x-post from General Ed board pls help me decide how much to require of dd

[MotherGoose]

Dd 8 (3rd grade) pretty much taught herself to read and enjoys reading. However, I have noticed that lately she's gravitating to twaddle and books that are too easy for her. We are going to start with "A Little Princess" next week. It won't be a huge challenge for her. We are going through McGuffey's 4th reader (near the end now) for practice reading aloud--a couple of times a week for 10 mins. No big deal, and I'm not worried about her reading aloud. She's doing MCP's Plaid Phonics, because she was so young when we did OPG (even though she made huge leaps ahead of the program, we still went through it) that she doesn't remember rules. It's also no big deal, a few pages a week she does independently. We are doing Sequential Spelling, which I really like. And we are doing Wordly Wise, level 4. It's interesting to me to see how there are words I thought she knew that she doesn't. I like it too. I have tried picking vocabulary out of things we read, but I'm not consistent with it.

I have posted before about how she's decided to write a book, which she worked pretty hard on for awhile, and is now taking a break from it and wants to write poetry. I have an Evan-Moor book that we are working through, and also "Writing Magic" for when she gets tired of poetry. My plan for other writing is for her to do narration and copywork from "A Little Princess," and she also is doing Mystery of History through a coop and will be doing some narrations for that.

Sooo for the reading: She is easily frightened by books. She's read the first 4 Harry Potter books but could only do that in the daytime. We are reading "A Little White Horse" together because she found it scary. I don't think "A Little Princess" is scary, hope not anyway. It certainly has some sad partsBut she seems to either have to be dragged through a book or else she finishes it in a day. And then I find her reading easy stuff instead of more complicated assigned things. I don't want her to allow her to do what I did: I was also an early reader, but read a lot of Sweet Valley High when I was older and Babysitter's Club when I was younger and junk like that instead of literature. I was ahead, but then was allowed to read junk and was not trained to enjoy literature. YWIM?

If you've made it this far, thank you. I have all the books from Ambleside Year 3's free reads. They are at a good level for her. Here's my main question: what's reasonable to expect of her? How quickly should we get through these? Should I have her read a chapter a day of "A Little Princess" and then narrate to me? She could easily read a chapter a day of it. And do I ban Geronimo Stilton and other too easy books that are twaddle? I know I need to find a balance but I'm not sure what that is. And any suggestions for books on her reading level that aren't scary I'd appreciate too. She's very sensitive.

[JennW in SoCal]

Please don't take away or ban any book that your dd is enjoying.  Don't make any judgement about it, just let her be.  Sometimes developing minds need a break, need something comforting, and if she enjoys the twaddle, let her enjoy it. Kids also seem to regress sometimes after periods of advancing by leaps and bounds.  It is as if their minds need to rest and regroup before moving on.  It is hard as a parent to let go during these periods, hard to know if there is a legitimate need to rest or if it is actually time to push.  

 

My approach to introducing quality literature was to read aloud.  If the book caught their fancy they could (and often would) pick it up and continue reading it on their own.  If they didn't particularly enjoy the book I'd wind up reading the entire thing aloud rather than .  If something was really detested we'd drop it.  I didn't expect narrations at the age of 8.  We discussed books -- talked about the things we enjoyed, whether it was the characters or the setting.  Reading and sharing literature was simply something we enjoyed as a family, and STILL enjoy now that my boys are grown.  I didn't turn it into assignments with written output until they were in high school.  I realize your dd WANTs to write and you are looking for ways to help her develop that.  Follow her lead as much as you can.  There will be seasons where she backs away from it, and hard as it is, let the writing go.  Talk about writing you love as you share books, read aloud favorite poems, play word games.  

 

I can empathize with knowing she gets frightened from certain books.  One of my kids in particular was a very sensitive soul, and I had to be really mindful and creative about it in choosing literature all the way through high school.  Harry Potter definitely gets dark -- I was fortunate to be raising kids while the books were still being written -- we had a built in break between books so that my kids were maturing at a pace to handle each succeeding book!   

 

Off the top of my head, some non-scary books...

 

Anything by Lynn Reid Banks, the Indian in the Cupboard series for instance and others.  I, Houdini was a huge favorite in my house.

Stuart Little, Trumpet of the Swan and Charlotte's Web

Babe and other books by Dick King Smith

From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler 

Heidi

Secret Garden (perhaps as a read aloud?)

 

I'm sure others will have some great suggestions -- it's been a while so I can't remember what all we read!

 

You are doing a great job in choosing material for your dd.  Trust that she WILL learn to love literature even though she likes to relax with twaddle.  

[MotherGoose]

Thanks so much! I haven't banned any books. Finding a balance of challenge and leaving her to her 8 year old self is difficult. She devoured novels in 1-2 grade but after you go thru Ramona and magic tree house and lots of others I start to run out.

[SanDiegoMom]

My kids are scared easily by books. The best luck we've had are The Saturdays and the Penderwicks, and whenever they need a go-to book at night they read Calvin and Hobbes.

[EndOfOrdinary]

It wasn't until this year (age 10, Grade 5) that I started really assigning novels to be read independently. Everything before this year was either a read aloud or personal reading. Where asked about books, I would steer him toward ones that I thought would like that were classics, but nothing was absolute. Read alouds happen every night unless he is too deep into his own book, and they often will happen during the day as well. As Ds has gotten bigger, I honestly wish I woukd have read aloud more. If you want her to enjoy classical books, just read them aloud more.

 

Recognize that some kids flat out do not like them. You do not "train" someone to enjoy something. You can make the process easier. You can guide people to selections they might enjoy. You can be excited yourself. However, there is no way to make her like anything or to create a situation where she is going to like something. She is the only person who can decide to put in the engaged work and learn.

 

I would love for my son to get geeked out about math. I have picked great curriculum, done projects, used art, talked it up, built catapults, let him blow stuff up...no dice. He is not into math. He's not bad at it, but he is not excited about it either. He wants classics. He wants languages. I cannot change that.

 

So read Classics to her, but she might always want People magazine. Talk with her about great language, expose her to beautiful writing, have her see you reading Great Books, but she might turn right around and bring out Captian Underpants. Maybe her thing is going to be chemistry. Maybe art, theater, or fixing cars. Maybe Hebrew. She is more than likely too young yet to find herself in the Classics, or chemistry, or Hebrew to have decided yet what she is going to get geeked out about.