dd still struggling in yr 1

[paddingtonbear1]

My dd is in yr 1. She won't be 6 until July. She has struggled ever since starting school. She is OK socially, and her behaviour is fine, but her school work is well behind most of her peers. I guess it's the reading that concerns me the most - she's interested in it, but has low confidence - tells herself she can't do it, and whatever dh and I try to do gets nowhere. This weekend she has an ORT book (level 3 I think it is), but although she seems to know the story from the pictures she won't read the words! dh and I are at a loss. We try and get her to read other things, to help her see the point eg. things on menus, lists etc but it doesn't seem to make much difference. I suspect at school they have given up slightly as she hasn't really progressed this year at all. Should I be worried or will it just happen? she does know her phonic alphabet and can blend.

Reading is a very technical subject. When children start to read they have to be able to talk about the text. First of all I would make reading an enjoyable experience. Read together daily for no more than 5 minutes and then spend another 5 minutes talking about the story.

She has to be able to read some words by sight. These are called sight words or high frequency words and are the most commonly used words in the english language. You cannot read them by breaking them down into sounds. For example the word "the" cannot be sounded out because "t", "h" and "eh" don't blend together. Children have to just recognise the word by sight. The only way to learn these is by repetition (use flash cards). Learning sight words improves fluency because the child is not using brain power to decode every word.

Another aspect of reading is to learn phonics or sounds that letters or combinations of letters make. The word "road" should not be sounded out as r-o-a-d but r-oa-d.

As well as this there is fluency, reading with expression and comprehension. I suspect that your dd is very good at reading comprehension because she can guess the gist of the story.

I would recommend reading for 5 minutes every day and stick to school reading books (which should be changed at least once a week) and flash cards with sight words on them. If she has memorised all the stroy in her reading book then do 5 minutes of flash cards with her. The key is to repeat as many times as it takes until she knows the words like the back of her hand.

Ninall - he is. He is on track and reading an age appropriate book, if on stage 3. Please don't worry. I work as a TA and there are many many children in Y1 on much lower than this, and some who are not reading at all at this point of Y1.

I think I put something slightly wrong there - I meant they get lines if they are naughty, not if they can't do the reading. dd's behaviour is normally OK thankfully! Her writing is slow also so she'd be there all week!
It's some of the combinations dd doesn't get, like oo, oa etc. She can do some high frequency words eg here, the. Her comprehension is fine if there are pictures!
She isn't ecstatic about school, would rather be at home, but accepts she has to go. I have to work which means she has to go to after school club a few days a week too.
tbh I did consider moving her a while ago but she does have friends there, plus I didn't know if things would be much different anywhere else.

It takes time. If she is not getting it all yet, she will. And actually if the teacher is that concerned then it is her responsibility (imo) to put a programme in place to help ie 1 to 1 with a TA. What are they doing at the school? They need to be constructive if they really think it is a concern. I think she sounds like a perfectly normal 5 year old and is doing just fine.
I have a group of 'weaker' (I know there is a better word but ykwim) pupils I take who have a daily session to re-enforce the letters and sounds. They are all improving with the more focussed group work.

I found a website to help with the phonics yesterday too. here She might enjoy this more than the books for a change?? Just something different to swap it about a bit?

Good Luck.

My ds1 is also in yr 1 and not doing so well with his reading. He'll be 6 next month but only started school last March. It got to the point where getting his school book out would result in him getting annoyed. I've spoken to his teacher about it and she doesn't seem to think it's much of a problem just yet so I've eased up on his school books and am reading a couple of chapters from a more advanced book every night when the other dcs are in bed. He's really loving books again and hangs around to hear dd1's stories too (she loves Rainbow Fairies). I'm sure they'll get it in time.

I teach year 1 and I HATE the early stages of ORT. We are teaching childrne to decode unfamilar words and yet we expect them to read ORT...there are better books out there. I like the songbird phoncis and others that are based on synthetci phonics. Does she know all her sounds? CAn she put them together to build unfamilar words? TBH stage 3 ORT sounds fine to me I wouldn't stress about it...more important she likes reading. She'll get it - unless there is some problem most children level out by Year 2, but by this stage in the year they are still all over the place.

I have to see the teacher on Friday anyway - it's not just her reading, she is falling behind with other things apparently! She has poor concentration. It's been the same since she started school, but nothing we've done so far has made much difference. She can concentrate OK on something she wants to do - but she's not very interested in schoolwork!

How did it go Paddington?

Hi Vanilla, have got another thread here - dd has more general problems than just with reading!

Oh good, it looks like you are getting alot of support and advice there from people who know what they are talking about! Good Luck.

Cazzybabs - the new Floppy phonics strand is brilliant, even better than Songbirds. Nag your Lit co-ordinator for a couple on approval!