Can I get some advice on my 8ds' reading? He can't retain unless he reads aloud.

[Kisa in CA]

He was severly premature and is weak in the LA area. I used CLE reading last year, but I literally had to sit through each question with him and he got many of them wrong. I don't want to use it again. I need simple, repetitive lessons on how to read something and think about it. WWE dictation and copywork has helped greatly, but I am looking for a reading curriculum. CLE just required too much abstract thinking and was not sequential enough for him. I looked at BJU but it is too busy too.

 

Any suggestions? How can I help him transition to reading silently? Why is it he can't retain unless he reads it out loud?

 

Thanks!

Kisa

[MIch elle]

My dc at that age were still learning how to read. Yes, they could read but not very well. Give it time. Patience and practice that's all that's needed imho. My dc used the CLE reader 1 in grade 2 and CLE readers 2 & 3 in grade 3 (without the lightunits). They were on reading level by grade 4.

[ElizabethB]

It takes a year of reading aloud for most children until they are ready to read silently. It can take more for a student with any added difficulties. Don't pressure him to read silently, it can start to cause guessing problems if you force it before a student is ready for that.

 

It takes a lot of phonics practice for many children before they are ready. I would add in some spelling to whatever phonics program you are doing to help solidify the information in the brain.

[farmwife]

I looked at BJU but it is too busy too.

 

Any suggestions? How can I help him transition to reading silently? Why is it he can't retain unless he reads it out loud?

 

Thanks!

Kisa

 

I would have to recommend BJU to you. If you could just get ahold of a teachers manual you could sit right next to your son and have him read a loud to you and you could ask some of the comprehension questions, not all of them. I used BJU Reading 2 last year and I can not tell you what a difference it made in my daughter. She loves to tell me about all her books she reads now. I really like the questions they pose, I don't use them all but they are really good at drawing the story out.

 

I personally think some reading aloud it very good for children and I can quickly pick up on word she mispronounces.

[MerryAtHope]

It may be an auditory processing issue, or it may be a way of helping himself with working memory. My dd has to say many things aloud to herself to understand them. The other day she caught me moving my lips while I balanced our checkbook, and she asked me what I was doing. I realized that I have to say things silently to myself sometimes to be able to track with it. And if there is lots of noise, I find I have to say numbers out loud to be able to do math (and yet, math was always one of my stronger subjects).

 

I think eventually your son will learn to read silently. I am a slower reader because I hear all of the words in my head--and if I don't hear them, if I try to skim--I'm not likely to remember any of it.

 

Merry :-)

[Kisa in CA]

Thanks everyone! I already own BJU, so I'm going to sit him down and try to use it in a simpler form without the workbook and see how he does. Sounds like it may be a good fit. I appreciate everyone's perspective!

[Kisa in CA]

Yes, we use Pathway Readers! I haven't used their workbooks. Do you like them?

 

THANKS!

[Moni]

Any suggestions?

 

Let him read aloud.

 

:seeya:

[skaterbabs]

Get him an audiorecorder and have him read the lessons to himself using it, and verbally answering the questions in his book into the recorder.

[hi_itsgwen]

Don't know if this applies in your situation, but I have a friend whose son is *not* a reader, but does well if things are taught outloud. The written words just don't translate into meaning in his brain, until he says them outloud (and one word at a time, then he stops to understand it, and then he says the next word...excruciatingly slow) or hears them spoken by the teacher.

 

I can't remember what the term for this is, but it's some sort of visual/auditory processing issue. Anyway, it is a recognized 'learning dissability' that, if diagnosed, a student can even take auditory courses all the way through college. And it has nothing to do with their intelligence either...but it can hugely impact their love of learning if it's not acknowledged.

 

My friend is a teacher, and she said this particular ld is usually mis-diagnosed as all sorts of different, more common ld's, and the child is unsuccessfully 'remediated' with all sorts of reading help before they finally are able to properly diagnose it. I think she said the average kid finally gets diagnosed in high school, but has struggled their whole academic life with it.