Guidance on building reading habits/fluency

[kubiac]

Can you guys help me educate myself on the next step in reading "instruction"?

 

DS-almost-five can read. We finished the BOB books, and he does very well (although not flawlessly) with the likes of Frog and Toad, Little Bear, Beginner Books, etc.

 

Anyway, now that the "mechanics" are mastered, what do I do to help him build stamina, fluency and a passion for reading?He has a bedroom library of "I Can Read" level books and I plan on reading aloud to him until he has his driver's license.

 

Do you have your kids read a certain number of pages/books per day/week? Should I entice him with appealing twaddle like Ninjago books?

 

I feel like I was ready for "learning to read" but now I'm overwhelmed by the thought of guiding him through "reading to learn." Help?

[Kiara.I]

Read to him.  Read really good, really interesting novels.  Read to him, read to him, read to him.  Provide books.  Read to yourself.  Make it a familiy culture to have a book in hand multiple times a day.

 

If it's an interesting thing to do, he'll do it.

[Tanaqui]

1. Start a good book that he can read.

2. When you get to an exciting point, put it down and go to the bathroom. "Sorry, kiddo, it's urgent!"

3. Wait for him to finish the book on his own.

 

Method two, to be used in conjunction:

 

1. Start a chapter book that he can't read on his own.

2. At the end of the chapter, put it away. "Gotta leave you hanging into tomorrow!"

3. Act surprised when you find him sounding out the words, then carefully tuck the book on a higher shelf.

 

Method three, also to be used in conjunction:

 

1. Announce that he's not allowed to read at the breakfast table, or until he's finished making his bed.

2. When he gets ready for bed quickly, allow him to read for 15 minutes before you shut off the light, "because you're so big now, so you can have a later bedtime". Reading is the dessert, not the health food. I've always felt that reverse psychology is more useful than requiring a set amount of reading (or whatever).

 

Method 4:

 

1. Always have a book with you for YOU to read, and a book with you for HIM to read. I never go anywhere, not even to the grocery store, without at least one book. My family asks what I think will happen to me while waiting in line, and I say "I don't know, but when it does, I'll be glad I had something to read!"

[forty-two]

In addition to what Kiara.I said - which I completely agree with - it sounds like he's learned the beginning/intermediate mechanics (which I think of as roughly covering single and multi-letter phonograms, simple and complex single syllable words and some common two and three syllable words), but probably hasn't learned the advanced mechanics (tackling longer and unfamiliar multi-syllable words).  A lot of programs end once they've covered all the phonograms and all the syllable types, assuming that the application to longer, multi-syllable words will happen automatically. 

 

Except that it doesn't for a lot of kids, even strong readers.  *I've* learned a lot from explicitly learning how to chunk multi-syllable words and how to experiment with where to place the accent.  I used to never, ever be able to pronounce words I learned from my reading, because my ability to break them into syllables and place the accent was extremely lacking - left to myself, I had cobbled together an approach (which is more than some kids manage), so I could "read" long, unfamiliar words, but my pronunciation was wrong 90% of the time.  (Which is really embarrassing, and I was always censoring my speech to avoid words I didn't know how to say.)  My cobbled-together approach just didn't reflect how English words generally behave, and had no flexibility to allow me to try something different if my first try didn't sound right.  Readers *need* to be able to handle unfamiliar multi-syllable words, and though some manage to intuit the structure without being taught, a majority don't - they intuit a shallow and incomplete structure, or don't manage to intuit enough to have *any* internal sense of the structure of long or complicated words.  And it really limits what a person can read - you can be functionally literate, enough to get on in society, but without the skills to interact with complex texts.

 

Unfortunately I can't give btdt recs for advanced phonics, because my kids have phonological processing issues and so the non-remedial things we've done didn't do a thing for dd8 (Reading Pathways and Webster's Speller: RP was easy to use and we did all the multi-syllable practice, which I did like - just couldn't make up for dd8's underlying deficits; we did 60 or so lessons in WS, but dd8 *loathed* it and in retrospect it both didn't make up for her underlying deficits *and* hit her other weaknesses, which is probably why), and the less intensive remedial program required better phonological processing skills than dd8 had (Sopris West's REWARDS, which is too much for a 5yo anyway).  We're now doing a very intensive remedial program (LiPS), which is overkill for neurotypical kids.  There's been discussions about hitting advanced phonics on the board, though, and many people use spelling programs to hit those skills.

[Tanikit]

This will depend on what works for your child. With my eldest I just kept having her read aloud to me increasing the amount she was reading until she was reading a chapter at a time out loud. At that point giving her books to read by herself would have her zooming through 3 chapters in a very short time and at that point I stopped her reading aloud to me except for school reading and reading the Bible (as this ensured checking vocabulary and multi-syllable words which we had already worked on extensively during the other read aloud times.

 

I am still reading to my child. I sometimes pick various articles for her to read during school work now which she reads aloud as non-fiction articles come with their own challenges.

