Reading - When/How does the penny dropped for your DCs?

[artichaut27]

My DS2 (recently turned 5) has been learning how to read for a bit more than a year. He was quite eager to learn phonics and all when age 3-4 so I started teaching him.

He started Reception on Blue book band and his teacher has not moved him from book band all year. He's in a guided reading group and reads at the level of the other kids, not been stretched to his level.

At home he reads Orange/Turquoise books.

Learning how to read seems to take him forever given that he knows 200+ of sight words and all of his phonics, blends etc.

What is holding me back? It seems like he's been plateauing for months.

With my DS1 he was behind his peers all of Reception and YR1 and then became Free reader in October of YR2.

My question is: what's your experience with reading? Does the penny suddenly drop or is it a steady progression?

From what you're describing, he has made progress, but for some reason he hasn't moved book band during Reception.

Did you ask the teacher? What has been the feedback in his reports, parents evenings? Have the school just not bothered to assess him for moving up a book band all year (very unlikely) or are they saying that he hasn't made progress?

I have the same questions as LetItGo.

What have the teachers said at parents' evening?
Have you asked what school feels your son needs to work on in order to move up?

How is your son's comprehension? You say that he is reading orange/turquoise at home, is he fully understanding those books as well as decoding the words?

Blue book band is still a perfectly fine place for a summer born at the end of reception. That is at least meeting ARE for reading.

Thanks LetItGoToRuin

The teacher has tested his phonics a few months ago, and he knew all of them.

At the start of the year he had a teacher who was only there for 3 months. This teacher started in January and I did tell her that he needed being stretched, but she seemed to be more interested in getting kids to write well than to read well. DS2 writes ok, and she said he should use his phonics better.

She's a good teacher but it looks a bit like she's putting cart before horse for Reception. I thought reading came first and then writing. But I might be wrong...

I think Reception has been confusing for him, as academically he's been taught what he already knew, and didn't go much beyond. Socially it has been great, and that was my main ambition.

Good points JuniorWarriors.

His comprehension is good. He read an ORT magic key book about Robin Hood this week and told me all about it when he was getting dressed the other morning.

I volunteer French classes at school and I've coincided with his guided reading group. I could see that he was reading books that were way too easy for him and was bored.

I tried to explain at the beginning of the year that he needed more stimulation, but I had to give up, as the teacher's priorities seemed to be on handwriting.

For both DC they made lots of progress in Year 1. The more interesting books were in those classrooms and the teachers seemed more willing for children to progress at their own pace. In Reception they seemed to prefer teaching at a group pace.

I have two very different readers. One read early and one got it later.

We read at home together. Choosing the right books at the right time was the most useful thing. School had no impact tbh.

The thing about primary is that they're stuck with one teacher for the entire year. The good thing about this is that next year's teacher might suit your DS better! It's great that he has benefitted socially from Reception though.

I agree with SummerSeasoning that school doesn't need to have a great impact on the more advanced readers. We were lucky in that D's YR teacher was happy to let her go up the book bands during YR, but we were supporting DD's reading at home regardless, so it needn't matter if the teacher is a bit more reticent. We have always made good use of the local library.

"I thought reading came first and then writing." They are taught together as the two sides of the same coin they go hand in hand. Writing is more difficult because it involves many skills so will lag slightly behind. If there's a big difference between the two the teacher will want to know why and focus on closing the gap.

I can see your point Norestformrz I think that's what his teacher has been trying to tel him. But at the same time, it looks like she held back his reading to work on his writing. Which is frustrating for us at home who are trying to get the reading moving on.

SummerSeasoning, Starlight36 and LetItGoToRuin I hope YR1 will be more stimulating for him academically. He's actually quite excited and proud to go up a class. Luckily the kids in his class are pretty switched on so it should create a good dynamic for YR1.

It's just that I have the feeling that we most of the academic stuff at home, because he's shown interest early. It feels like I'm not trained to do it, and that we're just making it up.

I had vague hopes that school would take him beyond what he knew when he entered reception. He liked most of his first year though and he's engaging with school as a whole, which is a non-negligible positive.

I'm sure he has learned some things during reception!

There's not a huge amount of formal teaching in reception but DD still found the phonics lessons fun and interesting, even though a lot of it probably just consolidated things she'd already worked out for herself.

Meanwhile, there's loads you can do with him to develop his love of learning without taking him ahead of the curriculum. Find something he's interested in (space or rocks or dinosaurs or the history of Brazil or whatever), and have fun encouraging him to find out more about it. Sign him up for a football team. Start him on a musical instrument. Teach him chess. Etc.

It's not a case of holding back his reading it's making sure that he can decode for reading and encode for writing equally well. I'd be checking his phonics skills to see if they match the books you're giving him at home which rely on mixed reading strategies and will certainly impact on writing.

As I recall the pattern for both of mine went with progressing in fits and starts until the point where reading the book in hand becomes very absorbing. Then they are flying.

