I have a 5-year-old daughter who is a natural reader. She can read pretty much anything she gets her hands on, and she comprehends what she is reading as well. I still want her to learn the building blocks of reading, so she has it in her back pocket for when she comes to words that she needs to decode.
I am considering Delightful Reading for her, but I’m curious if anyone else has used it with a young child who is a strong reader without prior instruction, but who could use reinforcement to refine her reading skills.
I also plan on using this with my 7yo, who is a rising second grader, to push her past always having to sound out every letter individually in order to blend the word, every time she sees it. She is definitely improving, but my hope is that DR will stretch her to learn to read differently and possibly more fluently. Her comprehension skills are excellent and her narration skills are blossoming, so it’s just a matter of making her more comfortable with reading and igniting that fire for independent reading.
It seems like DR would be a good fit for several reasons.
Since it uses rich selections, instead of easy reading, your 5yo won’t feel like she’s taking a step backward. And since it teaches both sight words and word-building (becoming familiar with word components), it will give her more tools to use when she comes to new words. Plus, she will get the gentle introduction to spelling that is inherent in the method with the letter tiles.
Your 7yo will also receive more tools to help her begin to recognize words quickly as her eyes move across the page. The video that explains the basic phonics approach that Charlotte used will explain that concept better than I can type it here. (It’s the second video on the page.)
Anyway, it sounds like a great idea for both girls!
I would agree. I am using it now (and was using a similar approach that I was making up on my own before the kit was available) with my dd5. She had already learned to decode quite a few words (we started with a strict phonics approach), but was getting easily bored with the limited amount of stories she could read. Giving her some sight words REALLY helped her take off in her reading, and helped her to be better able to read more stories and therefore stay interested. And having spent the time before hand trying to organize something simliar on our own…the kit is WELL worth the investment. =) She also LOVES it. I think the variety with the letter tiles, the reader, and writing in her word book helps to keep her interested too.
As always, thank you, Sonya. You are such a gift. I am grateful for your response … makes very good sense.
And, thank you, Jen. 🙂 I do love the variety in DR and the fact that it stays true to CM is such a find. I hope that this gives my older daughter the push she needs to become more fluent and continues to inspire my middle daughter to love to read these good good books!
Thank you! Erin
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