Jump to content

Menu

How far do you skip ahead in reading?


Recommended Posts

My 2nd DD (of 4) is age 5. She will be 6 in May. This year in school, we call her a Kindergartener. She is actually do much higher level work, though. I am struggling to know how far to push her. In my opinion she is definitely gifted. This year we started her on a 2nd grade reading program - Sonlight 2nd grade readers, plus Hooked on Phonics 2nd grade, plus Explode the Code 3. She finished all those programs. She is now reading Hooked on Phonics Master Reader set (which is 3rd-8th grade, I believe). She is already through the first level. She also finished ETC 3, 4 and is 1/2 way through 5.

 

I recently did some online screening/testing to see where she falls for reading. On Sonlights reading screen online she tests into Level F (which is ages 10-13)!!! No way, do I think I should skip her ahead that far. On another online test she scored 3/4th grade in reading comprehension. That is where the problem is, I think, because she can read most anything but doesn't always understand the story because she is only 5.

 

So, suggestions regarding what program or level to use next year. Do you just go up one level from this year? I was thinking she could keep doing her Hooked on Phonics, ETC progressing at her pace, and then do Sonlight 3rd grade readers? Is that too low, or good? What about phonics? Is it ok to move forward if she reads with no problems? She also spells great.

 

Thanks for your input. This is a good problem to have, I realize especially since my oldest has the oppositive issue.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My 4 year old is also now reading sonlight's second grade readers and getting through them pretty quickly. I do have some of the books from the third grade and feel that they are too old for my DD to read by herself - it is not the phonetic level which she can manage fine, but rather that the stories are about older children and things she will not quite comprehend. I read one of them to her and she enjoyed it, but I don't think she got very much from it. I have now moved to getting her to read picture books with advanced vocabulary - the ones she would enjoy me reading to her anyway. I do not feel she needs a reading programme right now and I would rather she just read anything she can comprehend and maintain her love for reading. We are doing OPGTR as a phonics fill in but I have found my daughter is figuring out many phonics concepts by herself - when she gets stuck I will teach her the lessons she may be missing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think this is probably the point where you'll need to stop using a "reading program" and start just having her read. If she's decoding at a 5th or 6th grade level, I don't see any point in continuing with phonics.

 

If I were you (and I was, last year ;)), I would supply her with a mix of books:

 

- Picture books with more complex vocabulary (try Ruth Sanderson fairy tales, for example)

- Sonlight read-alouds for lower age ranges

- High reading level, lower age interest chapter books like the Ramona series, Dick King-Smith, the Oz books, search this forum for more ideas.

- Engaging non-fiction. My daughter really liked the "If You Lived..." series at that age, like If You Lived in Colonial Times and If You Lived 100 Years Ago.

 

Then just talk with her about what she reads. I found that at that age my kid took books a bit too literally - she assumed that what characters said was happening was what was really happening, and missed textual evidence to the contrary. So we'd talk about things like that. Giving narrations is another good way to check comprehension.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My DD has tested post high school on reading (supposedly including comprehension) since age 5. What I've noticed is that she's GREAT at recalling facts/details, and can handle character motivations and the like when she can relate to the characters, but struggles when she can't. For her, the hardest books are often those written which assume understanding of a setting (usually school) and the motivations of, say, 13 yr olds. She has a much easier time with adult historical figures than with a book about "I'm upset because Janie stole my boyfriend".

 

As far as skipping ahead, I don't even TRY to reach DD's reading level in most things. And one reason is because I was an early advanced reader as well, who left the picture book section very, very young-and then, in college and grad school, spent hundreds of hours in the children's book section of the college and grad school libraries, reading stacks of children's books that I'd missed entirely. I was the kid reading Judy Blume's entire output at age 6-7, and I really didn't need to be reading "Forever" at that age.

 

So, for DD, I keep a range of materials available. For non-fiction, academic reading, I do try to keep books that are more challenging as far as vocabulary and sentence structure goes. Right now, that means using mostly middle/high school level/adult non-professional texts for science, and for biographies of generally positive, triumphant figures and historical events (you have to watch those-a lot of adult biographies seem to try to be romance novels, if not soft-core porn). She reads a lot of poetry and classic literature, especially more fantastic fiction, and often that's challenging just because of word choice. I have used the Sonlight and Ambleside Online booklists as a guide, and I think of SL, especially, as a way to find books to support a topic, not as a way to teach reading or reading skills.

 

But we also keep a lot of books around that are on the 3rd-6th grade reading level, picture books, novels, children's biographies, children's history books, DK and Usborne non-fiction books. And we have a good number of picture books and children's books down to even 1st grade level. The Kindle and Overdrive apps on the iTouch get a lot of use. We get several of the magazines from the Cricket group, too.

