My 7yo hates to read and is behind

[starwarsismyreligon]

Help! My 7yo daughter is having a really hard time reading. She has just finished year 3 at school (she just turned 7, very young for year)
I have tried all the ticks, to get her interested. Took her to library to choose own books, bought comics, she is quite tomboyish and loves horrid Henry but really struggles with the early readers, and just wants me to read them to her!
She has no interest and it really stresses me out, it's such a fundamental skill that she seems to be missing.
Any advise much appreciated!

[MagicChanges]

Can you afford some private tuition OP - as Dyslexia above post sounds good and could be in your area. My DGD isn't a great reader (7yrs) and they are paying for help once a week and she's come on by leaps and bounds - the 1 - 1 really works I think. They did the same thing for her older brother with maths as he was really struggling, with really good results. I think when kids are struggling in a class of 30 there isn't much hope of getting individual help. My DGD used to say she was bored with reading but it was because she wasn't good at it, and now she is happy to read and the 1 - 1 just gave her the confidence she needed.

[Dyslexiaadvisorni88]

Starwarsismyreligion I am a teacher with qualifications in Dyslexia and am a an Associate Member of the British Dyslexia Association. It's great that you're getting an appointment with an educational psychologist as I know the waiting list can be very long. The fact that your child knows her phonetic sounds in isolation is a great start and means that her reading should progress with the right support. A systematic, multi- sensory programme would work best for her. I am based in Co.Down, have a lot of experience teaching children with dyslexia, carrying out personalised interventions and most importantly, ensuring that children make progress. Please contact me if you would like to discuss this further. Ashton Phillips

[Dyslexiaadvisorni88]

Starwarsismyreligion I am a teacher with qualifications in Dyslexia and am a an Associate Member of the British Dyslexia Association. It's great that you're getting an appointment with an educational psychologist as I know the waiting list can be very long. The fact that your child knows her phonetic sounds in isolation is a great start and means that her reading should progress with the right support. A systematic, multi- sensory programme would work best for her. I am based in Co.Down, have a lot of experience teaching children with dyslexia, carrying out personalised interventions and most importantly, ensuring that children make progress. Please contact me if you would like to discuss this further. Ashton Phillips .

[kzmic31]

There are two films you could try, eleanors secret (animated) and pagemaster, both have a plot where the main character has to read in order to save friends. Sounds cheesy i know but maybe a family movie night with one of these might encourage them particularly if it seems like their idea.

[Kanga59]

oxfordowl website is great. You can have the volume on or off. She can be read to and then try and read it herself? its free. and has all the common reading schemes on it

[littlelate]

My yr5 dd only until recently she got a little better in terms of reading novels. But before year 5 she would only read books about animals and pets. My dd is much more interested and able in reading information books. She also loves to play Animal Jam online game as it also gives basic information about animals. We like both paper and online books. But the good thing about online books is that you don't need to spend too much time to look up new words in a dictionary. I always try to look for books that are not too long or contain short stories. Also I used to spend a fortune on magazines but she really loved them when she was same sort of age as op's dd.

[Readingrefusnik]

That's very good advice, lacebell. At the moment, I'm trying to read to DS as much as possible. The end game after all is to get him enjoying stories/literature and taking in information, and enjoying it/commenting on it/examining it/using what he's learned - the precise means by which this is done is secondary!

[starwarsismyreligon]

Thanks folks! I have already signed up to reading eggs! She is bored with it!
It assesses their level at start then sets tasks - her are all phonics sounds- she knows these inside out individually, it's just getting it to flow in the reading- it's that transition she seems to be missing. The memory recall makes sense to me.
Should I wait for my education physiologist appointment at Halloween or try to get one sooner?

[lacebell10]

At this stage just get her interested in language and if that means you read to her so be it... try to get her to guess what comes next .... Ask her to help you write a story then ask her to check it for you .... lots of FE students use speech to text .. she could use this on a tablet or computer to write a story ..... work on her vocabulary and use of language ... reading can come later

[mrsmortis]

OP - I don't know if you'd be interested but it's too serendipitous to pass up. I've just had an email from readingeggs for a 4 week free trial instead of the normal 2. PM me if you'd like me to forward it.

[Readingrefusnik]

I paid privately to have the test done - about 500 quid seems to be the going rate in England.

The results only came back just before the end of the school year. A lot of the recommendations which could be put into place immediately, DS's teacher was already doing (she has been very supportive throughout, and is an excellent teacher). Recommendations included sitting him near the front (because working memory problems mean if he's distracted he can lose track of sets of instructions), marking for content rather than picking up every single mistake in spelling/punctuation/grammar (which I'd noticed the teacher was already doing) and continuing to use a coloured overlay (he has slight issues with tracking lines of text both across the page and down to the next line, and the overlay seems to help).

I'll be seeing the SENCo (special educational needs coordinator) at the start of the school year to discuss the report with her and the new class teacher.

The other stuff includes exercises to improve working memory, and encouraging him to learn to touch-type (as this will both speed up his written work and enable him to access various software packages - one thing I discovered from the talk at work is that there are specialist packages out there which do a lot more than the very crude spelling/grammar checks in word processing packages like, say, Word). As he gets older, if the problems persist (we've been recommended to have him re-tested later in childhood/adolescence), he'll be eligible for extra time in exams (I know from a university friend's experience how much of a difference this made to her - she went from just scraping through exams in first year to getting a really good degree, and is now a professor in notoriously hard area of physics in world renowned institution - through getting that extra half hour in exams in our final year!)

