A Confused Mother

A lot of kids are NOT ready to read in kindergarten or first grade. My middle son didn’t read well until third grade. He was reading “Green Eggs and Ham” at the beginning of the year. By the end of the year, he was reading “The Hardy Boys”. What special interventions did we do? We read to him every day and waited until he got older.

It isn’t good to give kids a complex about reading this young. When I went to school, there was not nearly the emphasis on reading early that there is now, and it was accepted that some kids didn’t learn to read well until later. They were NOT labelled LD, they were just worked with. Sure, a few of them had real problems, but most just needed more pre-reading efforts instead of forcing them to do reading that is still over their heads.

The best thing you can do for a late reader is to get them a reading buddy. There are programs all over where volunteers go into the schools and read to kids, just for fun. It takes a lot of the stress out of reading, and makes it more interesting, as the kids can choose their own stories. I really think reading only happens when the child comes to the conclusion that learning to read will be good for them, rather than just keeping the teachers happy. Reading is a magical activity that opens worlds of possibilities for us. It shouldn’t be a chore or an obligation. See if you can get him into a pre-reading program and get the teachers to turn the heat off. If you can’t, you might want to look into another school setting, maybe a charter school, where early reading is not overstressed. Or try homeschooling. But I wouldn’t sweat it if a 6-year-old boy doesn’t read well yet. Many of them do not. He seems intelligent and interested in life, so he will probably figure it out eventually, if all the joy of it isn’t stamped out too early for him.

–- Steve

I seem to remember that I was about 7 when I started to learn to read. I also remember having some trouble with it. Vague memories of the shock of being expected to decipher marks on a page all of a sudden, instead of just enjoying the pictures. People will really have to get used to the idea that a little 6 or 7 year old brain is easily shocked like that. Gentleness and patience are called for above everything else. Schools should teach 6 year olds how to learn, not subjects. Unfortunately, school systems everywhere are selling the notion of deadlines and failures and non-compliance. It’s all just sad, pointless vicarious striving and must ultimately negatively affect the recipient of such hurried, harried, judgemental treatment.

A mistake the school system made with me was to try to interest me in reading by giving me things to read. As Steve points out, a love of reading is engendered by first hearing from books, not by reading them. What is the point of learning the mechanics of reading at the tender age of six if that learning experience is going to put you off non-compulsory reading for life? Parents and teachers should first show by example the worth, and their love, of books. READ TO YOUR CHILDREN AND STUDENTS. And let them see you reading.

Given that your son is an individual, who would know better than you what should be “done with him”. The following might help you to form a strategy though.

The minute you got that capital letter diagnosis you opened up the door to all kinds of prejudice. If you don’t think that’s true, ask yourself: Which is the most intelligent group overall, 100 children with ADHD or 100 without ADHD? If there is any leaning either way there is prejudice. If you can be even a little prejudiced against the diagnosed children, imagine what people who don’t have children with that diagnosis think.

If your son is getting 100% in all his math tests (math tests at 6, it’s a scary, scary, scary world) is it not possible that holding him back a year, for reading, might engender a new problem as math suddenly gets very old and boring? He’s already in danger in that area if he’s consistently being given tasks that are too simple. Better no tasks than boring tasks. 6 year olds should be getting most stuff wrong. That’s how a person learns and grows - by making mistakes, not by regurgitating too-simple lessons.

Have you reviewed WHAT he’s being asked to read? Not just the reading level but the content as far as its being interesting to a 6 year old and, more specifically, to your son. Perhaps, you could take him to the library or a bookshop and let him grab what he wants…then borrow or buy that book. Tell him you’ll buy it if he can read some of it aloud.

The most important lesson a child can learn at school, or anywhere else, is what success feel like. If his school is teaching that failure is a possibility, he’d be better off with no school. Why do schools reinforce failure based on an arbitrary timetable? Success leads to success and failure leads to failure. If reading success for him means A is for Apple, then that’s the level he should be at, but he doesn’t have to go into another room in order to read a different book…unless his teacher is a failure.

Have you considered going right back to basics. Maybe he doesn’t like words all strung together in a line, or on multiple pages. Maybe he doesn’t like black type on a white background. Why not open a Word Doc and list all the 3 and 4 letter words you can think of, in a nice big font, and have him read them aloud. Or list them on paper. Or make a memory game with paper squares using word pairs instead of pictures. He can’t win the pairs unless he can say the word.

Tell him what a great reader he is. ***** is a great reader. Oh, ***** is the best reader in his class. ***** was reading when he was only a baby. Within his earshot, all the time - he’ll believe whatever you say (so never say anything negative and don’t allow teachers to).

The other end of this spectrum is to scream in his ear that he is a fool who will never be any good at reading and who is always behind everyone else because he’s dumb!

Now, with the former being 0 and the this latter being 10, where would you rate his school’s approach? Got your answer? Now, isn’t that scary? Don’t stand for it.