 

And I have at least three separate series of school-type readers for 3rd-6th grade, which are nice anthologies of stories, poems, and sections from books with lots of illustrations and big text. These were a life saver when she was 4-5 years old and, while she could READ almost everything, was overwhelmed by small text sizes and too much print.

 

She will regularly go from reading "The Three Musketeers" to "Painless Earth Science, to "Magic Tree House #4975", to "How do Dinosaurs Clean their rooms", within a day.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

With my kids, the unwritten rule has been that if they're able to do all the reviews and tests for all the ETC books, they're ready to quit reading instruction (phonics). I don't do all the lessons in ETC, either. I don't see the point. When my kids were at that level, they weren't writing yet, so they couldn't do all the exercises for writing practice. They were already spelling pretty well, so there was no sense in drilling. I worked only on the phonics that gave them trouble and moved on.

 

I work on comprehension and critical thinking skills with two book series by EPS (Reading Comp in Varied Subject Matter, and Reasoning & Reading - both have elem, middle, and high school levels). The nice thing about using these books is that I'm not overly concerned about content. Obviously you're not going to hand your 5dd a book written for 5th graders, because she doesn't have the life experience to understand the relationships a 10-11 y/o child is going through. She's still very innocent, presumably, and not really into blood or magic or dating or anything like that. You can broaden her reading by giving her age-appropriate picture books with higher level reading (meant for parents to read aloud to children), and with non-fiction books of her choice. RCiVSM has stories and excerpts from history, math, science, poetry, etc. It's very interesting, even for me!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think this is probably the point where you'll need to stop using a "reading program" and start just having her read. If she's decoding at a 5th or 6th grade level, I don't see any point in continuing with phonics.

 

If I were you (and I was, last year ;)), I would supply her with a mix of books:

 

- Picture books with more complex vocabulary (try Ruth Sanderson fairy tales, for example)

- Sonlight read-alouds for lower age ranges

- High reading level, lower age interest chapter books like the Ramona series, Dick King-Smith, the Oz books, search this forum for more ideas.

- Engaging non-fiction. My daughter really liked the "If You Lived..." series at that age, like If You Lived in Colonial Times and If You Lived 100 Years Ago.

 

Then just talk with her about what she reads. I found that at that age my kid took books a bit too literally - she assumed that what characters said was happening was what was really happening, and missed textual evidence to the contrary. So we'd talk about things like that. Giving narrations is another good way to check comprehension.

 

 

Thanks for those recommendations! The "if you lived..." books sound interesting.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think this is probably the point where you'll need to stop using a "reading program" and start just having her read. If she's decoding at a 5th or 6th grade level, I don't see any point in continuing with phonics.

 

:iagree: We did phonics via spelling. I didn't do a reading program with DS1 at all. It just wasn't necessary.

 

 

As far as skipping ahead, I don't even TRY to reach DD's reading level in most things.

 

:iagree:

 

Once we got into chapter books at a 4th-5th grade level, I stopped worrying about what reading level a book was before giving it to him. I just picked books that I thought he'd enjoy. I picked out several books for "literature" at the beginning of the school year, and they ranged from 2nd to 7th grade reading level. Most are in the 4th-6th range. There are a lot of good, young child friendly books in that range. I get a lot of good quality picture books for history and science (SOTW AG has excellent recommendations that are often in the 4th-5th grade reading level range, and they're lengthy picture books).

 

Also, if you like Sonlight lists, take a look at the read-alouds for the younger cores. Those will be a higher reading level, yet still age appropriate content.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think this is probably the point where you'll need to stop using a "reading program" and start just having her read. If she's decoding at a 5th or 6th grade level, I don't see any point in continuing with phonics.

 

If I were you (and I was, last year ;)), I would supply her with a mix of books:

 

- Picture books with more complex vocabulary (try Ruth Sanderson fairy tales, for example)

- Sonlight read-alouds for lower age ranges

- High reading level, lower age interest chapter books like the Ramona series, Dick King-Smith, the Oz books, search this forum for more ideas.

- Engaging non-fiction. My daughter really liked the "If You Lived..." series at that age, like If You Lived in Colonial Times and If You Lived 100 Years Ago.

 

Then just talk with her about what she reads. I found that at that age my kid took books a bit too literally - she assumed that what characters said was happening was what was really happening, and missed textual evidence to the contrary. So we'd talk about things like that. Giving narrations is another good way to check comprehension.

 

 

:iagree:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My 5yo (also with a May birthday) is reading Sonlights read-alouds for "reading" and skating through the second grade readers. I'm requiring them because they are books she wouldn't pick up naturally, but ones she might enjoy. In her free time, though, she is reading at much higher levels. She enjoys a smattering of picture books and chapter books. Definitely look into picture books because they may fit her interest level yet still be challenging.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...