Drawn into the Heart of Reading vs. other reading programs

[playschool]

I am trying to decide what I should use for reading for my ds who will be in 3rd grade next year. I have thrown around the idea of using CLE, Abeka (which we have been using for the past 3 years), BJU, or Drawn into the Heart of Reading. My dc have always used "readers" for their reading program, so it is difficult to just let them go for real books for school reading. Now, they do read real books on their own. I guess especially for my 3rd grader who is still a young reader I do not know if I feel comfortable with letting go of the readers until he becomes a more proficient reader. He is reading at his level, but doesn't always sound smooth (some stuttering going on there), and sometimes substitutes words for other words of the same meaning.
When he gets to larger words, he tends to want to rush through them and guess rather than dividing them into syllables and sounding them out (words such as auditorium or prescription). Do you think that Drawn into the Heart of Reading would not be a good fit for him? Should I go with one of these other programs? Thanks for your help!

[mrsrandolph]

My opinion (FWIW) is that "real books" are 100 times better for emerging readers than vocabulary controlled readers that you get with programs. As long as you are reading along side your child, which you will be at this stage, the extended vocab won't cause a problem. Real books have much richer content. Books that are interesting are apt to create readers that love to read.

As far as the stuttering around when reading...my husband just completed a 2 year research project on improving reading fluency in children! Reading the same text over and over while underscoring word with their finger will improve their speed in words per minute and will transfer to other texts as well. If you want more info, let me know...

Shannon (in GA)

[amck1992]

As far as the stuttering around when reading...my husband just completed a 2 year research project on improving reading fluency in children! Reading the same text over and over while underscoring word with their finger will improve their speed in words per minute and will transfer to other texts as well. If you want more info, let me know...

Shannon (in GA)

Shannon, I would love more information on this research. I'm dealing with a 2nd child with dyslexia and it's quite frustrating. She needs much attention with her reading.

As for the original post. I am currently in the same position as you trying to decide what's best for my kids in terms of reading. When I schooled my older children, I used curriculum that was lighter(classical in nature) and a couple of my kids said they wished I had used more traditional curriculum b/c they felt that they were behind in some areas.

The past several years I used Rod & Staff reading which is very similar to CLE. My daughters both felt it was too difficult. The questions they were expected to answer were above their ability. I ended up skipping 1/2 of the lesson b/c of their inability to complete the assignment. The past few months I searched for the best reading program for my kids. Someone mentioned DITHOR and I didn't take their advice(kicking myself for not listening-although them mentioning DITHOR introduced me to Heart of Dakota that I have chosen for my kids curriculum). I ended up purchasing BJU reading. We have used it for 3 weeks and we've decided to ditch it. The stories are wonderful, however, the program is very teacher intensive and took up much of my time. My dyslexic 10 yr dd shared with me that she wants to just read "real" books. We decided to go with DITHOR for the fall. My girls 8 and 10 are reading the emerging readers now and through the summer to get ready for DITHOR level 2.

To sum it up, I didn't really see a love for reading coming from my girls using the traditional reading programs but I certainly see them light up when reading real books.

Ann

[Mom2Monkeys]

We used BJU Reading and it took 30min to an hour per day!! It was too controlled which didn't allow my dd to grow as a reader. When I started DITHOR with her, I knew then that that was it! My dd was a lover of books, but after a week of BJU, she was tired of it and most any book at all. We quit BJU and the love for books started coming back. We've been at DITHOR for a while now and she loves it! She's also learning SO much more than she did with BJU and has improved as an oral reader due to the reading aloud practice scheduled in. It also only takes 10-20 minutes to complete and doesn't have to be done every day. We'll never go back to any textbook style reading program! DITHOR is awesome!

[momofabcd]

As far as the stuttering around when reading...my husband just completed a 2 year research project on improving reading fluency in children! Reading the same text over and over while underscoring word with their finger will improve their speed in words per minute and will transfer to other texts as well. If you want more info, let me know...

Shannon (in GA)

When you say text, do you mean reading lists of words over and over? Or, do you mean reading a story over and over, either from a reader that doesn't have controlled vocabulary (old ones like Mcguffey's or the ones from Keepers of the Faith), or chapters in a book? The reason I ask is because I have the readers from Keepers of the Faith, and they have the child read the same story through for 4 days to improve elocution. By the fourth reading, dc are reading it amazingly well. The use instructions don't even have dc answer the questions until after the second reading. Is this similar to your husband's study?