It is possible that it is the ADHD but the fact that he doesn’t have the same difficulties with math suggests to me that the problem is bigger than ADHD. Either he is just not developmentally ready to read or he has LD. Realize that if he is LD, another year of doing the same thing will not help him and that he will be bored with the math. Kids who are ADHD are statistically more likely than other kids to have learning problems.

Personally, I wouldn’t hold him back. He is uneven—great at math and weak at reading. That tends to be the profile of a classic dyslexic. I held my own son back in fourth grade and it was of great benefit to him so I am hardly biased against doing so. But my son was socially immature and had broad based LDs that affected both reading and math.

You also have a whole summer between first and second grade in which you could directly teach him to read or hire a tutor.

Beth

Waiting for kids to get ready just doesn’t work. There is no magic “reading maturity” gene. People have for years done this sloppy sentimental talk about “the gift of time” and “let them be kids”; but if you read the research, it says that kids who have trouble reading in Grade 1 have about an 80 to 90 percent chance of reading trouble later. Do you want to just wait and bet against those odds?

What works is actually teaching the child to read, and teaching at an *appropriate level*. Start with simple and work towards complex step by step. Make sure he knows all the alphabet (often surprising gaps), then that he can give a sound for each letter especially the short vowels, then that he can figure out simple short-vowel words *on his own* (not memorize and guess), and *only then* simple books with common irregular words — and I teach kids to sound those out left to right too since it is MUCH easier to lear a few irregular vowels or silent letters than it is to brute force memorize several thousand words. Step by step, organized and learnable (not a magical mystery tour), no guesswork but understanding what he is doing and why.

Whether he has this diagnosis or that, he still needs to learn to read, and it always works best if you use research-based and time-tested methods (they are the same, don’t let anyone tell you different).

Children naturally want to learn and develop. If you give him *appropriate* work, not so difficult that he gives up and not so easy that he is bored silly, he should enjoy mastering it. This should be something he is proud to master. Don’t overdo it, a maximum of three twenty-minute sessions per day, and he will soon be asking for more.

There are many good reading programs out ther. On this board you will get recommendations for five or six different favourites. If they are research based — that is, they use systematic phonics combined with oral reading and feedback and vocabulary development — they can all work and all have good points. Choose what fits your style and your budget.

If you would like my collected tutoring outlines, now a large book in progress, please email me at [email protected]

You are right, Victoria, and I am not counseling just waiting. I believe readiness is an issue that is affected deeply by “pre-reading” activities. I am saying that forcing a child to read out loud to the teacher or to do activities that demand a higher reading level than they possess is foolishness and is destructive. Kids do need instruction, but it should be fun and it should be at exactly the level they are ready for. And I do want to stress again that many, many, many children do not read well in first grade. It is as bizarre as expecting all one year olds to walk. Some do, and some don’t. I really think that many of the later problems that you properly observe occur in kids who read late occur PRECISELY BECAUSE we try to force them to move forward faster than they are ready, and they become discouraged and learn that reading is a hateful and unpleasant task.

A good tutor is a great idea. But there was a recent study out here in Oregon that showed that just having a minimall trained adult spend 1/2 hour once a week reading books of the child’s choice with the child, plus giving them two free books of their choice to take home each month, created the necessary improvements to move these kids from below the expected grade-level benchmarks to above them.

Reading instruction is very important, but it needs to be appropriate to the child’s level of development. If we ignore that fact, we create bad readers who hate reading.

–- Steve

It can help to have a child read simple books to their pets. Pets are none judgemental, won’t correct your reading and have a lot of patience.

http://www.therapyanimals.org/read/

Steve and scifi, I must respectfully disagree. Respectfully but forcefully.

I feel very strongly about this, having seen a very large number of people’s lives wasted (and that is not too strong a word, for a dropout drinking all day and unable to hold a job) out of a combination of taking the easy and cute choice plus stubbornness from people who refuse to change their ways even when confronted with facts.

There are “studies” and then there are studies. The National Reading Panel set some fairly moderate standards for what kinds of studies they would include and what they would reject. In the sciences, these rules are expected for anything from the high school level up; not very demanding. The studies had to have measured data. They had to have a consistent unbiased method of measuring that data. They had to have control groups. The control groups had to be matched to the experimental groups in all fundamental ways. There had to be a clear statement of the hypothesis that was being tested and how the experimental and control groups differed. And the end results had to stand up to statistical analysis as being signigicant. Under these really minimal rules of experiment, 90 percent of the reading “studies” were rejected and only 10 percent stood up as meaningful. Please, if you want facts about reading teaching, and not self-promotion or cute anecdotes, check out the National Reading Panel report, which is available on this site on the LD In Depth page.

I work with kids who have been in a downward spiral for years, getting to Grade 3 or 5 or 8 or even adult ed as non-readers. These kids come from good and caring families — families that are good and caring enough to hunt me up (I am completely outside the system so they have to find me on the internet or by word of mouth) and then to pay me cash out of pocket. Those are parents who care!

