between September and November and was free reading by February.

Thank you AgnesBligg I think reading some of the threads on here have made me a little bit worried

Her teacher has not mentioned anything and the notes in her reading diary mainly say things like "lovely blending" but there is no way she will be up to the red level by the end of the year!

Omg, she is SO wee! Plenty of time to learn! My dc thankfully avoided the appallingly early UK start at 4 as we're overseas so only formally learnt to read at 6, but already 2 years on is devouring Harry Potter, don't worry!

I would not worry about it, she is still young.

I would go to the library though and see what phonics books they have (my local library has loads).

Phonics corner books are good (Run Rat Run was the first book DD read) think "Rat ran, pig ran, cat ran" etc but they are a lot less boring than school type books.

Usborne books do a set that you read together ie the adult reads the tougher page and the child reads the speech bubble on the next page which are very good.

But if she really hates doing it I would not push too hard at this stage.

Ds3 (5) is a v bright cookie who knows all his phonic sounds/blends etc. Can I get him to read? Nope.

I suppose since he's my 4th dc I know he'll get there in the end.

For me the key is to make books fun. So he 'reads' his older DCs' Beanos, we talk about street signs/food packaging - anything with letters on. We look at picture books but I also read to him from more difficult texts - we're doing 'How to Train Your Dragon" atm and he points out words, we talk about what things mean, we talk about the pictures and the plot.

She'll get there at her own pace, keep it fun is the main thing.

She is almost certainly just not ready. I say that as both a teacher and the mother of a sept daughter who could read fluently on entry to school and a spring daughter who didn't grasp it until half way through Y1.

Just don't make a big thing of it all. Gently practise her phonic sounds in a playing a game type of thing. Maybe put then on post it's around the house and whenever you come across a sound, say it together then verbally give her an example where it's used in a word. It will come. Don worry!

You could make it into a game. My youngest has just started parrotting the words loo, moo and boo when she sees them written.

Thank you.

She was very young when she started school, 4 years and 10 days.

She does enjoy going to the library so I will take her along and encourage she to pick some books she would like to read.

The school seem to use multiple reading schemes as the books she brings home change all of the time, one book had "hippopotamus" in it. I'm not sure if they are all phonics books as some she finds easier than others.

I didn't really think much of it until I read a thread on here about a child of the green or blue level and it got me worrying that I wasn't doing enough

There are some great computer/iPad/iPhone etc programmes out there - reading eggs is very good and is quite like a game. My dd (just turned 3) chooses to play it on my phone quite a lot and has picked up a few letter names and sounds from a few minutes here and there unsupervised playing.

I would say though I think I love of books is more important than reading at this stage.

You can also check out the Oxford owl website for free ebooks.

I would be concerned if my DC was expected to read words like hippopotamus at pink level (ie not phonetic - well it is, but not pink level iyswim).

My DS (now yr3) started school at exactly the same age (4yrs 10 days - 31st Aug birthday) and struggled with reading in reception but made amazing progress in the summer between reception/yr1 when things clicked and he is now a strong reader.

She knows the single phonics, though gets b and d mixed up nearly all of the time but she really struggles to remember the longer ones for example "ai" and ""ea" so sounds them out individually and then the word doesn't make any sense.

Is there anywhere I can get a list of all of the phonics she should have learnt by now? Would putting them onto cards and making a game with them help? I was thinking along the lines of a memory game where she turns cards over to find the correct one.

Right, ok! After reading your last post I am going to suggest you get a bunch of jolly phonics stuff. There is a website called jolly learning, I think. You can get the stuff from amazon too.
The workbooks are very good for doing at home as is the DVD. Don't worry about spending money on the flash cards. If you want you can always write the sounds on some paper.

Many children struggle to read if their school is not following a synthetic phonics approach with the idea of 42 sounds rather than 26. Jolly phonics does this and is, IMO, the easiest to use at home. Oh and the wall frieze is also good if you have somewhere to put it. It doesn't start at A then B. it starts at SATP. Children pick it up very well.

Forgot to say I have a placement in a reception class (not my DC school) and 20/30 are on pink or red level.

