DS disheartened with reading 'it's too difficult' - Reception

[TrueBlue]

My son started Reception in September and has been quite keen for the first few months, reading the books he brought home every evening (some of them mostly pictures, and some words) as well as just reading for fun with me.

I felt really worried and sad this evening, after his first day back after the Xmas holidays when he said he did not want to do any reading as 'it was too difficult' and he could not do it. He was so disheartened about the fact that the books get increasingly difficult and that the teacher 'forces' him to read. He said I like being read to but I don't want to read myself as it is too hard...

I just don't know what to think but feel quite sad that at 5 years old he is already feeling the pressure and that he feels like just opting out as 'he can't do it anyway'...

Until Christmas he was fine, he wrote Christmas cards to all his classmates himself (obviously with me writing all their names for him to copy) and he managed to read 'cat', 'dog', 'mum', 'dad', 'I' and the names of everybody in the family and he started being able to work words out based on the sounds....

Would like to hear from anybody else's experience with Literacy in Reception. What can you do if your child gets completely disheartened with it all?

have looked at dd's books and she is actually on 3 not 4, hmmmmm

still, she is gaining confidence reading all the time so hopefully she will come along between now and summer.

My DS was like your DS, he found reading difficult not so much the phonics but the words they needed to memorise.He hated reading at home
He used to get upset because other children found it a lot easier than him. I used to go in and listen to those children read and they were a long way ahead of him, even though he was just as bright as they were.

Then at the beginning of year 2 it all seemed to click and he caught up them all up

Although they did ORT, they also had a choice of a lot more books, so I couldn't tell you what level he was at.

My son was never over keen on reading as it was too hard. I tried to explain of course it was as he didn't know how to do it yet. Practice will help him learn how to do it. He is almost 7 and occasionally I remind him about the time he couldn't read, how he tried hard, and now he can.

With DD we have the opposite problem. She is helping her brother read year 2 books and is only allowed 2 books a week from Reception.

So much pressure so young is wrong. Pull right back and make reading fun - play lots of phonics games, with lots of movement which boys love, maybe get some foam letters for bathtime lots of children love these, play 'I-spy' with sounds instead of letters,and do lots of work on blending.

Have a look too at which sounds he is being taught,it may be that they are giving him books with long vowel sounds but not yet teaching them to him - my dd was like this in Reception and really struggled as she hated guessing and getting it wrong; teaching her all the phonic rules was the way forward as soon she could decode anything.

Can you get some easy decodable books from hte library that he CAN read so he builds his confiodence again?

Let him help you with things like shopping lists, road signs and praise every attempt

And be reassured, level 8 ORT in Reception is highly exceptional - most are on level 2 - 4

My son went through several stages like that in reception and year one. I often took the pressure off and didn't insist on reading the school books or everynight. Some weeks we did nothing and had a rest. Sometimes I'd read a short picture book and get him to read a specific common word or decodable word when we came across it. Like cat, the, a, sat, it , we did it in a silly way.

Also instead or reading I'd do a quick 2 mins play with magnetic or bath letters. You can put a sound like "at" up then put letters infront to see how it changes the sound. Had a few laughs making complete nonsense words. He used to love Smelly School, or I think that's what we called it. In the bath we'd use the foam letters to spell things like poo, fart, wee Going on to use other common words he was comfortable with and make gross poo related sentences. Or write notes to him, even if it was only I love you or did you "sit on the chip?" When he went through such phases it was mainly about short, sweet, fun and reinforcing things he was very comfortable with.

I also stressed that reading was mainly all about practice, a bit like swimming or learning to ride a bike. Reminding him how he often couldn't get his bike to move at the start and used to fall off. Does he remember how mad he became. He used to get stressed when he found a word hard or made mistakes. Talking to him about getting things wrong is fine and all part of learning helped.

Been though too many phases of hating his reading books to count. He's now coming up to 6.5 in Year 2 and a few months back his confidence and enjoyment or reading suddenly grew. He now reads in bed everynight and the improvement in his reading is incredible. He's gone from being a perfectly competant but reluctant to a reader! Despite his reading really coming on now I make sure he's got lots of books to hand that are quite a bit below his ability. Or stories that have been read to him before. After a day at school I'm sure he often likes something to chill to rather than working out new words whilst working out the plot.

If your child is struggling with reading please look at the following webpage:

www.aowm73.dsl.pipex.com/dyslexics/should_I_have.htm