These parents have done *everything* the pop culture books and counsellors suggested, buying books for the children, reading to the children, modelling reading behaviour, having the chioldren read with buddies, having the children read to buddies or pets, playing computer games, using funny-coloured plastic sheets and glasses — and none of it has worked, period. The poor kids continue to spiral downwards. They cannot read and then they develop behavioural problems and depression from failing all day every day.

Then I get in there and poof, the kids are reading on grade level, often in two or three months, almost always in six months — eighteen months for the high school kids, but hey, with eight years to make up it does take a bit longer … and then I get to hunt up new clients because I keep losing my old ones that don’t need me any more.

Am I working miracles? Far from it!! I am the LAST person to claim that I have a magic wand!! I am a rather ADD or maybe NLD person myself, with dreadful organizational issues (Please, please come and help me excavate my office, the same heap of stuff has been on the table since I moved in last December). I am somewhat cantankerous, do not suffer fools gladly, and am lacking in many social skills. I don’t play wonderful games with the kids, I don’t do cute things with pets, I don’t make up new and exciting and original teaching plans, don’t have shiny new high-tech materials, just do the same book work and photocopies over and over — but these kids are reading with me after failing for years with all that good stuff and those wonderful loving people.

Reading to kids does NOT teach them to read for themselves, period. Sure, it is a good thing to do, and very worth doing, and yes I read to my daughter all the time. But it does NOT teach the child to read. There is a difference between an otherwise valuable activity (yes definitely) and a how-to-read lesson (it simply is not.)
Having kids read to dogs just allows them to practice their mistakes. All of my students have had years and years of practicing mistakes, and the WORST thing you can do for them is to allow those mistakes to continue. Their non-fluent reading and wild guessing is the problem, not the solution. I have started to ask the Dr. Phil question — when a student in Grade 5 with Grade 2 reading and Grade 1 writing levels tells me he wants to do things “his” way, I look him straight in the eye and say “And how’s that working out for you?” All but the most defensive will admit that there may possibly be something different they could learn. We are the teachers and the parents, the adults. We are teaching because we know something that the child doesn’t. If the child already knew so much more than we do, we could sit back and retire and let him go on his merry way. But he doesn’t. We are there to teach and that is what we have to do.

Again, please check the National Reading Panel and all its references. What works to teach reading is teaching reading: On an appropriate level, step by step, accessing the child’s reasoning abilities, and not praying for magic. On an appropriate level, always starting where the child is and working from there, not handing him a book that is much too difficult and telling him to read it to the dog. Step by step, one thing at a time, not handing a beginner a book with a grade 3 vocabulary. Accessing the child’s reasoning abilities and teaching him system and thinking skills, not loading him down with either brute memorization or a ton of cutesy mnemonics to confuse him further. And above all not expecting him to absorb reading by magic from just seeing it done (Gee, if that worked as a “teaching” method, nobody would ever have to take driver’s ed or cooking classes or computer training or math or …)

I’ll have to back Victoria up on this one as well. I agree that we sometimes push too much on kids in kindergarten these days. And certainly reading to kids is a wonderful thing.

But by the middle of first grade, a child who excels in math should also be able to name the sounds for the consonants and short vowels and blend them into words at the very least. This is actually taught in kindergarten in most places today. But if he is still not doing this by late first grade, I agree with Victoria that he needs to be taught explicitly. I had my child repeat first grade because I knew she needed to repeat the Saxon Phonics until she had mastered more of it. It is a total waste to repeat a grade if effective instruction is not taking place in the classroom. Do you know the name of the reading program they are using?

If a family homeschools, they can have the luxury of taking more time if they wish. But a child going into second grade as a non-reader in school is going to be at a real disadvantage and will start to suffer self-esteem problems more than likely. I am not saying I like this, but it is the way it is.

As Victoria said, we all use similar methods with different names. I am using ABeCeDarian which works very well.

www.abcdrp.com

[i]Waiting for kids to get ready just doesn’t work. There is no magic “reading maturity” gene. People have for years done this sloppy sentimental talk about “the gift of time” and “let them be kids”; but if you read the research, it says that kids who have trouble reading in Grade 1 have about an 80 to 90 percent chance of reading trouble later. [/i]

I don’t know who is supposed to have given the advice to wait. I’d like to
address the “sentimental talk” thing, though.

In the first place, “Grade 1” is not a developmental life stage. It’s a term used to indicate “first year of elementary school”. Depending on circumstances and individual society, that period could occur anywhere between 5 and 7 years of age - or even later. Reading “research” that finds that all individuals within this age group should be at the same developmental level and expected to produce the same results, solely due to their school year designation, probably is a waste of time. Wonderful for the researchers - not so practical for real life purposes.

