How can I help her learn to read better?

[lyssie29]

My dd is almost 7 and I'm really struggling to get her to read. She brings her school reading books home but she still spells each word out before reading it and then says a completely different word. It takes a long time to read a page with 4 or 5 lines. She has come on well but will not read anything herself and will ask me what things say even if they are words she's read before. When she does read to me she gets distracted very easily and wriggles around continuously until I get annoyed and tell her to sit still. What can I do? I know you can't compare but her friends are reading independently now and bigger books. I'm not sure if she's just unwilling to read it or if she really doesn't know how to. I'm going to speak to the teacher on parents evening but how can I help her now? I was thinking of getting a note book and writing a word on each page and getting her to read the word and then write it out as it would help with spelling and handwriting as well as learning how to read the word do you think that would help? I have always read to her and she loves being read to but not reading herself.

OP... Bit of a strange question but ask her if when she looks at letters on a page if they move... Ie do they wobble/shake etc.

My 6 year old child's answer was to laugh and tell me 'of course mum.. Letters always shake and move when reading in books and on screen' .
A school vision test at specialist optician determined he needs glasses... Letters don't move anymore, he concentrates much longer, reads more confidently and has come on spectacularlyaccording to his teacher.

GreenTulips: One is a tricky word ... Come is also a tricky word Home is altered by the E

You can see that some words are trickier to read than others. But to a child, in the first few months or years of learning to read, they are all just letters that s/he is trying to make sense of - trying to get to the words they represent. And having to learn to pronounce come, one, done, gone differently from the o-e of bone, stone, alone, home is not easy. There are much fuller explanations of this on englishspellingproblems.blogspot.co.uk

You can get souped up eye tests to pick up visual stress about age 7 - are you doing reading practice at the end of the day @lyssie29 ?

Does she rub her eyes at all or look as though she’s having trouble concentrating?

If you see she’s better at the start of the day before school, you should definitely get an expanded eye test.

Phonics don’t work for all kids - some children need more practice as they memorise words as they go along, both of mine have definitely done this.

Most children need more than just phonics to become fluent readers

All recent research and evidence says otherwise - this statement could not be more wrong.

Huge supporter of phonics here. I have experienced children who can pass the phonics screen - essentially a decoding assessment, but have not yet mastered phonics to be able to sound out and blend quickly enough to be fluent readers and read for meaning. They sound out and blend all words so steadily that their reading is stilted. They have been taught and can apply the very important and necessary phonics skills to do so but just need a little more practice to apply them faster and allow their reading to flow.

Therefore they have all the tools to become better readers but just need a little more time than some children who pick up blending more quickly.

Thank you everyone for all your suggestions I'll be looking into the different book suggestions and I've changed her reading time. It was at bedtime. Now at bedtime I just read to her and she reads at another time. We're alternating pages in the book and instead of me reading things for her, for example a birthday invitation, if she wants to know what it says I'm asking her to read it. She appears ok to read those sorts of things when she wants to know what it says. She does wear glasses and she reads to a person who into the class (not her teacher) 3 times a week now. I wonder if me also asking her to read was just too much for her. Parents evening is just after half term so I'll speak to teacher but when she was in year one they said all was fine. We're doing spellings so also learning the words and I'm putting them in very short sentences for her. I'm not sure if that will work but she seems pleased with herself when she can read out the sentence and also spell out the tricky words.

Happy you are both feeling more positive about it. It would def be worth asking her teacher to hear her read before you discuss this at parents evening.