Do you stop and explain when reading aloud?

[Katie.Louise]

When reading aloud to your children, do you stop and explain words or things that you think they may not know the meaning of? Would some children find this distracting for you to stop and explain? Is it better to stop and explain at the end of the sentence? Or the end of the paragraph? What are your thoughts?

 

I am using some of Ambleside's reading selections and know the language is very rich in most of their recommendations. My 4th grade dd comes to me when she comes to a word she doesn't know. My 6th grade dd will wait maybe until the end of the chapter and come ask me a couple of words at a time. But I am curious about how to handle read-alouds.

 

Thanks,

Katie

[Laura Corin]

I sometimes ask if they understand a word, but often I just go on and expect them to pick it up from context.

 

Laura

[LivingUnderGrace]

but often I just go on and expect them to pick it up from context.

 

Laura

 

Same here.

[silvermine]

Mine ask if they don't understand a word or a section, usually. But I wouldn't expect all kids to.

[8filltheheart]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

[EKS]

I occasionally will do this if I am very sure that the word is one they don't know and knowing its meaning is necessary to understanding an important part of the book. Most of the time, though, I just assume they will get it from context. If they ask me what a word means I tell them.

[KAR120C]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

Especially if it's a book set in an unfamiliar time or place, or if there are references he might not understand, or if there's a confusing part where something very subtle makes a big difference.... I'll stop and ask what he got, and explain what he didn't, and back up and re-read. Also when there's a connection to something that I think he might have made, I'll ask... It makes reading aloud take a LOT longer, but I don't think I could stop myself if I tried!! LOL

 

I even do that when we have a book on CD in the car... Someday we'll finish reading Kim, but there's SO MUCH in the little references and connections to other stories and to events of history, and foreshadowing.... I just can't help myself! ;)

[Jen in PA]

I sometimes ask if they understand a word, but often I just go on and expect them to pick it up from context.

 

Laura

 

Same here.

[GoVanGogh]

I did not intend to "train" my son in this manner nor do I know how we picked up this habit, but DS taps my arm or leg once to signal that he wants me to stop and explain something. I will motion with my hand that I realize I need to stop, then I stop at a good breaking point - either the end of the sentence or paragraph.

Sometimes - if it is a word or phrase that I am sure he does not know - I will add in the definition to the reading as I read along.

[nmoira]

 

When reading aloud to your children, do you stop and explain words or things that you think they may not know the meaning of? Would some children find this distracting for you to stop and explain? Is it better to stop and explain at the end of the sentence? Or the end of the paragraph? What are your thoughts?

Sometimes. For example, there's some talk of pollarded willows/withies in our current bedtime read aloud. I took the time to explain why this was done and what the trees looked like because the mental picture adds something to the atmosphere of the story. Likewise, if the meaning of a sentence turns upon a word (as opposed to the meaning of the word being fairly clear from the context), I will usually make a note of it if I think the work is unfamiliar. Otherwise, both my kids are good about asking about unfamiliar terms or usages.

[Dawn in OH]

I usually explain when I get to the end of a paragraph, unless someone stops and asks for an explanation.

[Night Elf]

Yes, I stop whenever they have a question whether it's an unfamiliar word or something in the story they don't understand. I find it to be very helpful in comprehension and vocabulary skills.

[Earth Angel_79]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

 

This is exactly how we do it too! I think I've read philosophies that suggest you shouldn't, but I don't think we could stop if we wanted to either, it just seems so natural to do so. I do, however, like the suggestion of a pp using the tapping method...pretty cool!

[Peela]

I don't usually stop for words- I rely on context for that.

But, I do stop regularly to explain something or make sure they understood something or make a comment. I am reading Ivanhoe aloud to my teens at the moment and *I* find it difficult to follow at times, so I stop regularly to check if they are following. There are actually so many words I dont know the meaning of in Ivanhoe, it would take us a long time if we looked them all up. I just rely on us all getting the general gist and soaking up the language without understanidng every detail.

[AngelaNYC]

I used to stop and explain throughout the Ambleside readings, but I just read somewhere not to do that. Children are to hear the stories with as few interruptions as possible and they'll just pick up the meanings of the words they don't know. Of course, if they ask, then tell them. The narrations should be a good clue as to how much they understood and followed.

 

I'm still geared toward explaining as we go along, though. But, I have noticed it messes up the "story vibe" and ds's eyes start glazing over at me when I veer from the book. I'm going to try and stop doing that for a while and see if it matters any.

[siloam]

When reading aloud to your children, do you stop and explain words or things that you think they may not know the meaning of? Would some children find this distracting for you to stop and explain? Is it better to stop and explain at the end of the sentence? Or the end of the paragraph? What are your thoughts?