They use read, write inc. and don't seem to push the reading in reception but want to get the basic skills in place ready for yr1.

People talking about their children reading all kinds of super-inflated levels can make a mum feel bad. That has often been discussed on mumsnet.

I personally think that if a mum understand her child and how she's learning and how she's progressing and what she's doing that means a thousand times more than some school colour.

If one of my daughters was having problems I would strip the whole reading thing back down to abc, followed by silly words like wee, pee, moo, coo

then cat sat on the mat
and up to the fat cat sat on the big mat
and onwards and upwards.

she is very young.

The most important thing you can d is keep books fun, make sure you have lovely reading together times with no pressure, as well are quietly plodding on with the phonics etc. But i she is tired and can't do it, then don't.

I would go back to basics with her ie very simple books to build her confidence and gradually introduce each sound one at a time tbh (ie ch, th, sh, ou/ow etc...)

You can put jolly phonics into u tube or get your DD to watch alphablocks (cbeebies).

Hippopotamus is actually easily read by a young child who has followed a SP approach to reading. Though I agree, you don't often see longer phonetic words at pink level.
There are two issues here. Firstly, the OPs child is a summer born reception child. Many of these children aren't mature enough to tackle learning to read until the end of YR or beginning of Y1. Secondly, the child doesn't seem to be following a phonic based curriculum which is fine for bright able readers but for younger or less able children not following an SP approach is doing them a disservice.

simpson her teacher wrote in her reading diary to just get DD2 to read the smaller words but the longer ones seemed to put her off and she was reading worse than normal. DD2s birthday is 26th August.

Thank you for the iphone and Oxford owl website I will take a look. She has got a numeracy game on my phone that she enjoys so think she would love that.

To put this into perspective for you... my little boy will be 7 in December. He cannot read a word..well, he can read his name and 'mum' and that's about it. He struggles with the pink book.

I'm about to have him privately assessed for dyslexia as this is what i strongly believe. So... fret not. She is a baby!

DD is a very strong reader and at the age of your DD she was at the same stage. Only difference is she is the oldest in the year so was at this stage at the beginning of reception not the end. So she looked like she was doing brilliantly when in fact she was doing exactly what your DD is doing age for age.

I'm v conscious of this as DS will be like your DD going into reception at 4y plus 10 days and I'll be comparing him with 5yos. Your DD is v v v young - she's really doing fine and just be careful not to make her fearful or resistant.

Don't worry, DS wasn't reading too well in reception either (not many of the kids were!). We just made it fun, let him chose books, look at pictures, read to him every night.

It all seemed to click in year one though and he's rocketed through the reading levels but most importantly he enjoys reading.

hmm, meh peh. The whole word or whole language/look and say approach can get children off to a flying start. Using that approach they can read books early on far too difficult for phonics children of the same age in many cases, (hence the agony about non decodable books being given to phonics children.) But there is a danger that at some point these highly able whole language children are going to come to a painful reading limit. Most don't, thankfully. But a significant minority of them do.

Well I totally disagree with your DDs teacher, sorry. The last thing you want is to dent her confidence and reading books which are currently too difficult only has that effect. She needs it all to be stripped back to sounds. Then she can concentrate on blending those sounds together and only then should she be attempting to use that knowledge to read a book. It's no wonder she doesn't want to do it. She's finding it incredibly difficult and it's all moving too fast for her, poor little thing.

Btw, just so you're aware, this is absolutely no indicator of how bright she is or how well she will be reading at 11. With 20yrs of tracking experience in primary schools I can tell you that how far behind summer born children are in reception rarely indicates where they will be by Y6.

She has had some books that are definitely phonics based, Julia Donaldson for example, but she has also had some that are quite old as well as chip and biff.

The school had a session when DD2 first started school where they explained to the parents all about phonics and they were learning a different sound with actions up until a couple of months ago.

DD2 is still quite young for her age as well so I think I will get some of the Jolly Phonics stuff and have a bit of a play with her as well as continue reading her bedtime stories.

Thank you for the advice it has been very helpful.