[tiffanieh]

Hi Deanna,

I'm not Shannon, but I just wanted to chime in...my boys and I participated in a reading program last summer and this is exactly what they recommended for us to do when teaching our children the speed and pace of a book. First, I was to read the book in it's entirety to the boys so they could get out their desire to piddle over the pictures and dwaddle too long over each page. They were able to enjoy the storyline first without the need to have to perform with reading it. Then once I read it to them, my child would then have a turn to read it. Depending on the level of reader you would possibly read only a few sentences and then he would read a those same sentences back to you. As my child became a more efficient reader I no longer had to do this with each sentence and we could do a page or two at a time, and now I don't have to pre-read it at all with him.

From what they also taught me, during instruction time with phonics is when you wait for them to sound out the word for you without help, but during this time that you are trying to teach them the cadence and rhythym of reading a book that if they come across words that they stumble on then just immediately help them so they don't lose the pace of the reading.

There are times when I make my children sound out the word, especially during teaching times. And then there are many ocassions that I quickly help them with the word when they are learning how to read a book with a consistent pace.

Anyways...hope any of this makes sense!
Tiffanie

[Lynnw]

Hi Deanna,

I'm not Shannon, but I just wanted to chime in...my boys and I participated in a reading program last summer and this is exactly what they recommended for us to do when teaching our children the speed and pace of a book. First, I was to read the book in it's entirety to the boys so they could get out their desire to piddle over the pictures and dwaddle too long over each page. They were able to enjoy the storyline first without the need to have to perform with reading it. Then once I read it to them, my child would then have a turn to read it. Depending on the level of reader you would possibly read only a few sentences and then he would read a those same sentences back to you. As my child became a more efficient reader I no longer had to do this with each sentence and we could do a page or two at a time, and now I don't have to pre-read it at all with him.

From what they also taught me, during instruction time with phonics is when you wait for them to sound out the word for you without help, but during this time that you are trying to teach them the cadence and rhythym of reading a book that if they come across words that they stumble on then just immediately help them so they don't lose the pace of the reading.

There are times when I make my children sound out the word, especially during teaching times. And then there are many ocassions that I quickly help them with the word when they are learning how to read a book with a consistent pace.

Anyways...hope any of this makes sense!
Tiffanie

Tiffanie, Thanks so much for sharing this information - it really resonates with me as a method that might help my ds (7yo) over his reading "hump." Also, I've always wondered about helping with words vs. not helping and what you wrote about when to help and not help really makes sense to me. I can't wait to try some of the things you've written about! Would you recommend doing this with the emergent reader books from HOD?

Also (sorry to hi-jack) I don't think ds is quite ready for the emergent reader books yet, but if he is soon, is it okay to take them at a slower pace than the HOD schedule - or is that an indication that he's not ready yet? (Sorry, that doesn't have anything to do with DITHOR )

To OP I can't offer much to your question as I am starting DITHOR with my oldest today! This is the first time we've ever done a reading program (besides the American Language Readers he did as he learned to read and the McCall-Crabbs 3-minute timed drills for reading comprehension) Anyway, I'm coming from the opposite end of the spectrum as ds has always read real books (except for phonics) with very little traditional work (i.e. workbook pages, etc.), but sometimes narration, discussion etc. Today ds was to look for setting information - that was definitely new to him. He found one (questionable, LOL) example and I found some more to help him understand what he was looking for. I'm going to have him do the same "exercise" when he reads again tomorrow. I'm excited about how this will improve his attentiveness to things he might not have noticed before. Btw, DITHOR always asks the student to read a few pages aloud to his parent, but if you need to I would think you could keep your dc reading aloud for the whole reading.

I don't know if that is helpful at all!

Lynn

[mrsrandolph]

Some good suggestions for improving reading fluency have been posted. What my husband did was record the text of a simple book (maybe dr. Seuss type) being read by an adult. The words are read at a pretty slow pace at first. The child is taught to track with their finger following along with the recording.

Of course this could be done with a parent reading "live" versus a recording.

As the child's tracking improves, a recording is made at a faster pace. As the child gains tracking proficiency, he/she reads the text orally to the parent/teacher.

It does seem to work : )

Shannon

Oh--and as one mom already stated, reading the book to the child first in a regular fashion is a great idea.

[momofabcd]

Some good suggestions for improving reading fluency have been posted. What my husband did was record the text of a simple book (maybe dr. Seuss type) being read by an adult. The words are read at a pretty slow pace at first. The child is taught to track with their finger following along with the recording.

Of course this could be done with a parent reading "live" versus a recording.

As the child's tracking improves, a recording is made at a faster pace. As the child gains tracking proficiency, he/she reads the text orally to the parent/teacher.

It does seem to work : )

Shannon

Oh--and as one mom already stated, reading the book to the child first in a regular fashion is a great idea.

So, you're saying that the child doesn't even read the text orally until their tracking gains proficiency? How long does this initially take? When do you know when to stop recording the text being read? From your previous post, I would have never guessed that using recorded readings was your husband's experiment. But, it makes sense. A lady whom I highly admire, told me she had her dd listen to and follow along with books on tape to improve her reading skills. She is now a young adult in college.

[mrsrandolph]

There is another thing we do at our house. When our kids watch programs (educational videos usually), we keep the closed caption on. That way there is text on the screen to match the words they hear.

Now our family is addicted to the captions! You never know how much you are missing until you see what is being said

Shannon

[my3sons]

I am trying to decide what I should use for reading for my ds who will be in 3rd grade next year. I have thrown around the idea of using CLE, Abeka (which we have been using for the past 3 years), BJU, or Drawn into the Heart of Reading. My dc have always used "readers" for their reading program, so it is difficult to just let them go for real books for school reading. Now, they do read real books on their own. I guess especially for my 3rd grader who is still a young reader I do not know if I feel comfortable with letting go of the readers until he becomes a more proficient reader. He is reading at his level, but doesn't always sound smooth (some stuttering going on there), and sometimes substitutes words for other words of the same meaning.
When he gets to larger words, he tends to want to rush through them and guess rather than dividing them into syllables and sounding them out (words such as auditorium or prescription). Do you think that Drawn into the Heart of Reading would not be a good fit for him? Should I go with one of these other programs? Thanks for your help!

Playschool - I think your ds is ready to let go of readers and jump into real books - HOORAY! That means he is ready for DITHOR! I think he's actually at a point when reading real books is quite important to do, because he is ready to move to the next step in reading - which is read books without controlled vocabulary. This is a key step to reading proficiently, and he is ready for it. He will benefit greatly from the confidence that he gains when he realizes he is able to choose books of interest himself, and that he is not limited to a set of leveled readers moving in a set order. He will also benefit from seeing that all books don't necessarily incrementally get more difficult - but instead, one real book he reads first may be harder, but then the next one might be easier, and so on. This parallels natural reading.

I wouldn't worry about the occasional stuttering, the sometimes rough reading, and the now and then substitutions. When I used to give dc reading placement tests, they could have 2 substitutions/omissions in a leveled paragraph and still move on to the next level. Have you ever noticed that you may skip words here or there, reverse the order of words, or substitute similar words (that make sense) at times when you read out loud? I do, and I know that is very normal - not that I try to do this, but in the day to day of reading books, it happens. Reading with adequate pacing becomes quite important and is actually a higher level reading skill that can cause us to slip back into some of the mistakes I already mentioned - when you're in a nice rhythm for reading out loud, it's second nature not to want to stop to sound things out, or say, "oh, I missed reading that word, it was supposed to be ____", etc. I taught 3rd. grade for 7 years before homeshcooling my own dc the last 7 years, and how you've described your ds fit about 3/4 of the dc in each of my 3rd. grade classrooms over the years, as well as my own dc.

Research has proven again and again that one of the very best ways to improve reading fluency, increase vocabulary, and improve reading comprehension, is to have your dc listen to audio books that are several reading levels higher than their reading level. It is important that as they are listening they have the book to follow along with and that they do so throughout the entire reading. We've always had our dc listen on headphones to 15 minutes of books on tape/Cd and follow along in the book each day of the school week. Just thought I'd share this super easy way to meet that goal!

I think your ds would love DITHOR. It is a wonderful program, and I think it would launch him into a lifelong love of reading great books! Be sure to check out the Level 2 Book Pack. It is a wonderful place to begin!

In Christ,
Julie

[playschool]

Thank you Julie and Shannon and all of the others ladies who replied. It is reassuring, Julie, to hear that my ds's reading ability is typical for his grade. My older dd was a more fluent reader by this age, so in comparison, I thought he must be pretty below average. Thanks for the reassurance! He enjoys reading real books as opposed to readers. On occasion, when I allow him to ditch the particular reader he is working on, and substitute a real book in its place, he is thrilled. He has his own peculiar interests (typical for a boy, though). If it were up to him, he would be reading about bugs, animals, and other "science stuff." I really liked the idea of using books on tape and having him follow along. I think he would very much enjoy this and it would be very beneficial as well. Shannon, thanks for sharing about your dh's research. It is funny because many times I do not allow him to follow along with his finger for the plain idea that I thought it would not train his eyes to track and he would always have to use his finger as a crutch. I guess I was wrong. That is something I will have to change. I really liked the idea of turning on the closed caption on the TV as well.
I had planned on using DITHOR with my older dd, so I think I'll use the same with my ds. Thanks for all of your wonderful advice and encouragement.