Secondly, I find it a little sinister that a person would belittle the idea of letting 6 year olds “be children”, given that that’s what they, in fact, are. What is being suggested here? That we knock the fun and games out of their heads and set them to work on their ulcers early on? In nature, all young learn about the world they live in through play. Only later do they work on hard survival techniques. Children in school should be encouraged to keep up but, “research” notwithstanding, they are not devices and should not be subject to rigorous quality controls at an early age.

Thirdly, ANY skill may be taught at ANY age, where desitre to learn is present in the student and qualified help is available. The greatest threat to learning a school may have a hand in is creating a lack of that desire and, ultimately, a resistance to learning. I’d be inclined to agree with Steve, that it’s not the delay in reading that necessarily results in problems later on, but the methods used to treat that delay. Unfortunately, the powers that be have decided their timetables and have set them in stone. Nobody is getting left behind, whether they like it or not. The governmental policy should, if they were honest, be dubbed: “All children dragged along on time, kicking and screaming if necessary”. Is it any wonder that rebellion is at an all time high in teens? So they can read their tattoos and the lyrics to “My humps, my humps, my lovely lady lumps” - so what?

Again, the bottom line is that schools should “allow children to be children” and should teach how to learn and a love for knowledge. any fool can shove facts and techniques down a defenseless throat.

Long live all sloppy sentimental talk about the value of the individual!

[i]Please, if you want facts about reading teaching, and not [b]self-promotion [/b]or [b]cute anecdotes[/b], check out the National Reading Panel report, which is available on this site on the LD In Depth page…

… — families that are good and caring enough to hunt me up (I am completely outside the system so they have to find me on the internet or by word of mouth) and then to pay me cash out of pocket.

…Then I get in there and poof, the kids are reading on grade level, often in two or three months, almost always in six months — eighteen months for the high school kids, but hey, with eight years to make up it does take a bit longer … and then I get to hunt up new clients because I keep losing my old ones that don’t need me any more.[/i]

Hmmm.

[quote]These parents have done *everything* the pop culture books and counsellors suggested, buying books for the children, reading to the children, modelling reading behaviour, having the chioldren read with buddies, having the children read to buddies or pets, playing computer games, using funny-coloured plastic sheets and glasses — and none of it has worked, period.[/quote]

Victoria, you and I will just have to agree to disagree. My dd jumped 2 grade levels in reading using [i]funny-coloured plastic sheets and glasses[/i]. She went from getting blinding headaches after 2 minutes of reading to sustained reading of 15 minutes or more. It isn’t that she doesn’t know [b]how[/b] to read but that there are things getting in the way of her [b]ability[/b] to read. Her reading continues to improve and she really enjoys reading to her dogs. Its a way that has allowed her to build some confidence in her own ability and gain much needed practice.

I’m a strong believer that there are many different issues that can cause reading problems. There is never just one answer for everyone. Finding the right approach for each one is the key to helping them.

My son needed vision therapy. Again, it wasn’t that he didn’t know [b]how[/b] to read, it was difficulty seeing the words. In one year of therapy he jumped 2 grade levels. A year after therapy stopped he was 6 years ahead. Why, because he had what he needed to succeed. (This is also my child who, before 4th grade, hated to read and now I can’t get him out of the bookstore.)

I’m glad you are having success with your method but don’t put down things that have worked for others.

Steve wrote:

[b][i]The best thing you can do for a late reader is to get them a reading buddy. There are programs all over where volunteers go into the schools and read to kids, just for fun. It takes a lot of the stress out of reading, and makes it more interesting, as the kids can choose their own stories. I really think reading only happens when the child comes to the conclusion that learning to read will be good for them, rather than just keeping the teachers happy.[/i][/b]

I wrote:

[b][i]What is the point of learning the mechanics of reading at the tender age of six if that learning experience is going to put you off non-compulsory reading for life? Parents and teachers should first show by example the worth, and their love, of books.[/i][/b]

What we meant to say was:

[b][i]If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.[/i][/b]

Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Victoria, I really don’t think we disagree as much as you think we do. I agree absolutely that there as some kids you have specific difficulties that need special tutoring. I also agree that kids need to be TAUGHT pre-reading skills, and that this involves MORE than simply reading aloud to them. The study I am referring to was a controlled study of kids in regular classrooms with socioeconomics and race taken into account. The only variable in educational approach was the reading mentors who came in to read. Overall, those kids read much better than the matched set that didn’t have reading mentors, to the extent that they, on the average, made the benchmarks, whereas the others, on the average, did not. I am sure there were some in both groups who needed more intensive instruction. But I am equally sure that there were a large number in the control group who needed time with a reading mentor to help them make reading fun.

I am not saying that good, competent reading instruction is not helpful or even crucial in some cases. I am suggesting here that most literate adults actually engage in the process of teaching pre-reading skills, such as first letter recognition and phonetic values of letters and rhyming patterns and such, automatically and effectively for most students. I am suggesting further that taking a child at their developmental level and doing what works for them AT THAT LEVEL is much more effective than trying to have everyone do the same thing at the same time. As Brian suggests, it dampens the child’s interest and enthusiasm at the same time as it convinces them they are inadequate. And while I understand that second graders are expected to be able to read by the school system, I don’t have to agree that it makes sense for us to have that expectation.

