She is just not getting it.

[ElizabethB]

Thank you all so much for all of your replies and suggestions. Thought I'd update a little, I hope that is ok.:001_smile:

I've called and made an appointment with an optometrist from the COVD to have her eyes checked. They were booked solid until next year(!) but had one cancellation on December 23, so we went ahead and took that.

I've decided to put away our phonics curriculum until then. Since doing that, she has actually pulled it out to show her grandma, and read to her from it! :lol:

I talked to her about having her eyes checked and she is very hesitant, but I explained that I think that is the reason why reading is so difficult, and she seems more open to going now.

We are playing Elizabeths phonics game with a lot of success!!! She likes it, and it is low stress, which we both need right now.

Since she seems to do better with writing, I'm just having her write words down, and re read them to me. We use paper and a white board. I ordered ETC workbooks, figuring that the written part would help her.

 

And best of all, I realized she actually KNOWS a lot of the phonics 'rules'!!! She knows them, she just has a hard time reading text. However, after playing Elizabeths game once, she could sound out ANY combination of letters----correctly! I had no clue she could do that. She is enjoying playing word scramble with me using our homemade AAS letter tiles. She pulls the letters for a word, scrambles them up, and I have to unscramble them.

 

Soooo, all this to say, THANK YOU all so much. What a blessing it is to be able to post a concern here and get so many thoughtful responses, great advice, and encouragement. :grouphug:

 

:001_smile:

 

That is great! Keep us updated after the exam.

[Hedgehog]

I'm glad you and your dd are making progress, OP. Best wishes to both of you.

[MerryAtHope]

So glad to hear this update! Thank you, and I'm glad things are looking more positive now :). It will be interesting to hear how your appt. goes!

 

Merry :-)

[LittleIzumi]

:grouphug:Thank you all so much for taking the time to reply, and doing so with encouragement and gentleness. :grouphug:It really means a lot.

I will try to get to all the points...

 

I agree that we need a break from official phonics instruction. We are both frustrated, and I am not helping her confidence.:001_unsure:

I called today about vision therapy. Reading all the signs and symptoms on the website was eye opening...she meets almost all of them.

She is remarkably smart, can remember random information, is amazing at math concepts. She is a really bright little girl, which is why I am having such a hard time with this, kwim? She HAS made some progress, but I guess I just don't feel like this amount of struggle is normal...

I have tried many programs, and no, I haven't stuck with any one for a long time except for TRL, which we are doing now. I think what would happen is we would start, and it would get SO hard for her, that I thought "well maybe she isn't ready yet..." and shelve it. Well then she turned six and I felt like we should really get going on this reading thing! She is 6.5 now, and we are halfway through TRL. She can do max of two pages a day, and I've had her redo lessons two days in a row to really cement the concept.

 

Funny thing (well, not funny since I really am freaking out about this, butnkind of ironic) is that I've read all of the Better Late than Early type books. Beechick, Moores, the unschooling books...and I agree with them! But it's hard to see every.other. 5 and 6 Year old in coop or in the neighborhood able to real whole books(!) and dd is struggling with a few words on a page.

 

I do have Bob books, I will try those.

 

She does do MUcH better with an actual story over random words on a page...and she also does much better with writing. For example, today, she got stuck on the words 'was' and 'want'. After we did the lesson, I had her write a few words, and included those two and she got them right! It is literally 'lifting' the words off the page that is soooooooo hard for her.

 

Again, thank you for the replies and ideas. I am bookmarking the website suggestions to go read through. I really just want my little girls to feel successful at reading. It is such a divine thing to lose yourself in a book, I really want her to experience that and not struggle so much that it turns her off from reading forever.

 

I am very glad you're getting her eyes checked. Your dd sounds a LOT like mine, right down to be being great at Elizabeth's game. :lol: She is in vision therapy now, coming up on month four of it. She could read large print, like on the game cards, but not the print that was in books, not without a large struggle and especially if it was in more than one line, forget it! With VT she is reading a Magic Tree House book right now. If vision is the issue, VT can help SO MUCH. :grouphug:

[PeterPan]

So glad to hear you're making progress both on the vision front and phonics. Just remember, beginning to read does NOT mean you cancel the vision appointment. Get her vision tested properly, no matter what. If there's nothing there, there's nothing there. If there's something there, then you've caught it.

 

Enjoy your time between now and January. Think of it as a rest before things get crazy. :)

[mudcuddles]

I needed to read this. Thank you for posting! :)

 

My ds is the same way and he just turned 7. It will come. My 5 year old is at the level of my 7 year old and about to pass him up. Some kids just need more time. Thats ok! This is one of the wonderful things about being a homeschooler! Last school year I had so many panic posts about him.

