Not Learning Letters

[Carrie]

glperky,

The ladies are doing a great job of talking through possibilities with you. I wanted to chime in with a few thoughts and questions too. It is true that kiddos do not need to know the names of the letters in order to read, so I would focus more on learning the letter sounds instead of the letter names and letter sounds both. Learning both names and sounds can be a challenge to keep straight! Of course, later it helps to know the letter names in order to spell, to copy, to alphabetize, and to use the dictionary. However, to read only the sounds are needed.

Next, I am wondering if your child has had any formal curriculum that actually teaches the letter sounds and reviews them on a daily basis? The reason I ask is that all of the online options and videos you mentioned are great, but in order for the sounds to really stick (for quite a few kiddos), many different senses are needed to be employed and much practice is needed. This doesn't mean that drill, drill, drill is the needed method. It just means that regular practice with the sounds in a variety of ways will make all the difference.

It also means that once your kiddo starts to pick up the sounds you keep on going, making sure you are not pausing and taking breaks. Phonics is one of those things that once you begin, it helps to keep some steady practice going until kids really grab on. We took the last three summers off with my last little guy during the process of teaching him phonics, and I cannot tell you how much I regret that! It was at a time when he really needed to keep on going, but I was just so busy writing that I lost steam with the phonics. So, one thing that I would encourage you to do is either commit to really beginning phonics (and learning sounds) formally, and then you're in it for the two-year haul until most of the phonics is learned; or wait until you are ready to be more committed. I am not saying that you need to commit vast quantities of time to phonics daily, but I am saying that 10-15 min. daily (5 times a week) is needed on a regular basis to truly see progress.

Phonics is one of those areas that also requires a teacher. It requires interaction and the teacher and child sitting together and sharing the words, books, letter sounds. It is work, but it pays off. We did The Reading Lesson here in a stop and start fashion that really set us back. After we finished it completely, I had to pull out an old phonics program I had here and go almost completely through that simply to build fluency and to review (because we had stopped the Reading Lesson over two different summer breaks on two different years, which made remembering everything really tough for my little one). I could have probably just gone back through the Reading Lesson all over again, but I just didn't want to redo it all again. So, I share this to let you know that amount of teacher time spent steadily teaching phonics can make a big difference. I am convicted of that anew, and I am not taking phonics off this summer with my youngest one! He is progressing, and I can see that had I taken a big break right now all of that slow but steady progress would have been lost...again. With my older three, I was much more consistent early on in teaching them phonics. What a difference that made!

It is also possible that your son has this as an area of struggle for other reasons. We won't know that for sure right now unless you have already devoted several years steadily teaching him phonics 5 times a week with no progress made. One thing I am wondering if whether your son is able to do the writing that is within Beyond right now and the spelling, or whether that is tough too? Is it possible that he might be better placed in LHFHG? Feel free to share your thoughts.

Blessings,
Carrie

[glperky]

Carrie,

Thank you so much for taking the time to reply and for the thoughts.

I have worked on just letter sounds by themselves and together with letter names. We did go through Little Hands and Little Hearts so I have tried to teach him and not just let him learn on his own. The reason I mentioned the other programs like Leap Frog, etc. I because people usually say to try those, so I just wanted to put it out there first that I had tried those. We also school year around minus a week at Thanksgiving, two at Christmas and the month of Aug. We school 5 days a week except for June and July where we only cut out two days. So learning letter sounds has been a steady on going process.

As far as Beyond goes. Julie suggested once that I try the spelling in Beyond with him to see if he would place in Beyond and if I rememebr correctly, he only missed one word the week we tried List one Week One. So we tried week two the next week and he missed one again. He can copy about two lines of the poem at a sitting. It is a real struggle for him, and the spacing is horrible, but he can do it.

So, now what are your thoughts?

Thank you agian for your help in this matter.

Be Son-filled
Ger

[Rice]

I do have a call into the eye Dr. to schedule an appt.

I want to encourage you to make sure you see more than just a regular optometrist. Make sure they check not just eye health and vision (ie 20/20 kind of prescription-type diagnosis) but also developmental issues, tracking, convergence, etc. I've heard some people say to look for a Developmental Ophthalmologist (though the terminology may be different in different states/countries?).

Our DD has just gotten reading glasses and has an un-diagnosed ear problem, too. (She's had ringing and pain in her ears for 1 1/2 years and we are finally awaiting placement of tubes in her ears.) On Tuesday we are finally getting her in to a Psychologist for cognitive testing. She is now 10 and, although she has made progress this year, she still struggles with reading aloud; she makes lots of guesses, flips letters around within words, etc. Her comprehension is WAY above her reading ability (and I believe her silent reading ability passes her oral). We've finally come to the place where we'd rather spend the money and know where she is at; is there something that a few years from now we will wish we had done or is she just slower than average to make the eye-brain-mouth connection and we just need to continue as we have? So, although our DD's problem is different, just know that you are not the only parent watching, waiting and wondering if more should/could be done to help a child take the next step on the (sometimes long ) road to reading.

Blessings as you search out answers,

[glperky]

I do have a call into the eye Dr. to schedule an appt.

I want to encourage you to make sure you see more than just a regular optometrist. Make sure they check not just eye health and vision (ie 20/20 kind of prescription-type diagnosis) but also developmental issues, tracking, convergence, etc. I've heard some people say to look for a Developmental Ophthalmologist (though the terminology may be different in different states/countries?).

Our DD has just gotten reading glasses and has an un-diagnosed ear problem, too. (She's had ringing and pain in her ears for 1 1/2 years and we are finally awaiting placement of tubes in her ears.) On Tuesday we are finally getting her in to a Psychologist for cognitive testing. She is now 10 and, although she has made progress this year, she still struggles with reading aloud; she makes lots of guesses, flips letters around within words, etc. Her comprehension is WAY above her reading ability (and I believe her silent reading ability passes her oral). We've finally come to the place where we'd rather spend the money and know where she is at; is there something that a few years from now we will wish we had done or is she just slower than average to make the eye-brain-mouth connection and we just need to continue as we have? So, although our DD's problem is different, just know that you are not the only parent watching, waiting and wondering if more should/could be done to help a child take the next step on the (sometimes long ) road to reading.

Blessings as you search out answers,

Thank you for this. I do have a call into a Dev. Ophthalmogist. I looked up the names of ones within 100 miles of my house thinking "there won't be one" then I could hardly believe my eyes when there was one on the list. He is 20 miles away and is MY eye Dr., that I rally like and trust. I was so excited. God is good!