If kids are having a hard time reading, by all means, we need to focus on teaching them reading. But at THEIR PACE. Which I am absolutely sure is what you are doing with them, Victoria. I am sure you can teach anyone to read, specifically because you do take it at their own pace. No, kids don’t magically learn to read, and yes, there are excellent reading programs out there for kids who have difficulty with more informal methods. My point is, most kids do well enough with the informal methods if you let them proceed at their own pace. If they aren’t ready to read, then you work on pre-reading stuff. If they are just starting, then you work on early reading skills. If they are advancing, you challenge them with more advanced work. But you don’t put them all in a group of kids the same age and force them to read outloud to the teacher and create embarrassment and humiliation for them, and you don’t give them written directions that they are unable to read and then downgrade them for being unable to perform as expected. That’s my point. We used to understand that kids develop and different rates, and that not all first graders are able to read yet, no matter what kind of instruction you provide. You have to bring them along at their own pace. Most schools simply don’t do that, in reading or any other area. It’s about developmentally appropriate expectations being used to label and denigrate children who are actually being entirely normal. That’s my objection. And my personal experience backs this up, not only with my child, but many others I have worked with. I, like you, have not found that kids are unable to learn to read. I find that they have been approached in inappropriate manners, and that most if not all of their resistance to learning stems from reading being a horrible emotional trauma for them. I have a lot more trouble overcoming the trauma than I do teaching the skills of reading (or math, for that matter).

Kids aren’t robots. You can’t program them and expect them to perform on command. They learn at their own pace, and when we don’t respect this pace, we get poor results. I don’t think it would have benefitted my son Sean one iota to have been labeled as “learning diabled” and put into “special ed” in first grade due to his current inability to read. I think how we handled it worked much better - keep reading fun, work on fundamentals of pre-reading and early reading, and look for signs of progress from where he was, rather than comparing him to other kids and seeing him as deficient. He is a great reader today, but I am not so sure he would love reading as much as he does if we had taken the standard approach.

–- Steve

I would just reply to Brian that no one in this country is forced to send their child to public school. Many people choose to homeschool so they can control the curriculum and pacing. If a person chooses to place the child in a system that does have rigid pacing, they know they will have to deal with it. Otherwise, pull the child out and do it another way. Public school is an assembly line. If you don’t fit the mold, you probably won’t do well there.

But I am totally lost with Brian’s argument about the value of reading to children. No one disagrees that we should read from birth on to children. But at some point you have to build that ship or you’ll never set sail.

Scifinut,

We had a similar experience to yours with writing. It turned out my son had absorbed writing instruction but motor issues kept him for displaying his knowledge. We did Interactive Metronome for the summer and then much to my and the resource teacher’s shock, he wrote a coherent five paragraph essay for his fourth grade teacher.

I always say that my kid has to not only be different than NT but different than the typical LD child!

Beth

Steve, I do agree with you on almost everything. Just one little point. You say that informal methods work “well enough”. I have real trouble with how “well enough” is defined.
Is it OK for a gifted child with an IQ of 150 to be placed in the basic non-college track in high school because of a lack of elementary skills? I’m not making this up — it happened to a young relative of mine. Sure, the kid could read, sort of, by guessing, and do arithmetic, sort of, by finger-counting, and that was just fine by the informal methods being used in the elementary school; and the report cards were all very positive — but is this learning “well enough”?
Is it OK for an eighteen-year-old to be given a Grade 9 certificate with a Grade 2 reading level and no measurable math skills, totally unemployable? Again, I am not making this up; one of my students who was warehoused in Special Ed and then handed the certificate apparently as a prize for not causing too much trouble. Did he learn “well enough” to be sent out into the working world?
Or how about a boy arriving in Grade 8 with a Grade 2 reading level and K writing level, but the informal system at the elementary gave him passing grades in every subject every year — yes, another of my students. Was he learning “well enough” as shown by all those passing grades?
And then there are all the kids I get all the time, four of them right now, who are learning “well enough” with the informal methods used in the primary classes, get positive report cards and the parents are told everything is wonderful — and then they hit Grade 4 or 5 and gee, NOW we are going to fail the kid becasue he clearly can’t read, is three years behind. Were they doing “well enough” until they suddnely fell into a black hole, or perhaps was there a problem from the start?

There’s a horrible hidden waste out there. Bright and capable kids being tracked down to the low average and even low-low classes. Average kids being tracked down to low-low and special ed. Educable kids being tracked down to lifelong dependency. If you track *everyone* down, it doesn’t show so badly, but it’s prety frightening. Young people who have the abilities to be doctors and engineers tracked into factory work. (One of my dear friends just got fired as a gas jockey and a bag boy — he’s too smart to be patient with those jobs, and too unqualified to get anything else.) Young people who have the ability to hold a good job being tracked into special ed and unemployability, often drugs and alcohol. (His friends.)

