Reading III

The day after my last post we had a big breakthrough in reading.  I had forgotten to mention that he knows a couple words by sight in addition to 'stop'. One of these is 'zoo', and more recently he's learned 'exit' (which is great word to point out because there are signs for it everywhere). He was playing on our keyboard when he said "Hey Dad, it say's exit." I went over there and sure enough, there was an 'exit' button on the keyboard. This is the first time he's pointed out a sight word without prompting from me (aside from 'stop'). 

In addition to the above I had another cause to be happy this weekend. We were away at my wife's family's house this weekend.  While there I was having him show his grandparents that he could read letters in a word.  I pulled a magnet off the shelf that said "Boston" and he went through all the letters, which is something he can do pretty easily now.  What surprised me was when I asked him to sound it out, he went through and made the right sounds for each letter (like this: "Bh - oh - sss - t - oh -nnnn").  Now, he didn't string it all together and say Boston, but this is the first time he has sounded something out like this without any help from me.

He still doesn't like the "Flesch/Flash" cards when I bring them out.  He usually puts up with one or two of them before wanting to read a book or do something else instead. I find it's much easier to get him to sound out words while we read a book. I think this just reinforces the point that what works for each parent/child is different and the important thing is to just do the things you guys like to do (but find a way to incorporate learning the alphabet, letters, etc.. into it).

A summary of the tools that I have found helpful:
-Reading books he likes every day (ie space, moon, monsters, dragons, pop-up books, etc...)
  -While reading occasionally asking him to identify a word
  -Making it a point to go to the library regularly to get new books
-Foam letters from the dollar store (these were great for teaching the letters and then sounds, and now we play with them in the bath to make "words" and practice sounding them out).
-Using a text editor, turn the font way up and let him press buttons (you can ask him to find the "a", for example.  You can use cap locks too if you want to limit to upper case).
-Some games on PBS Kids Online ("Pig's alphabricks", "Dog's Letter Pit")
-Pointing out words in the world, such as STOP signs, EXIT signs, OPEN signs, BUS signs
-For the alphabet just reading a lot of alphabet books (finding ones with lower case letters is more difficult)

Things I tried that he didn't like:
-I made cards for letters a couple months back, hoping he would like to match them for a memory game.  His interest in this was modest at best.
-Bob books are ok, but quite boring, and I find the simplified grammar in the early ones almost make them harder to read because he wants to add the right words in to keep them from being unnatural.  That being said, we do occasionally read them and he really liked the first page of each book where there were the letters being introduced and a picture of a word that starts with it.
-And as mentioned the flash cards with words on them, although perhaps at some point he'll like them

Reading Part II

So my son didn't like the cards. We just got through the holidays, and then everyone got very sick so there wasn't as much structure as I normally like when I am off.  Of course, everyone got better but then I had to work a week of nights so there was less time for me to read to him.  Now that things have settled down and I don't have to work I thought I would review what is new.

Yesterday I was surprised when he called me over to tell me that there was the word "exit" on the keyboard button, this is the first time he's really pointed out a word other than "STOP" on a stop sign (which of course have plenty of visual clues that don't require actually looking at the letters).  My "plan" has really not changed:  I try to sit down and read with him at least three times a day (probably 1-1.5 hrs total time) and switch between reading things for fun and pointing at the words as we go along, occasionally asking him to try and sound it out (haven't really had a successful sounding yet, although he is very good at identifying the letters).  Usually it goes like this:

I ask: "What does that say?"
JT: " C-A-T ... CAT!" (or HAT!, or some other word)

In addition we play some online reading games. It took a while to find games that asked to sound out letters and make words. My favorite for him at this stage is called "Dog's Letter Pit" and is on the PBS Kids website. He used to really like it but he now only tolerates it for about 3-4 words before getting bored.

Today the library opens at 11 AM so we can go get some more books.  This last checkout round (has it really been three weeks ago that we last went?) I especially enjoyed "Put Me in the Zoo" by Lopshire.