 

My younger now 4 has taken off with her reading too and I will be guiding her through the same steps you are asking about, however her stamina is much greater than her sister's was at the same age, but her phonics still needs some work (her sister coped better with the phonics rules than she has) as she is moving into multi-syllable words. Since she is a young 4 we are also working some on fluency (again it is better than her sister's was at the same age). I do plan just to have her reading aloud to me daily but perhaps only once a day unlike her sister who had 2 much shorter sessions. 

 

The elder needed more guided reading since she could not sit still to read a book alone (she was doing handstands and jumping constantly but was quite happy to read like that - it just meant I had to keep her place with a piece of paper) The younger is much quieter and less boisterous and will pile up blankets and pillows in the bath and sit reading to herself for fun so I suspect she will be independent long before her sister was - however with the phonics issues I will probably need separate phonics lessons for her will need to check her pronunciation more than I have had to with the older.

 

Find what works for your child. They are all different. The most important is to find books he loves and that excite him - ones you read and ones he reads.

[Kalmia]

Reading aloud to your child. Having him/her read to you. Popcorn reading. Modeling reading. Rereading the same books over and over.

 

All of that, plus you may want to continue reading instruction under the guise of spelling so that the more complex phonograms and spelling rules are added to your child's repertoire. All About Spelling, Logic of English, Spalding all have good programs.

 

Here is a nice introductory lecture by Denise Eide of Logic of English. She has a whole free teacher training program on the Logic of English Channel on Youtube.

 

[Btervet]

We are at about the same stage with my just turned 5 year old. I take a few different approaches.

 

I have him read a lesson in McGuffey's 2nd reader every day. This is what stretches him right now, and it also slows him down to improve his verbal reading skills, as he tends to skip words or switch stuff around if he isn't careful or the book is too easy.

 

He gets an hour of quiet time each day, without me there. He is only allowed to read or sleep. He almost always reads now, though sometimes it is just looking at pictures. He is allowed to read anything during this time.

 

We have a reading session before bed. We each read two things. I read a picture book (or similar length) book to him. He reads a short book (picture book or reader) to me. Then he reads a chapter of a chapter book (Magic Tree House level) to me, and I read a chapter of our read-aloud to him. He loves this because his reading mirrors mine, but is on his own level. He likes finishing a quick book, but also likes having a big chapter book he is working on.

 

Personally, I wish we didn't have any of the 'twaddle' readers. Some of them are horrible, and have random extremely difficult words. I cannot stand them. We still have them around, but I don't encourage them at all. I found that when he discovered he could read most picture books, those replaced the readers.

[kubiac]

Thank you for each and every response, they are just what I needed.

 

You guys are unequivocally The Best.

[EmseB]

I bought a lot of books about children's literature, and I look at different curriculum companies (SL, MP, VP) to see their book lists for recommended age groups.  Then, usually Amazon will start recommending me stuff based on what I buy from that list.  I don't like enticing with branded stuff because there's so much good stuff out there.

 

I'm at about the spot you are with DS5 and I just keep buying things like Frog and Toad, Little Bear, Dr. Seuss, etc for him to read.   A thriftier person would use the library, but I suck at returning books, so $3-4/reader works out.  It's hard to keep this age in books, I think, because you don't want dumb, but you do want it to be on their level.  My secret weapon is that his older brother devours books, and he wants to be just like his older brother.  But I don't know where to get a voraciously reading older brother for your DS.

[Tanikit]

I also used Sonlight's readers grade 2 and 3 to move my eldest along as the books chosen were good and certainly through the grade 3 readers moved them to reading longer books - my DD did not read them all or on the schedule provided - I just chose the ones that suited her.

[ElizabethB]

Keep up the phoncs until he can read at a 12th grade level and then reading anything will be easy!

 

http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Reading/WellTaughtPhonicsStudent.html

 

Also, do a phonics review at the beginning of each year for at least the next 3 years even if he gets to the 12th grade level soon, reading is too important to leave to chance, and you can quickly work through all the things on my page above in the first week or so of each school year.

[SharonUF]

There are quite a few books in the public domain that might help. Reading McGuffey lessons out loud to you at an easier level will help him build fluency and stamina as the lessons get longer and harder through each book. Also there are vintage books of stories "written in words of one syllable" where larger words a broken up for the new reader. Third idea is RLTL which uses the Elson Reader and use it more for spelling and studying phonograms. The most important thing is to read to him and him read aloud to you.

[ALB]

 

Personally, I wish we didn't have any of the 'twaddle' readers. Some of them are horrible, and have random extremely difficult words. I cannot stand them. We still have them around, but I don't encourage them at all. I found that when he discovered he could read most picture books, those replaced the readers.

Me, too!  I really love for my kids to be entirely surrounded by quality literature, but in the real world we somehow end up with less than wonderful books that were given to us or we accumulated somehow.  I try to gently steer my kids away from simple series books as much as I can without sounding too dictatorial.  

As everyone else has said, just keep reading!  My daughter immediately moved on to devouring every book in sight, while my son (7 yr) would usually rather play.  He's getting there, though.  Last week he picked up Misty of Chincoteague to read for fun.  I was secretly thrilled he chose that over the Magic Treehouse books that he usually loves.

[SharonUF]

Another suggestion is to listen to audio books and read along in the book at the same time. This is especially good for challenging books. Both my boys like to do this.