Engineering and science schools cannot fill their classes because of a lack of qualified applicants, and are filling the spaces as much as possible with foreign students. A weakness in fundamental skills across the board is a tragedy for the individual, and a huge economic/social problem for the society.

I usually try to ignore Brian who is just here with his own axe to grind. But a very important point, which I know Steve knows but which needs to be brought up: kids LIKE learning. They LIKE competence. A normal child is a bundle of energy looking to grow and develop. You have to work hard for a long time to turn kids off learning completely, and even then they often channel the learning urge into other things from video games to playing music to skateboarding. If you provide positive guidance and instruction in reading and math, kids will generally take off. There is no horrible monster standing there forcing them to do unnatural things under pain of torture. Quite the opposite in most cases; usually the problem is getting them to slow down and take the time to develop a solid foundation before they get in over their heads. Sure it isn’t all fun, there is work involved, but kids *like* doing real work, when they see real results from it. The idea that “being a kid” means never having any real things to do and never having any responsibilities is just silly — and if you meet anyone who was raised like this, they are very sad people.

So we can probably all agree that 1) learning should be reasonably enjoyable for kids, and if it is miserable, something is wrong; 2) it doesn’t happen by magic - appropriate adult instruction is essential for these skills to develop (with the big stress on APPROPRIATE), and 3) all kids learn at different paces, and expecting kids to all learn in the same way at the same time is not going to be very effective. Oh, and 4) adults reading to kids is a very positive experience that is an essential contributor to learning to read.

Victoria, I only wish you were available for those youngsters back when they were learning how “stupid” they were because their standard classrooms were too inflexible to respond to their needs! It is an awful waste. Those kids are lucky they ran into you!

I never ignore anyone who takes the trouble to express their point of view here. I wasn’t raised to ignore people just because their viewpoints differ from my own. And if I have an axe, it’s that children should not be treated like commodities that should be “tracked” or “not tracked” into factory work depending upon early scholastic showings.

The term and concept of “being a child” is something that doesn’t seem to sit well with Victoria. Although she raised that issue here, she really appears to be uncomfortable with the phrase. Somehow it appears to have connotations of throwing off pesky shoes, dodging school and rafting down the Mississippi, for the start of a life-long career of idleness.

“Being a child” means exactly what it says. That those individuals should be allowed to learn about their world somewhat at their own pace. In the full knowledge that their inherent desire for more knowledge will direct them towards obtaining the basic tools that they will later use in their quest. “Being a child” is not a disease that must be nipped in the bud. It’s a fact of life for anyone who is out of babyhood and hasn’t yet reached adolescence.

This thread started off being about a 6 year old who is “behind” in reading skills - an arbitrarily reached designation of his new school that wasn’t reached in his old school. Victoria has regaled us with horror stories of what the future holds in store for that boy if he isn’t immediately remediated. We all now know that he is destined to be a failure as a bag boy if he doesn’t get private tutorage in short order.

My own thoughts are that he will probably catch up given a little extra attention from his teacher (as he moves naturally from grade 1 to grade 2) and is shown how interesting and useful reading can be. That coupled with less negative and more positive comments made to him, or in his presence, about his reading ability.

He’s 6 and he’s clever - there’s no need for panic. Really, many children in many societies, don’t see the inside of any kind of classroom until they are 6 or 7. Most of the men who built America and drove the industrial revolution internationally certainly didn’t. Kindergarten tests are a product of the unnatural and unenlightened society we live in now. Just because some committee came up with a dumb idea on how to compete with Japan or somewhere else, doesn’t mean either that that idea has any merit or that everyone has to automatically buy into it.

Tom! No answer. Tom! No answer. Tom! No answer.
(Attention deficit or boyhood?)

I would just reply to Janis that the fact that no one is forced to place their children in public school, and that everyone has the choice to do so or decide to homeschool, is neither here nor there with regard to the discussion at hand. The same may be said for any element of the status quo. The status quo is not necessarily the correct way just because it is the status quo, and just being the status quo certainly doesn’t grant it immunity from criticism and/or attempts to effect change.

I’d also add that a person may both place a child into an educative system that has rigid pacing (or any other undesirable facet) and STILL campaign for changes in that system. Since when did systems get set in stone and since when did people tacitly forfeit their right to criticize a sitting system by participating in that system - for reasons perhaps forced upon them by circumstance? Why does Janis propose “pull the child out and do it another way” as the only alternative open to taxpayers who are forced to pay for the public educative system, financially and socially, whether they use it or not.

And why is there a “mold” that some fortunate few who “fit” may benefit from, while “misfits” must languish outside the fold? Were the pigs right, then? Are some animals more equal than others? And who was the model for the mold? I must say I didn’t know there was an actual mold and that I find the idea a trifle disconcerting. One thing I’d hate to end up with is moldy children.

