Your wisdom needed again...reading

[Stereolab]

Sorry to post so soon having only recently received lots of helpful advice... but I am really stuck. In summary, my son is almost six and has been at school a year. Reading hasn't really clicked for him but he is making progress. We have Songbirds books at home and over the holidays (last two weeks here in New Zealand), we have been doing a little reading each day (10 minutes). He is coping with the pink level although he still needs to sound out many CVC words.

At school they use Letterland and PM readers. He is on blue level. I am pretty sure (and he has told me) that he memorises the books by listening to the other children. As unseen texts he can't read them fluently at all.

I asked to speak to his teacher about his reading level before the holiday but she didn't get back to me. After school today she sought me out and told me that DS is fine and is on target with his blue books. I said that wasn't my impression and that he was getting quite upset at home. She said I shouldn't worry and that he was on target. I said that I had been helping him over the holidays and that he was doing well with his phonics. She told me that I should stop doing phonics with him as it would confuse him and that I should just let him use the letter sounds A for apple etc.. I should stick with his school reader and give him lots of praise. There was no time to discuss further as she was rushing off. (We give him loads of praise for his efforts BTW.)

I feel really upset both for being put on the spot in front of other parents and made to feel like a pushy 'nothing is good enough for my boy' parent and for my son who has been really struggling and upset by reading at home. There doesn't seem to be any room for him to be not at the expected level and my cynical side suspects that this is convenient for school stats and resources.

What would you? I feel ridiculous sitting here in tears over this (not in front of my son he has gone to play at a friends). His teacher is not the most approachable and I'm pretty sure that the team at the school all use a similar method for teaching reading and therefore I am bound to be in the wrong if I suggest it's not working for my DS. Do I need to teach him covertly!?

so your school doesn't do phonics at all? Where is the school?

I'm afraid the PM books are meant to be memorised and Letterland is very dated now and not as effective as the phonic programmes used in the UK now.

It very much sounds as if the school is using mixed methods - lots of different strategies with phonics playing a very small last resort role.

Dame Marie Clay is an instituition in NZ and teachers have been raised on her ideas www.massey.ac.nz/massey/about-massey/news/article.cfm?mnarticle_uuid=F287725F-9E6F-011D-BE0E-F34366B8376A

Unfortunately it seems as if you will need to do it yourself given the teacher's response.

Not sure if you have an ipad but I highly recommend sounds-write.co.uk/apps.aspx the first units are free and it's £1.99 for the whole initial code.

We are in Wellington, NZ. Don't want to name the school! I am not sure what the school's approach is to be honest. They use Letterland and a variety of books including PM readers. There seems to be some phonics instruction....isn't Letterland phonics based? However some of the books that come home have defeated my DS as he is not able to decode them yet.

He seems to be responding well to practising sounding out words with the Songbirds books at home. Over the holiday period his confidence appears to have grown and he has been asking about letter sounds/spelling etc. Today when he got back from his friend's house he said that the teacher had listened to him read his (blue) PM reader and had made him read one of the words five times until he got it right (his account). He has to sound out most words still (even in the pink level Songbirds books) so it is quite slow going for him. He told me the school books are too hard and that he feels really angry inside when he reads them but the teacher will not listen to him. We have a parents' evening next week and we will raise this with the teacher. I am not feeling too hopeful though. The teacher seems to think that my attempts to help him will do more harm than good.

Thanks mrz. Seems like I might have to go it alone as I could be up against a cultural icon by the sounds of things! I get the feeling any ideas I might have for helping my DS will not be well received by his teacher. The difficulty will be in keeping his spirits up as he will be expected to adopt the school's approach to reading during the hours he is there. He is also pretty tired by the time he gets home, which means his energy for extra reading at home is pretty limited and I don't want to push him.

My fear is that if he has any underlying issue that is affecting his reading progress it could go unrecognised by the school for quite some time. He wears glasses for reading and I have booked an appointment to get his eyes re-tested this week.

From your description he is being taught to memorise words so the teacher will see your attempts to teach him differently as "harmful".

Letterland is phonics based but we have moved on since it was produced and there are much more effective programmes available.

I love the Songbirds books and use them in school but for children starting out I would use them alongside a much more systematic scheme. www.phonicsinternational.com/web_free_res_sign.html

I taught my children to read using Jelly and Bean phonics reading system. It's excellent and I recommended it to someone yesterday, google their website and take a look.

A friend suggested the pocket phonics app for iphones and ipads to us (sadly no android). It takes the form of a game and builds up phonic knowledge and blending slowly through levels. It was free and might be worth looking into as a fun way of learning. My kids seem to enjoy using it. Sorry to hear your son is getting upset.

DS is being taught a phonics way, I think he will pass his yr1 phonics test okay, but he hasn't clicked at all & will struggle repeatedly with same short words in a story.
DS is just about same age & at school last 20 months & not reading any better than OP's DS. Sometimes they just need time.

Hi again, Stereolab! We 'met' the other week, and I DID have a listen to the band, but not yet done it justice.

'mrz' is an undisputed expert in these matters, but despite that, when I was first a Teaching Assistant in a UK infant school over twenty years ago, WE were using Letterland: the children divided a page in their work books into quarters, and wrote four words starting with the letter being learned, and illustrated it with a small picture.

They were also taught pairs of letters that went together, such as 'tr' and I well remember getting my small group of Yr1 children to learn 'train' 'truck' 'track' 'trick' etc etc.

By today's 'modern' methods of Phonics, Letterland probably took longer for the children to become proficient readers, and they probably wouldn't have the understanding to support good, accurate spelling. But, the vast majority DID learn to read, and I don't think any serious damage was done to their education.

You obviously aren't going to get the school to change their methods, but provided you support your child in a sympathetic way, it should be possible to merge school methods, with UK phonics methods, and I don't see why one system should be adopted to the exclusion of the other. The important thing is that DS learns to read, enjoys reading, and before long, learns to write and spell.

If I didn't mention it before, in MN Book Reviews, "Children's educational books and courses" section, the Oxford Phonics Spelling Dictionary is featured, and I think you would both find it interesting and useful.

Feel free to come back if we can help any more, and I am sorry that you are being presented with this dilemma.

Thanks very much for your comments.

You've all helped to lift my spirits.

I thought Letterland would be classed as a phonics system and was baffled by the teacher asking me not to confuse him by using phonics at home. It is not as if I am doing anything outrageous or complex with him. Very odd.

We will carry on doing a little extra with our own books at home and see how he goes. Thanks for the recommendations Minimalist and tricot. I will check them out.

Thanks Holiday It is always helpful to hear of another child progressing at a similar rate. It is not that my DS is not meeting the expected target that bothers me as such, it is more that he is being expected to read at a level that seems to be out of his grasp at the moment. This is undermining his already shaky confidence.

Ferguson and mrz really appreciate you both taking the time to share your knowledge and experience (again). Very impressed that you gave Stereolab a listen Ferguson. An acquired taste perhaps but one worth acquiring in my opinion!

Stereolab
It sounds like you are doing a fab job with your son. I suggest you carry on with the phonics and do a little and often, but keep it secret from your child's school

This website has lots of lovely free ebooks for practicing

www.oxfordowl.co.uk/

Not all of them are decodable, however your son will become less reliant on decodable books as he gets more skilled. The Ruth miskin books are good as well.