Let him read ahead?

[ShareBear]

My 7 year old loves his science book (Apologia, Zoology 1). So far we've been reading through the book together, and he's been told not to read ahead on his own time. But he really wants to read ahead. He is a fast reader and I'm sure that if I let him, he would devour the book within a few days.

 

Part of me (the lazy part :tongue_smilie: ) is tempted to let him go ahead and read the book on his own. He loves science and would no doubt retain most of it.

 

But if I did let him read ahead, I know I would be tempted to skip "doing science" with him. (I'm sooo busy!) I would also be afraid that if I did try to "do science" with him after he had already read the book, he would not be as excited about it because he would already know what was coming.

 

What would you do?

[psychmom]

I've run into the same issue with my daughter a few times...

 

I would let him read ahead. At this age, I think the point is to expose them to a lot of information and if they want to do that on their own, more power to them! When you want to "do science" with him, maybe you can ask him what he thought was most interesting in the zoology book, and then you can explore that together in more depth. For example, you could look up information on the internet together, get more books from the library, make a lapbook, etc. Even if he doesn't retain everything he reads, that's okay because you'll be coming back to it eventually. Have fun with it!

[regentrude]

My 7 year old loves his science book (Apologia, Zoology 1). So far we've been reading through the book together, and he's been told not to read ahead on his own time. But he really wants to read ahead. He is a fast reader and I'm sure that if I let him, he would devour the book within a few days.

 

Part of me (the lazy part :tongue_smilie: ) is tempted to let him go ahead and read the book on his own. He loves science and would no doubt retain most of it.

But if I did let him read ahead, I know I would be tempted to skip "doing science" with him. (I'm sooo busy!) I would also be afraid that if I did try to "do science" with him after he had already read the book, he would not be as excited about it because he would already know what was coming.

What would you do?

 

I would let my child read to his heart's content. If he retains the information from reading, it would free me up to do interesting stuff with him. What do you do with him when you "do science"?

If it's just going over the book, it may really just be wasted time. But if you do experiments, in-depth discussions, activities, use other materials, it can be very beneficial if he has already read the book and has some understanding of the material because then you can do more interesting things.

Anyway, I would never tell my kid not to read his book. To me, that would send the wrong message - at some point, you WANT him to read his books independently.

[Anne]

I'd let him read ahead - At this stage, imho, you're really trying to light a fire of interest and provide some basic information. If he's interested, he'll do that himself. Depending on the book he's reading, maybe he could pick out the experiments he'd like to try? Maybe he could even gather the materials!

 

Put the boy to work!!!:D

 

Anne

 

ETA - Have him tell you the most interesting bits of what he's reading - and then call it good!!

[2smartones]

I agree! Let him read ahead. Actually, it may free up some of your time, because he'll be able to tell you which activities/experiments are the most appealing to him. You'll be able to focus your time & attention on those. You should also look into the journals they have available now (some have only one version, and some have a junior version also). Those have a lot of great activities that will allow you to see what he's really retained and what he hasn't, and you can focus your time on the activities found in those, as well as the experiments in the book. Because the text is written at an elementary level, you should be able to skim the chapter to pick up most of the important information the night before you present the hands-on material. No reason to waste time reading it word-for-word together if that's just going to turn off the fire to learn. Some kids retain more by reading silently than by listening to someone else read to them. My older son is like that, but my younger prefers that we read things together.

[boscopup]

I let DS read ahead also. He loves the Apologia books! He finished Astronomy recently. I cannot read those things aloud. Yuck. Too wordy. Fine to read to yourself though! :D

 

He also read ahead in SOTW. We are still going through SOTW at regular pace, and he just re-reads what he's already read. Better retention that way, right? ;) He hasn't minded reading things again so far.

[acurtis75]

Dd reads ahead in both apologia anatomy & sotw. When we "do" history she answers the narration questions and we do the map and occasional activity page before she does the test. When we "so" science we work through the notebook pages & review what she learned from reading. We also get lots of supplemental library books for both subjects which she reads on her own.

[ShareBear]

Oh wow, I posted this thread and promptly forgot all about it! I'm so sorry!

 

Thanks for the helpful responses. It's interesting that you are all agreed that I should let him read ahead.

 

Part of the reason I hesitated to let him read ahead: I remember how boring English class was when I was young. I always read the textbook through within the first few days of the school year. Then there was nothing to look forward to in English class.

 

Another reason I hesitated was: his terrible pronunciation of words that he's read but hasn't heard spoken aloud. His vocabulary is quite advanced, but a full quarter of his vocabulary is pronounced incorrectly! When I read aloud with him, he hears the correct pronunciations of new terms right from the start.

 

And a third reason: I know that once he's read the book, he's going to bug me repeatedly to do *all* of the experiments! I'm not that into experiments myself...

 

When we "do" science, I add additional explanation, check his understanding of what we're learning, and stop to pull out the encyclopedia or other supplemental books for additional information. He loves the way we "do" science now and wouldn't mind continuing to do it this way, but he would also really love to read ahead.

 

But he would really like to read ahead, and from the input y'all have given, it sounds like it won't do any harm. I guess I'll just let him read ahead, and go back through the material with him later to address the pronunciation issues, and add the additional depth as I've been doing.

 

(I just told him that he could read ahead. You should see the smile on his face! He got out his notebook so that he can copy information and diagrams that he finds especially interesting.)

[ShareBear]

Well, he finished the book yesterday. He took lots of notes, mostly consisting of pictures relating to the text, and diagrams copied from the text. And he told me alllll about what he was learning. :) Now he's going through it a second time, just in case he missed something first time through.

 

At some point this week I hope to page through the book and ask him a few questions, to see how much he has retained. If he's retained most of it, I will have to decide whether to continue going through the book with him in a formal way, or whether to just jump right into Zoology 2.

 

It's very tempting to skip most formal schooling with him, since he learns so much on his own. For example, right now, I'm browsing the internet, and he and his brother are sorting through their rock collection, and identifying rocks with the help of the encyclopedia.

 

But if I don't sit down and teach him things at least now and then, I feel guilty, like I'm not being a good homeschooler. :tongue_smilie: I should probably just get over it, right?