My argument about the value of reading to children is, of course, not that hinted at by Janis. I’ve already stated that children will at some point have to be taught to read by qualified individuals (i.e., anyone who can read and speak the child’s language themselves and who has the time). My “argument” was that teaching a child to read, or do anything else, is not like placing a peg in a hole - it being either in or out when the task is completed. There are many shades of “being in or out” as far as having learned to read is concerned - including bashing the edges off and jamming it in. Actually, that’s probably how the mold works, given that we send them the children already semi-formed.

Saint Exupery’s analogy, for me and in this context, has the “ship” as the school-educated individual, the “wood and tasks” as school subjects and methods, and the “endless immensity of the sea” as the sum total of what there is to possibly learn and discover about ourselves, others and the universe we populate. He proposes that although the wood and tasks will be necessary in order to build the physical ship, the endless immensity of the sea, and a skillfully instilled desired to explore all it has to offer, is what will turn a potential Staten Island Ferry into the Calypso. You may build a ship with wood and tasks but how are you going to make it ocean-worthy if it was built to pond stats and has grown to hate water?

Sure you can cobble together ships on a one-size-fits-all basis and according to the same plans and deadlines. Sure you can teach a child to do just about anything you want by sending him along to the scare-em-straight crowd and getting a short-term result at the potential expense of long-term usefulness. (I say “potential”, some children actually survive school and go on to live happy, productive lives. Or so they say.)

I agree with Saint-Exupery, though. It’s far better to introduce them first to the endless immensity, as a matter of course and through example, and later show them where the shipwright’s tools are, for the various levels of work, when the need for the ship has been made apparent. Most people reading this will probably agree that they learned about the computer they’re using and the parts of the software they use by dint of necessity. The reason they don’t know the other parts yet is that they have, as yet, no need for them. Why should anyone suppose that a child is any different - being forced to learn reams of things that, to him, at his age, have no use in the real world? The greatest tool for teaching spelling is a web browser. I can’t remember my son ever asking me how a word was spelled before he discovered surfing and searching. All of a sudden, accurate spelling had a point. I mean, who wants to visit the Descurvy Kids web site?

However, I will grant that, the way the factory-track “system” is set up nowadays, that method isn’t likely to catch on any time soon, and I find that I have little real control over what is done at non-public school in my own children’s case either. That fact notwithstanding, outside of school, where it counts if you want it to, I’m shooting for Calypso minisubs.

Brian,

My focus here on this board is to emphasize to parents that under the current system, if their child has a problem with reading, most of the time they will have to seek outside help or fix it themselves.

I worked closely with my child’s charter school for a couple of years to bring in effective methods, and the day the principal was replaced, we lost it all. That was a manageable system to try to change, but in the long run it didn’t work. So taking on a huge school system and trying to affect change, however noble, will not result in changes fast enough to help that person’s individual child most of the time. It is far too late to begin helping a 4th or 5th grader who is 2-3 years behind in reading.

So please continue your efforts to change the system. I think it would be wonderful for kindergarten to be rich in reading readiness activities and wait and begin formal reading instruction in first grade. But a child who needs help today cannot wait for that change to occur. They need help today, and that will come from the parent seeking a tutor or learning to help them themselves. You cannot ethically sacrifice a child by allowing them to never learn to read at school to prove the point that the system needs to change. Again, my focus is helping the individual child overcome the reading problem. I see so many posts on here of children who are suffering all kinds of side effects such as anxiety over not being able to “fit” in the regular ed. program, and I think it is imperative that we empower parents to help their own children.

I am concerned that I am seeing this thread deteriorate into some level of personlized attacks, and I really think we have been through that and that we need to stop doing it. There have been a wide range of opinions about education and schools and how kids learn that have been discussed here, and that is very enriching. But a couple of posts now have started moving into questioning people’s motivations for posting, and I just don’t think that is going to be helpful. Calling people names or making negative comments about their posts is simply poor etiquette, and it leads to escalating negativity and hostility, which does NOT forward anyone’s agenda. Let’s admit that learning to read is a complex topic and that many of us have had a wide range of experiences and that there are many ways to approach learning to read that might be workable, and leave it at that.

My strong suggestion is that if anyone has a personal problem with what someone else posted, and they feel they can’t ignore it (which I think is the first and best choice in most cases), they handle this off the board by sending a personal message to the offending party about how they are feeling. That way, the rest of us who are not involved in the conflict can continue to have a constructive discussion while whoever’s feelings are hurt can handle it in a more private and less disruptive fashion.

Of course, I fully anticipate the possibility that I might be attacked myself for trying to be the “politeness police,” and maybe I shouldn’t comment. I tried ignoring the first one, hoping others would do the same, but I have seen where this board goes when we get personal, and I just don’t want to go there. My apologies if I offended anyone, but I want to keep this board as a place where productive discussion happens, not have people being scared off or attacked because they present contrary opinions or ideas as it seemed to be when I first started posting.

