Im afraid this is going to be rather long but Im really worried about what to do next and need some help!!
My daughter started at nursery school aged 2. She could read and knew her alphabet etc. To begin with the teachers refused to believe it and insisted that she must learn jolly phonics – even when they knew she could already understand the phonics they said that she had to learn the actions!!
But we weathered that one – and last September they agreed she could start their reading scheme.
I should explain that the nursery is divided into 2 classes – one for the 2-3 year olds (Peach Room) and the other for the kids who are going to reception class in the primary schools the following year (Apple room kids). My daughter because her birthday falls the wrong side of the date line has had to do 2 years in Peach Room and will be going to Apple Room this September.
The teachers and owner at the school have really struggled to cope with her reading needs. But once they allowed her to start their book scheme – normally reserved for Apple Room children – she literally flew through them. The scheme has 17 levels. They eventually agreed to ‘test’ her and were astonished to find that she was already at level 10, but they dropped her to 6 ‘to build confidence’.
Just over 8 months passed by and she has reached the top of their reading scheme – there are 6 books left and it has been a subject of much debate what they will do with her when she has finished with these – especially as she has another year to do at nursery. She is the first child in the school to have ever got this far.
Having finally recognised that she could read, they found the only way that they could cope with her development was to send her – at a time convenient to them but never properly scheduled so she got taken away from whatever activity she was engrossed in to read.- and send her to Apple Room where there are some other children on the other scheme levels. Here the teacher who deals with her most often has on at least 3 occasions denied her access to a choosey book (one they take home for an adult to read to them) saying that she has done too much already, and only allows her to read one or 2 pages of her reader. But whenever she reads at home I have to make her stop – usually after we have read most of the book not just a couple of pages. And as for books to be read to her – it’s a full time job keeping up with her!! But time etc allowing I let her drive when and how we read.
She continues to read fluently at home. Her eading age is about age 5 – 6 now. But sometimes she messes around or gets distracted. This applies to anything she does – Im guessing she is like most 3 year olds in that respect. So we turn reading into a game or we change the environment, remove the distractions etc. I cant get the school to see the benefits of this.
Yesterday, having yet again learnt from her that she was told she cant have a choosey book I left a note in her book diary. The school owner called me into see her and told me that she has never been denied a book and that they think that the issue is that my daughter doesn’t want to go to Apple Room – something I have been aware of for sometime. She went on to say that my daughter is struggling with her reading and couldn’t even read very basic words. And yet this morning she sat and read those same words fluently and clearly at home. The school will not take my word for it and are refusing to move her to another book until she has this one perfect. (which is daft – because they know she will refuse to read a book she has already read and she has a photographic memory - their words not mine – so they must realise that this not about reading ability but about something else? The more I think about it its to do with the fact that she doesn’t want to go to Apple Room – and that the 2 things have become muddled because this is where she is sent to read even tho she isn’t old enough to go there properly yet.
Im sorry that this is a bit rambling but I wanted to set the scene, because what I would like to know is if there is anyone else out there who has had a reading child in this age group behave like this – reading at home, but becoming reluctant at school, and if so what they did about it. And also whilst typing this I think that I have worked out the problem i.e. the whole peach room / apple room thing and not the reading thing. But does anyone have any experience of managing schools in this scenario. Im really worried now that if a nursery cant cope with her – how on earth will the middle and senior schools cope ? Have I in exposing her (and her younger brother) to infant learning actually made things really hard for her?
I had a similar problem with my oldest child. Except that I am in the US and they don’t teach reading in most Preschools here. I taught my daughter to read in Preschool. I did it in the evening after she came home from regular preschool. She went to kindergarten late because her birthday falls after the cutoff day. So that meant by the time she reached Kindergarten she was 6 and had been reading for a few years. At her school they use sight words and slowly teach the alphabet sounds. Well she was way beyond this and most of the time she didn’t want to participate because it was boring and she couldn’t pick her own book to read(at least that’s what she told me). They tested her sight word reading ability a few months into the school year and called me up, told me she couldn’t read, and said we needed to have a teacher/parent conference. At the conference they told me that they test the children 3 times a year, and if she doesn’t pass the end of the year reading test she will fail Kindergarten. Honestly I couldn’t believe it. First of all, I knew she could read. Second, fail Kindergarten… Really??? Luckily I had my reading materials in my car(I am a tutor so I usually carry reading and math materials in my car). So I asked the teacher if I could use my reading materials with my daughter to see if I get her to read. I had to seriously convince her to let me try because she just didn’t believe me. Well that certainly did the trick. My daughter was not only reading words, she was sounding them out. Which is not something they were teaching the kids yet. Then I had her read sentences. Well that blew the teacher away. She was shocked and still skeptical! She took the kindergarten sight word list and told my daughter to read them. She flew through the word list at great speed. Then her teacher called her friend over(a second grade teacher at the school that was in the next room). She told the teacher to go get her reading materials and bring them so that she could test my daughter. She still didn’t believe she could read, she thought I had coached her with my stuff. The teacher came back with flash cards that had sentences on them. My daughter was able to read each one out loud without a problem. Finally the teacher believed she could read!
And that’s where the problems at school became worse. Now the teacher knew she could read and expected her to do exactly the same thing she had hated doing before. Read boring beginning sight word books that she couldn’t even pick. At home I always let her pick the book. And while I know that is not always feasible in a school setting, they could let her do it once in a while as a treat for being good or something like that. I asked if I could send some reading materials with her, things I knew she liked or worksheets. They said no they had to stick with the curriculum. They just didn’t know what to do with her.
Well a few months later she took the middle of the school year test and she did not pass. This time at the conference they tell me that I cannot read with her at home because it is causing too many problems. My daughter told them that she doesn’t like reading at school, only at home. They said that her reading at home was making her fail the test and she would fail kindergarten if she didn’t pass the test. I told them that that sounded ridiculous! I had never heard of that before(remember I am a tutor, I specialize in reading!).
Well after 2 months of them pressuring me to stop reading with her I cracked. I stopped teacher her to read. I was afraid she would fail. That was the worst decision I have ever made in my life! The school was so happy that I did because she started to read in class. She began to hate school and eventually it got to the point where she was having emotional outburst. At the end of the year she passed her test and they promoted her to first grade.
Then I decided to pick up reading where we left off. Well it didn’t work out that way. She had lost her love of reading and now refused to read anything. I had so many problems with the teacher and inflexible curriculum that I just decided to pull her out. Where I live it is a lottery to get in to a good public school and we didn’t win. All of my neighborhood schools are horrific. