mommywise Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 (edited) Hi, I have a 1st grader who is not much interested in reading and want to get some ideas how to motivate her and teach her how to read. She gets bored easily when we read (doesn't want to finish the book, even small books with pictures) but would rather draw/craft/dance all day :). Did you have any reluctant learner? What helped you? Should I use some flash card method I'm reading about? Thanks in advance. Edited September 4, 2012 by mommywise added in title Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OrganicAnn Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 - Does she enjoy it when you read aloud to her? Have you increased the length and complexity of your read aloud selections. - Ask her if she finds looking at the words on the page difficult. - Does she tend to avoid things she is not good at? My reluctant reader is the type that avoids things she is not good at. My suggesions: - good phonics program be very consistent about it. - use flash cards for common words to build up a body of words. - have her read 15 minutes per day (20 mintues 2nd grade/30 minutes 3rd grade) every single day. These can be easy books. - have her eyes tested by someone who know about vision therapy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SKL Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 - Does she enjoy it when you read aloud to her? Have you increased the length and complexity of your read aloud selections. - Ask her if she finds looking at the words on the page difficult. - Does she tend to avoid things she is not good at? My reluctant reader is the type that avoids things she is not good at. My suggesions: - good phonics program be very consistent about it. - use flash cards for common words to build up a body of words. - have her read 15 minutes per day (20 mintues 2nd grade/30 minutes 3rd grade) every single day. These can be easy books. - have her eyes tested by someone who know about vision therapy. :iagree: My daughter wouldn't even look at picture books as I read, until around age 5. She'd go do something else across the room. Her vision screening (developmental optometrist, NOT ophthalmologist) explained a lot. Honestly, given my experience, vision would be the first thing I'd check. If she's resistant to words, ease in by asking questions about the pictures and "what do you think will happen next." Try rhyming stories so she can guess the final word etc. Another idea that helped here: a Scholastic storybook video collection, which is basically a series of read-alouds with just enough animation and sound effects to draw in the "reader." You can turn subtitles on or off. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hsingscrapper Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 One thing that worked for my oldest at around that age, and came at my dh's insistent nudging, was to let him read whatever interested him so long as he was reading. Flash forward to 13 and now he tries to talk me into reading-only days! He also needs reading glasses. Good luck!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trilliums Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 I stopped trying to teach him how to read. :) It was surprisingly difficult for me to do this. We read out loud a lot (fiction and non-fiction) and stayed active with hands on activities. He went from a non-reader to reading books such as Eragon at age 9. He is now a voracious reader, much more so than his younger brother who was a self taught reader at a young age. Good luck; I know hiw stressful it can be. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RoughCollie Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 When DS2 was that age, he had a hard time learning to read. It was a brain development problem, I think, because at the end of 2nd grade, he read at a 2nd grade, 1 month level and at the end of a summer without reading lessons, he read the first Harry Potter book to himself with no problem. This leap in reading ability happened every time we took a break from reading lessons (Decembers and summers). What spurred his interest was that he enjoyed being read to. His dad read him Lord of the Rings, and wasn't always home from work in time to read some more of the book. This frustrated DS2, so I pointed out that if he knew how to read, he could finish the book himself. Another frustrating thing for DS2 was that in 2nd grade, he was still having to sound out words like cat. I got the Dolch word list (online) and he memorized that. Before he read a book, I'd list the Dolch words for him to memorize. Being able to read without having to sound out every single word was a big help to him. We used several different reading programs and ended up with a cobbled-together system that was tailored to DS2's needs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ottakee Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 http://www.iseesam.com and http://www.3rsplus.com have great little books that really teach reading with just 10-15 minutes of work a day in very small steps. I post a lot about them on the learning challenges board. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jelbe5 Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 The reading lessons resulted in tears. :glare: She was very interested in comic books. Calvin and Hobbs in particular. I was busy with the autisic boy and little sister and when she kept asking me to read the comics I finally said she was going to have to learn to read herself. So she did! Has never stopped! She reads more than just comics now. :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murphy101 Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 (edited) :confused: Same way I taught all the others? We just keep swimming along... ETA: I don't think I ever spend more than 15-20 minutes tops on any lesson below 3rd grade. It take serious concentration to develop decoding skills and most little ones just can't sustain that for more than 15-20 minutes. It has nothing to do with attention span or interest, tho pushing for longer will often lead to that problem as well. Edited September 4, 2012 by Martha Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
merry gardens Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 I had great difficulty teaching one child to read. Turns out he's dyslexic. I taught him to read using special ed materials developed for people with dyslexia. We often discuss reading struggles on the Special Needs Board, so it might be worth your while posting over there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ellie Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 I plugged away at it. We did Spalding for about six weeks when she was 5yo. We did Spalding for about six weeks when she was 6yo. Then we did R&S's Unit O (which is now titled something else; it's all of the phonics taken out of the Bible Nurture and Reader materials). We did Spalding for about six weeks when she was 7. I didn't require her to read aloud to me or otherwise do any instruction. She picked up books on her own, because we went to the library weekly, but I never required her to read to me, and I didn't try to trick her into reading, lol. I don't think we did Spalding again until she was 9, and then we did it for three months. I burned out all of us by Christmas that year ::facepalm:: So I put all the books away at Thanksgiving and didn't pick them up again until the next fall. Somewhere around February or March, dds (9 and 12yo) began looking at me out the corners of their eyes, lol, and finally older dd asked if we were going to do school and I said no. And I noticed that 9yo was taking books out of the library basket, although I pretended not to notice. One day she came out, looked at the basket, and said, "There's NOTHING TO READ!!!" ::partypartyparty:: So we went to the library and got more books. :D BTW, She started taking community college courses when she was 14, aced all of them, was asked to be valedictorian but turned it down because of all the politics involved. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ferdie Posted September 4, 2012 Share Posted September 4, 2012 For teaching reading I set the timer for 20 minutes and we worked at it everyday. We started with Teaching Your Child to Read in 100 EZ Lessons. The added Phonics Pathways around lesson 50. We moved on to easy reader after that. Once my ds was in beginner chapter books we increase time to 30 minutes. After he was reading on his own, we tracked the books he read with a huge book worm taped to the wall. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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