[Hairyhat]

"Teach your monster to read" helped my son

[WhattodoSue]

Y2 in England :) explains the difference. Look into dyslexia, and try story tapes on long car journeys. You can get fab ones and they may encourage a love of books, which will help keep books positive even if the process of learning to read is really hard. And tell her she will get there, she just has to work twice as hard as everyone else and it has nothing to do with being stupid, just having a differently organised brain which is really useful for other things.

[starwarsismyreligon]

In Northern Ireland, primary 3 out of 7 primary years- started p1 aged 4, turned 5 June. Will have last year at primary starting aged 10 turning 11 as she leaves. Does that translate to year 2 in England?
She is on Oxford reading tree stage 6, and can just manage but it's such a chore for her.
Really interested in the dyslexia post readingrefusenik
I have her booked in with ed Phys in October. I suspect sounds something similar, her exhaustion and feeling "stupid" and pure reluctance is worrying rather than her ability.
I am happy in other areas of her academics (maths, science)
What was outcome of your diagnosis, did school do extra work? Give you any extra tasks or did you do this on own bat?

[Readingrefusnik]

How is the rest of her school performance? My DS (aged 8) has just finished year 3 (England, so reception+3 further years), and I started a thread about 4 months back about his reluctance to read.

Several people on that thread said "have you considered dyslexia?" and I, naively, thought because he didn't mix up b and d, didn't report text dancing around the page, etc, that there probably wasn't a problem with this.

However, there was a very noticeable difference between reading and the rest of his performance at school - good at maths, science, great at making up stories with a wide vocabulary (albeit very slow at writing them down). Then my chance attendance at a talk about dyslexia in the workplace made me realise dyslexia is far more complex than my stereotypical "layperson's" picture of it.

To cut a long story short, I had DS tested by an ed psych and he is indeed dyslexic - in particular with issues in working memory, which make it very hard for him to decode phonemes. It doesn't mean he can't read - it just means that at the moment he does so very slowly, and more importantly, the mental effort it takes him is immense (so he comes home from school absolutely knackered and really doesn't want to do his reading homework - it's not that he's lazy or reluctant, he just is shattered).

So I guess I'd say think about the bigger picture - is it just reading, or is it schoolwork across the board? And if there are reasons for suspecting dyslexia, would a diagnosis be helpful to you and your DD? Some parents think "labelling" isn't helpful, and in some cases I can see why they take this position. For us, it is helpful, because DS was starting to say things like "I'm stupid" - now he knows he isn't, his brain just works differently. And it gives us helpful strategies to try to work on the bits he finds hard - computer based games to improve working memory, for instance, helping him to work free from distractions, etc. (And it also gives me useful background for when he reaches secondary - the secondary schools in our area aren't very good, and he's just the sort of child who, without this sort of paper trail, would be written off as "typical boy, bit lazy and can't be bothered..." - with the diagnosis I can push the school to support him properly).

[user789653241]

That's true, just turned 7 end of yr3 doesn't sound right. Maybe in the different country or private school?

[WhattodoSue]

How is she in y3 if she has just turned 7? My 7 year old (March birthday) has just finished Y2. If she is advanced a year, why not put her back in her proper year group?

[iseenodust]

Keep up with the reading to her every single day. Listening to stories helps hugely with comprehension and building vocabulary. There are some easy readers which come with a cd so you can listen and follow the text. Giant jam sandwich

Let her see you reading a book for your own pleasure eg relaxing in the garden.

[FretYeNotAllIsShiny]

Absolutely have subtitles on the tv/ youtube, I think it goes in even if the aren't consciously reading it. Is she imaginative? Could you get her to write her own stories? When out and about, encourage her to read signs,menus in McDonalds, posters etc. What about comics?

I never read to any of my kids as small children, they weren't interested and wouldn't sit still for it. All four are now teens and above and all read. Even ds, who is dyslexic with Irlen's syndrome, though he prefers the kindle app. Games with lots of text in them are also good.

[mrsmortis]

My nephew was on the verge of becoming a reading refuser in Y2. My Mum (his grandma) paid for a readingeggs/readingexpress subscription for him. It made all the difference. Initially he did it because it meant he got extra screen time (yay for 'playing' on tablets') that his mum didn't complain about (i.e. he could do readingexpress for 30 mins and then get his allocated playtime on top).

I don't think it would work for all children. But perhaps you could do the 2 week free trial and see if it works for your DD.

[mouldycheesefan]

If she wants you to read to her that is a positive as she is enjoying books. Could you take it in turns so you read a bit and she reads a bit?
Reward chart for reading? If she reads to you for five mins a day she gets to choose a treat?
Library summer reading challenges with a medal at the end?

[user789653241]

What does teacher say? As she is end of yr3, it will be more and more bigger problem if she can't(or won't) be able to read. It's not just literacy, word problems in maths, research in science or history, etc.

If she doesn't want to read whole page, maybe take turns, like she read one sentence, and you read one?

By the way MaddyHatter's way(subs on tv) was how my ds learned to read before starting school. Watching words and listening how it pronounced at the same time all the time was the trick behind it, I think.

[MaddyHatter]

Might be worth trying non fiction too, just as a thought. I know its not ideal for comprehension, but for basic reading skills, fact books about an animal she likes or crafting instructions, taking her shopping and getting her to help you compose a list she reads back to you...etc.

[MaddyHatter]

my DS is autistic, and won't read story books, instead he put the subtitles up on youtube videos and the telly.

Its really helped his reading skills, might be worth a try with her?