 

I am using some of Ambleside's reading selections and know the language is very rich in most of their recommendations. My 4th grade dd comes to me when she comes to a word she doesn't know. My 6th grade dd will wait maybe until the end of the chapter and come ask me a couple of words at a time. But I am curious about how to handle read-alouds.

 

Thanks,

Katie

 

Katie,

 

Yes I will, but not for every word/concept, just when I think it is so foreign that they won't understand it even from the context.

 

Hfeather

 

[Mandy in TN]

Sometimes I will add in definitions/ explanations on the fly if it is a word or situation that is totally unfamiliar and sometimes I will just go with context if the story makes the definition obvious. I rarely, if ever, stop and interrupt the flow of the story by asking if they understand and giving lengthy explanations.

HTH-

Mandy

[Wee Pip]

...and then there's my kids:glare:

 

Our last read-aloud was the Percy Jackson series. A typical reading ran like this-

 

Kid: "Who's Chiron again?"

me: "the teacher that first found Percy Jackson and helped him."

kid: "oh."

kid: "and who's Grover?"

me: "the main character's best friend". Starts reading again.

kid: "wait a minute, who's Chiron?"

me: wondering why we do read-alouds.

 

Please tell me I'm not the only one whose kids don't remember even the important characters during our read-alouds! LOL. So to answer your question: yes, we have lots of discussion interrupting our read-alouds, and not all of them the kind I'd like to be having.

[Katie.Louise]

Thank you all so much for your responses. It is really nice to hear how others handle this.

Katie

[IsabelC]

We talk about things arising from our read alouds often. I'm not sure how many times I stop at the end of a sentence, paragraph or chapter because we just do it naturally without really considering the best way to do it. Sometimes the kids will ask what something means, sometimes I'll quickly define a term if I know they won't be familiar with it. Sometimes I'll introduce an idea on the fly, other times we'll discuss it at length, perhaps at another time. Some questions can be answered quickly (what does hauberk mean? why couldn't Pa Ingalls ring Ma up?) while other questions don't lend themselves to quick off the cuff answers (why did white people used to think they were better than black people? why did God make the tree of knowledge if nobody was allowed to touch that fruit?). But it's very seldom that we'd get through a chapter without some new topic for discussion coming up. :001_smile:

Edited November 17, 2010 by Hotdrink

[Dinsfamily]

I occasionally will do this if I am very sure that the word is one they don't know and knowing its meaning is necessary to understanding an important part of the book. Most of the time, though, I just assume they will get it from context. If they ask me what a word means I tell them.

 

This is what I do. Both of my older boys will stop me if they need to know what a word means so often I let it go unless they ask. Lately, I find myself explaining idioms more than individual words.

[Veritaserum]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

 

:iagree: I don't stop and explain every little thing, but I like to ask questions and explain particularly complicated plot points or vocabulary. My kids ask questions and make comments as well.

 

I can't watch a movie without commenting, either. :tongue_smilie:

[FO4UR]

I do sometimes. I stop to ask for narrations when it seems like we hit an important spot and new words often pop up at those spots. Instead of explaining a word, I'll often sandwich it in some context myself to make the meaning extremely obvious.

 

"Antarctica, the freezing cold continent at the South pole, blah blah blah..."

[silliness7]

I used to stop and explain throughout the Ambleside readings, but I just read somewhere not to do that. Children are to hear the stories with as few interruptions as possible and they'll just pick up the meanings of the words they don't know. Of course, if they ask, then tell them. The narrations should be a good clue as to how much they understood and followed.

 

I'm still geared toward explaining as we go along, though. But, I have noticed it messes up the "story vibe" and ds's eyes start glazing over at me when I veer from the book. I'm going to try and stop doing that for a while and see if it matters any.

 

:iagree: My oldest son would get visibly agitated and disgusted when I would stop and try to explain something. I rarely stop unless we come across something that I'm pretty sure is confusing and their lack of understanding is seriously diminishing their enjoyment of the story and even then I would like to be able to explain it in 5 seconds or less and keep it moving.

[Vida Winter]

I try to strike a balance between stopping to explain too much and keeping the story moving along. I'm usually reading aloud to a 10yo and 6yo and I know a lot of the vocab is passing by the 6yo - but I try to explain things to the 10yo and hope the 6yo is picking it up. Not a perfect solution but the best I have found for us.

[NanceXToo]

When reading aloud to your children, do you stop and explain words or things that you think they may not know the meaning of? Would some children find this distracting for you to stop and explain? Is it better to stop and explain at the end of the sentence? Or the end of the paragraph? What are your thoughts?

 

I am using some of Ambleside's reading selections and know the language is very rich in most of their recommendations. My 4th grade dd comes to me when she comes to a word she doesn't know. My 6th grade dd will wait maybe until the end of the chapter and come ask me a couple of words at a time. But I am curious about how to handle read-alouds.

