How much reading to mom in 2nd, 1st, K?

[ThursdayNext]

How much reading aloud to me should I require this year and next? They don't love it, especially the younger one. How can I streamline this for next year?

 

Right now I have a 1st grade girl and preK boy (who is an early reader).

 

After they learned to read and were past the #1 & 2 leveled readers, I just had them read aloud to me from picture books. It was supposed to be every day, but it's more like 2 or 3 days a week. We are working though the Mensa list for K-3rd, but nearing the end of the picture books on that list.

 

They both read on their own, you should see how quiet it is in our house when we get back from the library. And the 1st grader reads to her little brother. But on their own, they skip over difficult words, and I feel like I should make them sound out the big words, go over a little more phonics in context. And also practice reading clearly and with expression. The 5 year old mumbles terribly, reads whisper soft with no expression, and lapses into reading silently when I ask him to read aloud.

 

Any experienced advice?

[HomeAgain]

We practice expression and diction with well-known books: Goodnight Moon, Go Dog Go..things I know he knows well.  Once a child has favorites down, we branch out a little into still easy, but unfamiliar territory and rotate through until those are read well.  Eventually they get to the point where they can look ahead to see the flow of the story and still read at the same time, so the reading aloud is easier.

[Chris in VA]

Agreeing that reading aloud (your children to you) is ideally with books below their challenge level.

(Funny, because it's the opposite when you read to them!)

 

I only required a little bit of reading aloud. I knew dd would not stick with a book she couldn't understand, and, if she could answer a few questions about her reading, I was willing to let her read silently the bulk of the time. The questions were basically in the context of, "Hey, catch me up in your book! What happened in the last chapter?" --not asking picky details. (At that point, she was reading things like Little House and A Little Princess, so I knew she was fine.)

 

We used her history narrations for reading aloud practice, and also her spelling and grammar. We used SWO, and there was always a paragraph at the beginning of the chapter for her to read. Those, along with a bit of reading aloud from books, was about all I required. I wanted her to love reading and was gentle in the process.

 

 

 

Edited March 14, 2016 by Chris in VA

[AggieMama]

I knocked DD down a few levels on Raz Kids when I saw this happening. I was requiring 20 minutes read aloud to me every day, but I backed off a little. DD is now more likely to pick up a book on her own. She's beginning to like reading again. I'm starting to institute a 20 minute independent reading time for DD. We will work up to an hour or more.

[Cake and Pi]

I require that my 2nd grader and Ker read aloud to me for 15 minutes 4x/week, but I may be bringing it down to 2-3x per week next year for 3rd.  We make it fun and take turns.  It most often happens around bedtime.  For stretch material, I often read material aloud to them a day or three before having them read it to me, though DS#1 is getting to where he doesn't need that anymore so we just go over new vocabulary and phrases beforehand.  When they read a very long sentence or a direct quote and it doesn't come out with correct inflection/whatever, I will often say, "It sounds like this..." or "He/she said..." and then they usually try again, copying me.  DS#2 likes to follow along in an actual book while listening to an audio book, then later he will read the book aloud himself (imitating the voices used in the audio book, lol).   With my 4yo (early reader) I aim for 7-8 minutes every day, but sometimes he's done after 5min and sometimes he wants to read for 30+ minutes.  I follow his lead and we read whatever he wants.

[73349]

Rather than going by the time, I have DS read me one section of a chapter in a Pathway Readers book--about 8 pages, with very few hard words, but some long sentences. I know that when he reads to himself, he skips and skims, so I want him to practice reading every word and being expressive.

Edited March 14, 2016 by whitehawk

[ThursdayNext]

Should I stop challenging them then? Do I give them anything with big or tricky words, or vocabulary they don't know? Shorten the reading or stick with picture books? My 1st grader's interest level is in longer books, and she listens to audiobooks every chance she gets. I'd like her to be able to read the books she likes.

 

I do ELTL with my daughter, so I could have her read the Aesop's fable (3 days a week). Maybe have my son read a Milne poem each day. Is that enough?

 

Or would setting a time limit on the read aloud help? I've cut longer books in half, but I often try to push through.

 

Also, my son is getting bored with the books on his level, but can't really advance without more vocabulary. Should I be doing anything to increase his vocabulary? Or just let it come with time? He is good at decoding, but doesn't know the meaning of many words. I have no idea of what is an average receptive vocabulary for a five year old. From recent example, he doesn't know humiliated, coronation, or engaged. He sounded out engaged, didn't know it, and substituted injured. He continued that substitution through the the rest of the story. I guess injuries are more common in little boy world than weddings. ;)

Edited March 14, 2016 by ThursdayNext

[HomeAgain]

Alternate. Pick a single goal for each reading period. You can always schedule it around science or such. Monday, read Danny And The Dinosaur, Tuesday, read a short informational text, Wednesday, read a poem, Thursday, a book about paleontologist so, Friday, How Did The Dinosaur Get To The Museum. Daily work, but you incorporate a well loved story, unknown words, rhythm practice, and work on fluency in the topic.

[mamakelly]

My youngest is 2nd grade. He reads to me 15 min per day, 5 days a week. He has a 15 minute silent reading to himself time also. I have him read the harder books with me, and I don't care what he reads during the 15 minute read to yourself time. I just have him pick something from the library book basket.

[kbutton]

Also, my son is getting bored with the books on his level, but can't really advance without more vocabulary. Should I be doing anything to increase his vocabulary? Or just let it come with time? He is good at decoding, but doesn't know the meaning of many words. I have no idea of what is an average receptive vocabulary for a five year old. From recent example, he doesn't know humiliated, coronation, or engaged. He sounded out engaged, didn't know it, and substituted injured. He continued that substitution through the the rest of the story. I guess injuries are more common in little boy world than weddings. ;)

 

It might be more fruitful for him to come to you when words don't make sense in context--if you can give him recent examples and show how it doesn't make sense in the story, it could help him see them himself.

 

A certain amount of this is just par for the course with kids who like to read everything they pick up, but I have seen older kids who do this too much, and it has really hurt their reading comprehension in all subjects. Another thing I've seen is when kids can figure out what a word means, but not recognize it in "real life" when they hear it. Again, this is to be expected to some extent, but it can build up and create a problem. I know some people figure kids will eventually put the pieces together, but that's just not always the case.

 

BTW, some Kindle books have definitions available in the text (I think it shows up as something you can touch and expand the definition). You can turn this feature on or off. If you have a Kindle, you might check out some e-books from the library and let him use this feature.

 

You could potentially work on short reading passages from magazines, any kind of book, etc. and pull out bigger/harder words and ask him how he'd figure out what they mean. If he has multiple strategies to check his own comprehension, the problem may solve itself. I have one that is good about self-correcting (though he's very literal at times and will make a mistake because of that), and I have one that has to work harder at vocabulary. I am keeping close tabs on the one who doesn't just pick up vocabulary on his own. We will do a vocabulary program with him (it's currently built into a couple of his subjects).

[wintermom]

Should I stop challenging them then? Do I give them anything with big or tricky words, or vocabulary they don't know? Shorten the reading or stick with picture books? My 1st grader's interest level is in longer books, and she listens to audiobooks every chance she gets. I'd like her to be able to read the books she likes.

 

I do ELTL with my daughter, so I could have her read the Aesop's fable (3 days a week). Maybe have my son read a Milne poem each day. Is that enough?

 

Or would setting a time limit on the read aloud help? I've cut longer books in half, but I often try to push through.

