The last eleven lessons in the OPGTR

[Noreen Claire]

DS8 is a voracious reader. He prefers nonfiction books, and reads (and discusses with us) many math and science books well above his age/grade level. His current bedtime book is the fourth Harry Potter, he recently finished both Greek Gods and Greek Heroes by Rick Riordan, and he routinely reads whatever middle-grade graphic novels DS11 leaves around the house. This is all to say that he has shown himself to be a very good reader, with excellent comprehension and a large vocabulary.

We've been working through the Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading since starting in 1st grade (he showed no desire to learn to read in K, and I didn't push it). He's never, not once, had trouble with any of the lessons, but since I've heard SWB mention that students who are natural readers sometimes have trouble in the upper grades because they abandoned the later phonics lessons, I've been determined to just finish the lessons. However, we recently hit lesson 221 (out of 231), and suddenly DS8 is having all sorts of trouble. Most of the words are ones that he *uses* in everyday conversations, (e.g., charade, mechanic, maneuver, unique, etc.), but he can't seem to pronounce them when he reads out loud. I can't tell if he's guessing, or looking at them like sight words, or what. He reads the word "unique" as "unquite," the word "chandelier" with a hard /CHa/ instead of a soft /SHa/, the word "plaque" is "playkee." I asked him to read the sentence (from lesson 228), "I do not need all of that repetitious information in order to plan my trip," and he got all of the words except "repetitious" which he wouldn't even attempt. He dislikes breaking down words into syllables to sound them out. I think it's because he's never had trouble reading before, so he doesn't think he should have to do it?

I am going to just repeat and repeat and repeat these last lessons until they stick, but what else can I do? I was thinking maybe we could make flash cards of the words that give him trouble, with the word on one side and the rule on the other. I also have Wise Owl Polysyllables on the shelf, I can add that in, a page or two a day. What else would you recommend?

[Little Green Leaves]

My 8 year old sometimes does stuff like this. I did too as a kid. I think when you spend a lot of time reading, you kind of develop your own private version of the way words "sound." Then it can feel weird actually saying words out loud. I STILL mispronounce words like "monastery" and "episcopal". 

Maybe having him read out loud to you would help?

[domestic_engineer]

The phonics videos or Syllables Spell Success videos from ElizabethB.    thephonicspage.org

[Noreen Claire]

8 hours ago, Little Green Leaves said:

Maybe having him read out loud to you would help?

That's a good idea, thanks.

2 hours ago, domestic_engineer said:

The phonics videos or Syllables Spell Success videos from ElizabethB.    thephonicspage.org

Thank you!

[domestic_engineer]

I also used other resources from ElizabethB and don potter; There was one (Webster’s Speller?) that had bigger words already divided into syllables and grouped by where the accented syllable fell. 
 

(maybe the polysyllables book would do all this. I was procrastinating on buying that book, but that was my next thing to try.)

[EKS]

Perhaps a different approach would help?

I used REWARDS Intermediate with my younger son who was a strong reader.  It teaches a flexible strategy for dealing with multisyllabic words.  He loved it.