 

Thanks,

Katie

 

It depends. Oak Meadow assigns a particular book every like three weeks for my daughter's 5th grade curriculum. And it does want us to look up unfamiliar vocabulary words. Since we read the assigned books together, it's pretty easy for her to ask me "what does that word mean?" and I jot it down and then I either tell her what it means, or we look it up if I'm having a hard time defining it.

 

When she's reading on her own for fun, she might occasionally ask me what a word means, and I'll tell her.

 

When we're reading a book aloud together just for fun, I usually just keep the flow of the story but every now and then I'll say as an aside "that means ______" if I think it would benefit her to know).

 

The truth is though most of the words, even if we look them up, she'll never remember most of them at this age if they're words she doesn't hear regularly. So it seems almost a waste of time to do so much stopping and looking up of words with the assigned reading, but we do it anyway (most of the time). :D

[creekmom]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

 

:iagree:

 

This is especially important when reading to a wide range of ages. Also, I pick one difficult word out of each chapter to write on a colored strip of paper for our "word wall". The kids use the context of the sentence to guess its meaning (this is very competitive since the one who guesses correctly gets 5 M&Ms!). We go over the words on our wall daily. I'm hoping by the end of the year they'll have a much richer vocabulary!

 

I wanted to add that my kids are remembering the words' meanings much better since they remember how the word was used in the story. For example, in The Midnight Fox, one sentence talked about how the fox was not impetuous. They always remember that impetuous means "acting quickly without thought" simply bc the fox was not like that when he wanted to kill the turkey.

Edited November 17, 2010 by creekmom

[SeekingSimplicity]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

 

I do this too, especially if the language of the book is difficult (archaic) or the setting is unfamiliar to them.

[ladydusk]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

 

:iagree:

 

We're reading The Jungle Book right now (we're in part II and the story we're on is *long*, we can usually do a story in 2 nights, but this one has at least 2 more to got). Anyway, this is a big stretch for our children, they're loving it, but there's some hard stuff in there. So, we stop a lot and explain a lot. Sometimes, I stop just to read a sentence over again to "hear" Kipling's writing. Not very often, but occasionally I say, listen to how he said this ... listen to the words he chose and the way he put them together.

 

Laying the ground work for writing and LA in many years :)

[Verity]

I occasionally will do this if I am very sure that the word is one they don't know and knowing its meaning is necessary to understanding an important part of the book. Most of the time, though, I just assume they will get it from context. If they ask me what a word means I tell them.

 

This is us. One reason I find that I don't use audio books much is that it's hard to stop the recording (if I'm not right next to the device) to explain a word or concept. Especially with my 2E kids some things they get far above their level and other basic concepts have to be explained in depth. Plus having to stop to tell the 4 year to stop bothering/poking/touching one of his brothers. :D

 

I tend to stop to explain or make side comments frequently during our reading for everything except probably SotW because they seem to understand most of how that is written.

[mothergooseof4]

Yep, I usually stop and explain words or ideas that they may not be familiar with. It doesn't usually cause any confusion for my kids.

[Harriet Vane]

Yes, I do stop to explain, briefly. If it's a quick sentence or two, I just pick up where I left off and keep reading. If the explanation/discussion is more lengthy I might re-read a sentence or two to orient us again. My kids do not find it confusing or distracting.

 

I don't explain everything, though--there is a lot that can be picked up from context. As much as possible, I try to let the reading carry on.

[Trish]

Yes.

[Whereneverever]

Yes, I do, and I think it's one of the best benefits of reading aloud to my kids.

[Aubrey]

I do, & it leads to some of our best conversations, but this is also one of the ways that I identify authors I really love:

 

by the time I've finished my off-the-wall explanation, SWB & MCT invariably spend the next paragraph explaining exactly what I explained in the exact words I chose to explain it.

[Snowfall]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

 

That's what I do, too, and at this point dd is so used to it that she interrupts me if I don't. lol

[abrightmom]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

:001_smile: We do the same but sheesh. I feel really silly agreeing with 8filltheheart because she is AWESOME and I am not. :D

[sarahv]

I stop all the time when I am reading. I ask questions about what happened, what they think will happen, to explain background knowledge that I have that the story doesn't, etc. Discussion just seems normal when we are reading. I have never really thought about it. We just do. :)

:iagree:

 

Sometimes my kids discuss it so long it goes something like this: (sigh...)Ok, guys, do you want me to keep reading or not??

 

I don't stop all the time, but my kids will often interrupt and ask what a word means and to comment on the material. We do Ambleside, too. :001_smile:

 

Then there are quiet days when they just listen. Those are kind of nice. :001_smile: