Quote:
Originally Posted by hsumam11  Thanks for all your input, mamas! Now I have a few questions - what are these BOB books that posters are talking about? Also, I know you can't rush kids into learning but how do you know when they are ready to learn? What are some signs? TIA!
|
We got our Bob books at Barnes and Noble. They're kind of like "Dick and Jane". Like book 1 of level 1 goes something like, "Mat. Sam. Mat sat. Sam sat. Mat sat on Sam." The drawings are stick-figure style drawings with no color.
Everyone has a different approach and all kids are different in terms of what they want and need. Both my kids are extremely stubborn and internally motivated so that: 1. they don't want me to lead them and 2. they are always busy doing whatever it is they do. So, I didn't set out to teach my kids to read. Other people do, because it's good for them. It's whatever works for your family.
In my personal opinion, the signs that they are ready to learn is when they start asking you what things say and when they have more than a passing interest in it. My kids asked what things said from a very young age, but they didn't have more than a passing interest in it. My oldest actually asked me to sit with him and teach him to read at 4, but after 10 minutes, he was incredibly bored and annoyed so we both agreed to just stop doing it. In my personal experience, the readiness signs that my oldest son displayed was when he simply started reading. Also, I really believe that there's an individual developmental stage where they get the big picture and it just "clicks" for them; I don't believe that can be hurried. I'm going to assume that it's the same for my youngest. I assume he will just start reading at some point, and then ask the detailed questions that my oldest did at that point.
The reason why I did not strive to teach my kids to read before they initiated it is because I couldn't see any advantages to it. I'm, personally, not sure of what the point is of teaching a very young child to read when they aren't in an environment that requires reading yet and when it doesn't translate to them being more fluent readers at a later stage. Actually, it would have possibly saved me from reading aloud so much (soooo tedious, not a nice thing to say but it's true) but I think I would keep reading aloud to my kids even after they become fluent readers. For us, personally, I didn't see the point. I figured it was on their developmental timetable, not mine.
] Anyways, just curious how you mamas taught your dc to read - I'd appreciate any advice! TIA! 
). Anyway, she is really musical and the videos really helped her make sense of what I had been trying to teach her. The Between the Lions videos are really good too. She's now about 5.5 yo and is starting to read. She has tons of her own books and we get tons each week from the library. I read a lot and even though he's not into books, dh always has magazines he's reading.