Steve,

I appreciate that you will have your own perceptions of what constitutes a personal attack. Those perceptions will be colored by your personal experiences and references. I’ve read the entire thread content though, and can’t find any examples. I have never been offended here as I appreciate that people concerned enough to visit this site are likely to have strong views on things. Given what is at stake. Definitely, nobody appears, at least to me, to be indulging in name-calling. We just don’t happen to agree on some things.

What has been been challenged here are personal opinions - that’s what the board is for in one sense. Otherwise threads would be limited to one post each with no responses allowed. Of course people are going to disagree, and ideas and opinions clash. That’s called conflict and is the basis for all evolution and growth. Please, let’s not try to create an artificial world where no conflict exists. That would be plain dishonesty. Whatever a person expresses here is fair game for being challenged, opposed or refuted. Inferences may be drawn on the poster’s thinking patterns based on what is written. Those inferences may be ultimately correct or incorrect, the only question for the moderators should be: are they justified? - given the content of the post. From your last post, for example, I infer that you are a little more squeamish than most when it comes to interpersonal conflict. Right or wrong in reality, I feel it is a justified inference.

What contributers who are designated as “members” and not “moderators” have no right to do is attempt to moderate the discussion. That’s not your role, Steve. Nor, as you admit, were you ever elected politeness monitor. If any poster or reader takes offense at anything posted here, she or he has very adequate recourse to attempt to remedy that situation under the forum’s rules and moderation system. There’s even a sticky at the top of the page directing them to the proper authority. I’m guessing that that’s not you. Thanks though, for contributing your personal opinion on the matter.

Janis,

I understand and appreciate that focus. It’s a very practical approach. I have a different appraoach and a different outlook when it comes to the possibility of individuals effecting change.

It must be difficult to rebound from seeing all your hard work be wiped out by an incoming principal. However, that very statement underlines for me that change was and is possible. A better argument would have been if you had never been able to ever make a dent in the status quo. You did make a dent, you just gave up at the first disappointment (at least that’s what your post seems to say).

I think you’ve also read me wrong if you believe that I would consider taking on a “huge school system” to try to effect change. The huge school system is a servant of the people. What we need to effect change in is the peoples’ consciousness. Only by changing the peoples’ desires can we expect lasting change in the system. Attempting to change the system itself without the support of the people would be to dictate. I work with the existing system because, for good or bad, the people have decided that that is the system they want. Everyone though, has the right to speak up and attempt to have the people see it another way.

The fact that trying to affect change in a huge school system will probably not show results in my children’s school lifetime is, again, neither here nor there. Where would we be if growth and progress were only spurred by those who would benefit from those changes.

Again, we didn’t start here discussing a 4th or 5th grader who is behind in reading. We were discussing a 6 year old 1st grader, excellent in math, who has been arbitrarily designated as “being behind in reading”. I wonder if his entire clas is now “behind in math”? In having these discussions, it helps if the parameters aren’t continually being changed to suit individual arguments.

I believe the “confused mother” who started this thread has been unjustifiably made “confused” by a school’s inflexibility and lack of perspective. According to the evidence so far presented, the boy only requires a little extra help with reading. Nobody said he couldn’t read at all. All that’s been said is that he is “behind” a group that could be taken to have concentrated more on reading than math in the last two years. Why would his teacher be talking about holding him back a year? Why all the talk on here about the urgency of “seeking professional help”. I know I took home at least one teacher’s note stating that “This boy refuses to read”. Well, I’m reading (and writing) up a storm now. I remember my mother made me read the vocabulary at the back of the book to her - sounding it out until I got it.

I don’t think it would be wonderful if kindergartens changed. I think it would be wonderful if there were no kindergertens. Like that old boiling frog, people are being gradually duped into denying children a childhood and replacing that time with striving. Those parents who measure life success in dollars or degrees or positions eagerly buy into such a scheme. How sad that their own time spent in the hor water pot ultimately taught them nothing about something that was considered so important that it was included as one of the three specified unalienable rights in the Declaration of Independence, viz, the pursuit of happiness. Jefferson didn’t think fit to specify the pursuit of either education, position or money, and we all know why (at least, its supposed to be self evident).

6 year olds should be living their imagined adventures, not learning to read about them. Fitting wouldn’t be the great problem it is if “fitting” meant being able to play and imagine and dream. I’ve yet to meet a physically healthy 6 year old who has any trouble with those subjects.

So bottom line: It’s the “mold” that doesn’t fit, not the children.

“Is it OK for an eighteen-year-old to be given a Grade 9 certificate with a Grade 2 reading level and no measurable math skills, totally unemployable?”

Grade 9? Around here we see a constant stream with high school diplomas.

John…who is paid to do testing & career planning as part of the job placement process.

P.S. - “What contributers who are designated as “members” and not “moderators” have no right to do is attempt to moderate the discussion. That’s not your role, Steve.” Now who is moderating?