School can't truly hold them back if you are sharing books from elsewhere too. My slower reader only took off how I described a while into school. It just took a lot longer for everything to line up and be ready.

Maybe they made an error on the initial banding.
Or they want him to be able to make progress yr 1.
My dc made consistent progress. By about Dec of yr r R they could read without sounding out. And were fluent by the end of yr r.
I would just read whatever at home. There is a list of real books at bands so like gruffalo etc.

I'd focus on phonics if you want reading and writing to progress

I do have a list of real books actually. Thanks for the reminder. I should tap into it. I think I do need to get him books that he more gets engaged in. He's asked me for a Captain Underpants

The thing with DS2 is that he will rather make inferences and guesses than sounding out. On a good day that will get him to read pretty well, on a not so good day we need to remind him to sound out.

My main thing is that I wondered why his phonics, sight words, blends skills have not equated with reading better earlier than he is. It seems that he has been on the edge of reading fluently for months.

At this stage it is really important to insist on him reading each word correctly, and not using inferences or guesses. If he needs to sound out he should be encouraged to do so, or perhaps he can just pause and decode in his head and then say the whole word.

In her haste to read the story my DD would sometimes guess at a longer word, or even add in words within a sentence, but with gentle encouragement to read exactly what’s written on the page she got there. Next she went through a phase of pausing at the top of each page to read the text quickly in her head before reading it out loud fluently.

I would go lot simpler and shorter than Captain Underpants.

"The thing with DS2 is that he will rather make inferences and guesses than sounding out. On a good day that will get him to read pretty well, on a not so good day we need to remind him to sound out. ". I'd suggest this is due to him being given books that are beyond his current phonic knowledge so he's trying to fill in the gaps by guessing.

Not necessarily Norestformz, sometimes he reads more difficult books pretty much fluently with that method.

His great-aunt is a retired KS1 teacher and has said he's very able. She says the guessing and inferences are not necessarily a problem. It's another way of attacking words which in the long term will pay off. In my opinion, he just relies too much on it when he wants to avoid effort, though.

The thing with him, is that he's not fussed. DS1 who is dyspraxic had a harder time learning how to read, but he had a dogged determination to get there, and he loves books.

DS2 on the hand has a very good auditory memory. He started sounding out and encoding just after he turned 3. He shortly knew most of his phonics through Alphablocks and I filled in the rest.

So by that token, and being at school, I thought he would be reading by now.

I think lack of motivation could well be at the centre of this. The holiday is a good chance to explore his tastes.

I think the key to cracking reading is to both read to them every single day (books they cannot yet read - by the end of reception I'd think a mix of picture books and moving into short stories or short chapter books) and really importantly, making sure you have them reading to you every day.

I remember lots of parents found getting their children to read a real chore because the children found it hard work. So they did during term time but not really at weekends or in holidays, seeing that time as time for a 'break'. However, reading shouldn't be seen as a job or homework for children or parents, but as life. It's the doing of it every single day including Christmas and birthdays that makes it become normal and second nature and it's that which cracks it. So press on, even if it's a few minutes each day. And you can also do your sight words and blending patterns over the holiday. It's really easy to move backwards in the holiday as 6 weeks is a long time, but it's also possible to move forward if you're at home and have time just for s few minutes if focused learning each day. Some people say 'poor little thing, they're only 5 and it's the holiday' but 5 or 10 minutes a day makes all the difference and can hardly be seen to ruin a holiday.

Thanks WombatChocolate I like your approach of reading as part of life.

I'm undiagnosed dyslexic and had a terrible experience of books as a kid. So I'm never too sure of what expectations should be for reading. Plus every child learns at their pace.

But I like the ethos of books and reading as a part of life. It helps with making it natural.

We do read a bit everyday. With my DS1 and his Dyspraxia we have daily routines of speech therapy, handwriting exercises etc, to do no matter what. Not reaching automaticity at the normal pace is more of a norm for him. DS2 on the other side has been reaching milestones early, so it's hard to tell where he should be. But the only healthy thing I can see now, is to work back from his interests during the holiday and develop a positive relationship with reading.

I found good authors made ME enthusiastic about books and that can be catching,

We liked the Happy Families series by Alan Ahlberg or Frank Rogers' Pirate Penguins to read together (alternately.)

Our library also has a shelf of early readers just right for this stage, some of which are phonics readers.

"His great-aunt is a retired KS1 teacher and has said he's very able. She says the guessing and inferences are not necessarily a problem." She's very out of touch with the evidence then ...it can be a huge problem for many children

She's very out of touch with the evidence then ...it can be a huge problem for many children

I also hope that she hadn't become a primary teacher or wasn't around when you were struggling through your experiences as a kid.

Norestformrz Would you have reading recommendations of studies I could read about the subject? I'm definitely curious to find out more. Ta!