He's reading….now what?

Viewing 4 posts - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • Britney
    Member

    So, my 5 1/2 year old is reading, and pretty well at that. He pretty much began teaching himself with Dr. Suess books awhile back. So, since he has an older sister “doing school”, he wanted to be included. So, this past year we did phonics instruction with him and he has taken off. He is currently reading the Treadwell’s First Reader, he’s already finished with the primer. There are a couple of words here and there that I have to explain the rules for such as -ought in brought but other than that he is doing great. My question is where do we go now? My plan is just to continue supplying him with good readers, gradually increasing difficulty, until he is ready for chapter books. Does this sound like a good plan? Unfortunately with my daughter, before we learned of CM, we used a packaged curriculum. She learned to read in K and then had leveled readers in the program. His situation is a little different. He didn’t really learn through any program, just mainly by listening to good books along with a little phonics instruction. Any ideas?

    MamaSnow
    Participant

    Yes, that sounds like a very good plan. That’s what I do with my dd6 anyhow. I have her read out loud to me several days a week just so I can see how she is doing and address any ‘gaps’ that come up, but she is also starting to read a lot on her own. She’s not quite to the chapter books level yet, but close. We’ve read through a couple of the Treadwell readers, we also like the Pathway Readers and I also like to look at the Sonlight Readers list to get ideas for regular books that might be at about the right level. A few series we’ve particularly enjoyed (beyond Dr Suess) are the Little Bear books, Amelia Bedelia, and Frog and Toad.

    Hope that helps!

    Jen

    jmac17
    Participant

    My DS (4) has just moved through this stage, starting on simple chapter books a few months ago, so we are right there with you!

    I think pictures books make a great bridge between ‘readers’ and chapter books.  My kids love that they can now read all their favourite books that they have been listening to for years.  All the books on the ‘early years’ lists are great.  The text in many of these books is actually more advanced than some of the chapter books, since they are designed to be read aloud, but the pictures help an early reader in figuring out any of the unfamiliar words.

    Our library has a great selection of early readers.  We especially like the non-fiction books.  I don’t know what the series is officially called, but my kids have been reading a bunch of ‘amazing’ books.  “Amazing Sharks”  “Amazing Bugs”, etc.

    Also, you might be surprised how quickly your son moves into chapter books.  Both my DD and DS learned to read at age 4 and went directly from the Treadwell first reader into short chapter books.  They like books like “Magic Treehouse”, “Puppy Place”, and “Boxcar Children”.  To me these are borderline twaddle, but as long as the content is fine, I’m ok with them right now as they develop independence.  We read lots of great literature for our read alouds, so they are also developing a taste for living books.  My DD is almost 7 now and is moving more toward reading more quality literature on her own.

    Joanne

    Britney
    Member

    Thanks. I’ve been pouring over easy reader lists today and I like what I see. I’m glad there are other CMers on here that have early readers like me. It’s not that I pushed him, he just kind of did it! So, I wasn’t sure where to go from here. I don’t really want to continue phonics just because his age because he it past that. So, thanks for the suggestions.

Viewing 4 posts - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
  • The topic ‘He's reading….now what?’ is closed to new replies.