Name: Teach Them Diligently (Branson)
Start: 2025-05-15T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-05-17T23:59:59-05:00
Location: Branson, MO

Tagged: fluency, reading

This topic has 7 replies, 7 voices, and was last updated 9 years, 10 months ago by HSMAMA.

Viewing 8 posts - 1 through 8 (of 8 total)

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May 19, 2015 at 10:10 pm
AFthfulJrney
Participant
I’m hoping to get some guidance, or honestly some reassurance, that it’s all ok and I’m not doing it all completely wrong! 🙂
My 8 year old dd has struggled from the beginning with learning to and wanting to read. She has always enjoyed being read to, it was just that when it came time to try and learn to read on her own that the fight began. Many tears were shed, both from her and I. Frustration and stress and worry…it became no fun at all and not at all what I wanted for my daughter. I wanted to instill a love of reading…not a hate for it! Thankfully, over the past 6 months or so, she has improved greatly. Still doesn’t just sit down with a book on her own, willingly, but the fight is no longer present. She has accepted the fact that she needs to spend some time reading everyday, but still has not developed a love for it.
My concern is with her fluency. It takes her a good while to finish one chapter in her Pathway Reader. These are the only books she has read all the way through. She is currently finishing up the last of the 2nd grade readers. Is fluency just something that will come over time the more she reads? She is comprehending what she reads…I know this from her dictating it back to me. Because of that, should I really be that concerned? Is there anything besides just having her read everyday that I should be doing to help her improve? Any advice, tips, words of encouragement, you can offer would be greatly appreciated!
May 20, 2015 at 7:16 am
HollyS
Participant
Is she still reading aloud to you? I like my kids reading aloud to me on a daily basis until they are reading fluently. After that, I try to have them read aloud at least once a week.
My oldest two didn’t enjoy reading on their own until they were a bit older… around age 9 or 10. They would read books I assigned or read for a few minutes at bedtime, but they didn’t really seem to enjoy it until that age. My 8yo is still working on fluency and doesn’t care to read on her own.
May 20, 2015 at 8:29 am
eawerner
Participant
Keep having her read aloud every day! To you, of course, but also sneak in some reading board books to younger siblings if you can. 😉
Keep reading aloud to her every day!
If you aren’t using a reading program anymore, at least make a note of which words she struggles with while reading aloud and spend time doing reading lessons that focus on her areas of weakness.
Maybe sounding out multi syllable words? (dinner, diner)
Words with silent or weird letters? (know, phone)
Vowel team words? (oa, ea, ou combos)
Homophones? (know, no)
I can’t remember where I read it, but a person needs to see/read a word x number of times before the word becomes automatic and the brain can make the mouth spit it out quickly without thinking about it. It was a crazy high number! So once a child starts reading as your daughter has, it can still take a long time for it to become fluent. Just keep working with her – slow and steady each day. 🙂
May 20, 2015 at 7:30 pm
wife2agr8man
Participant
I have a daughter who has really struggled every step of the way on reading, so it was recommended I read the passage to her before she reads it to me. I was horrified at first because I thought this would teach her not to pay attention, and what about practicing decoding, etc. However, the mom pointed out to me, I was going to help her see how to read a sentence fluently, how to naturally pause, etc. Plus I might give her some positive input on some tough words. My daughter had heard me read all of my life, but I think because reading was so difficult and she had to work so hard at the words, she couldn’t possibly think about fluency. She loved me reading first, and we still use it. Her fluency has increased and she still has to read the words. The passages are too long for her to memorize. She was already comprehending and her narrations from other passages I read to her only once throughout the day, ie history etc, are still good.
May 21, 2015 at 8:23 am
AFthfulJrney
Participant
Thank you all for your kind words and advice! It’s just nice to be reassured that it is all ok and that others have gone through the same thing! It is so hard, for me anyways, to trust in myself that I’m doing it all right. I will continue to have her read a loud to me and I like the idea of having her read to her younger siblings! They will love that!
Can an anyone recommend any great books for me to get for her throughout the summer from the library? All she has been reading so far are the Pathway Readers.
May 21, 2015 at 6:45 pm
lettucepatchkids
Participant
some great suggestions here… taking notes myself!

My daughter is 9 and has been struggling with learning to read, we had her evaluated for dyslexia (not tested) and they said she had markers but I’m not 100% sure… anyhow we’ve been using Barton and while she gets the lessons she still very much struggles with fluency, so I’ve been working a ton with her on that. Having her read aloud to me daily, and doing fluency drills. I think the fluency drills are really helping, I turned my nose to them at first because they seemed so “drill and kill” but man she loves them, and like I said I’ve seen an improvement with her fluency. So at the start of our reading lesson I give her a sheet of 48 words and her read as many as she can in 2 minutes, I mark the ones she gets wrong and we keep score… at the end of the reading lesson we do it again (only this time she’s “warmed up” so to speak.) I will do the same word list until she can read all of it without mistakes in 2 minutes, then move on to another list. Just a suggestion, may be something to try… we use the words tied to the lesson she is working on, but really you cold use anything.

For readers my DD loves the AAR readers and the elison readers.
May 21, 2015 at 9:08 pm
SuperMamaOwl
Participant
I would suggest the Arnold Lobel books (Frog and Toad, etc.) as well as the Mercy Watson series. Also, I believe Ambleside Online (year 1?) has some good suggestions.
May 22, 2015 at 8:56 am
HSMAMA
Participant
You’ve got some great suggestions so far! Has she completed a phonics program? Does she have any trouble areas with multi-syllable words, etc? I’d do an evaluation (there are lots of free ones online) to make sure she hasn’t got any gaps that need to be addressed. Then I’d continue as suggested and keep reading to her and having her read aloud. Keep in mind also, that reading aloud is a separate skill and takes more work than reading silently. One thing we’ve used that has really helped fluency is books on cd. Our library lists them as a kit and you get the cd and the book so the child can listen to the story and follow along and then read a section, or more, aloud to you. If my DD makes a lot of mistakes, I’ll have her listen to the CD again and then read to me. She’s never needed to hear it more than twice. When we started we used the Usborne early chapter books. They were below reading level and easy for her, which gave her confidence, than we moved into harder selections. Now she enjoys having some of her books on CD so she is able to learn unfamiliar names and places (Narnia, for example).