 

Also, my son is getting bored with the books on his level, but can't really advance without more vocabulary. Should I be doing anything to increase his vocabulary? Or just let it come with time? He is good at decoding, but doesn't know the meaning of many words. I have no idea of what is an average receptive vocabulary for a five year old. From recent example, he doesn't know humiliated, coronation, or engaged. He sounded out engaged, didn't know it, and substituted injured. He continued that substitution through the the rest of the story. I guess injuries are more common in little boy world than weddings. ;)

 

I'd often do team reading aloud with my guys when they were younger. I'd read a page, they'd read a page, (or in science books it might be a caption). That way you can ask along the way whether he understands words, you can discuss them, and you can correct his pronunciation immediately. You can cover a wider variety of topics and levels, and slip reading practice in with science, history, or even technology (e.g., Minecraft books). 

[Mama Geek]

I have spent a lot of time working with reading and phonics with dd, she turns 6 this summer.  She does a read aloud for 30 minutes a day.  I had her reading little house on the prairie in my lap and she wasn't enjoying it mostly because the size of the book was intimidating.  She now is happily reading from the NIV bible for half and hour a day on the computer.  (Take into account that she has heard us read aloud many hours from the bible so she is familiar with a lot of the vocabulary and sentence structure.)  Just within the last couple of weeks she said she would like to read silently more of the time.  I am now letter her read silently every other day and we discuss what she reads and she still reads aloud every other day with me helping her with words she doesn't know.  In her free time she often picks up picture books or small chapter books and reads them now.

[...................]

We plugged through the pathway readers until my kids could easily read the grade 3 books. My son thought it was torture; my daughter loved the stories.

 

I think using graded readers makes it easy to get it done, consistently. But for boys I would choose the Abeka readers which at least have some variety other than farm life :)

[pehp]

Well, for my third grader I am using the old Garrard Discovery books (American history biographies) as his "readers"--one chapter per day to me, and that's it.  They are below his actual reading level.  But I think it's better to read aloud BELOW the level so they can get really fluent and familiar and confident with reading aloud.  

 

My son didn't read well until he was 7, so I did not require any of this in K or 1st.  In 2nd grade we read through some of the leveled readers like Hill of Fire, some American history-type books, Wagon Wheels, Titanic Lost and Found, etc.  One chapter a day, or if there were no chapters, then only a few pages a day. Less is more..I don't want my child to dread reading aloud to me!

 

On a positive note, my son is a confident reader-aloud-er.  He stunned us in church recently by reading aloud a passage with words I had no idea he knew how to read and nailing every single one.  So, it seems to be working!!! 

[ThursdayNext]

It might be more fruitful for him to come to you when words don't make sense in context--if you can give him recent examples and show how it doesn't make sense in the story, it could help him see them himself.

 

A certain amount of this is just par for the course with kids who like to read everything they pick up, but I have seen older kids who do this too much, and it has really hurt their reading comprehension in all subjects. Another thing I've seen is when kids can figure out what a word means, but not recognize it in "real life" when they hear it. Again, this is to be expected to some extent, but it can build up and create a problem. I know some people figure kids will eventually put the pieces together, but that's just not always the case.

 

BTW, some Kindle books have definitions available in the text (I think it shows up as something you can touch and expand the definition). You can turn this feature on or off. If you have a Kindle, you might check out some e-books from the library and let him use this.

The idea of him coming to me when a word doesn't make sense is nice in theory. But it's never going to happen. This kid is way too independent. He just turned 5, so he's not going to be looking up words in a dictionary. We have a kindle, but I'm not sure that we want him to use it for reading often, or if he would learn to check definitions of words on it. I could ask home questions when I read to him, but I can't tell when he doesn't know a word, and hate interrupting the flow. I do that a little bit, but not much. So I guess I will keep having him read to me, some easy books and some challenging.

[horsellian]

He just turned 5, so he's not going to be looking up words in a dictionary.

My 6 year old loves to look up words in the dictionary, because she thinks it's very grown-up! She got herself a "schools" dictionary with Christmas money and is delighted with it. It does have shorter definitions than our 2-volume dictionary, and is much easier for her to use.