 

 

One thing that my ds needs is a varied approach. Phonics Pathways got him started REALLY good. We tried OPGTTR before that. Tears every time that book came out. When we got a small way into PP he did not want that book anymore. He was done. I checked out OPGTTR from the library and he took off. He loved it. We also play with starfall.com, he does ETC and AAS. I honestly think some kids need a varied approach. We just keep cycling through what we have. When he is tired of 1 thing, we move to the next and so on. He is making VERY slow strides but he is getting there, painfully slow but getting there. Keep doing what you are doing and she WILL get there!!

 

You have not failed your daughter. She is only 6. I know its hard reading about 3-4year olds reading but she is only 6!! She will get there :grouphug:

[Gentlemommy]

If you've done VT, mind telling (by pm if you'd rather) how much it runs? I've a got a bit of sticker shock over the price ($350) of the initial exam. Being that insurance doesnt cover this, I need to know what I am getting into. Come he!! Or come high water, I'm getting her the therapy, I just need to be prepared lol.

[PeterPan]

If you've done VT, mind telling (by pm if you'd rather) how much it runs? I've a got a bit of sticker shock over the price ($350) of the initial exam. Being that insurance doesnt cover this, I need to know what I am getting into. Come he!! Or come high water, I'm getting her the therapy, I just need to be prepared lol.

 

Talk with your place upfront. Our insurance doesn't cover vision at all, but it DID cover some of the VT. And just by letting them run it through, the rates came back lower. So still have them run it through and see what happens.

 

Ours was around $550 a month. That was 2 half-hour sessions a week X 7 plus 1 doctor re-eval to make 8 sessions. The sessions could be paid singly or buy 7 get one free. But every place is different. Many practitioners do the Care Credit program, which can help. Or space your sesssions and knock your butts out with homework. I'd rather have less sessions than no sessions. I think that $100-150 an hour range is pretty normal for the VT and just about any therapy or practitioner these days. My only consolation is that when I paid that much I felt like what we got out of that session was WORTH it. It was way beyond what I could have done at home, but in efficiency and knowledge. That's the only consolation when the cost is so many times your only hourly wage. :(

[LittleIzumi]

If you've done VT, mind telling (by pm if you'd rather) how much it runs? I've a got a bit of sticker shock over the price ($350) of the initial exam. Being that insurance doesnt cover this, I need to know what I am getting into. Come he!! Or come high water, I'm getting her the therapy, I just need to be prepared lol.

 

I agree that you need to talk with the place. Ours was very generous with help once insurance stopped covering it. There is also a large range of cost from what I've seen.

[EthiopianFood]

Good job, mom! :) You both will feel so much better knowing if it is (or isn't) something physical!

[NavyWifeandMommy]

mY dd6 was the same way. it was very hard and stressful work. We started this year in August and it's now November and she has hardly improved. we decided to send her to school. Our school has under 100 children and I like the school. I will still be homeschooling my oldest child.

[NanceXToo]

Dd6, is just.not.getting.reading. I have tried and tried, and still, it's like pulling teeth. We have read to her from birth, I've modeled reading (I'm a huge bookworm), I have tried the laid back approach, the phonics approach, whole word, workbook, 100 EZ lessons, funnix, teach her to read using children's books...

We are halfway through The Reading Lesson. So far, it has been working best for her. However, she is still struggling through every single word on every single page. :confused: I don't know what else to do. I feel like I'm failing her big time.

 

I'm saying this gently, but if she's only 6 and you've already tried six or more different methods for teaching her to read, I wouldn't say you've tried a "laid back approach"- I'd say you're really stressing over this, and by default probably stressing her over this, and, really, she's only 6. There's no harm in just dropping it for now. Read to her for fun if she wants you to. If she asks you what a word is or how to spell it, tell her. Play board or computer games for young children for fun that incorporate some learning of letters/language IF she enjoys it, all while NOT making a big deal or fuss over learning to read. Wait til she's 7 or so and then try again. There's a whole school of thought that waiting until around age 8 or so makes the process go MUCH more smoothly as they're more ready to grasp it, and that not long after that, you wouldn't ever be able to tell if that child learned to read at 4 or 6 or 8. Even if you don't fully proscribe to its beliefs, you might want to read a book called "Better Late Than Early" just for some perspective. And then relax. She's 6. But, of course, this is coming from a more relaxed homeschooler to begin with. :)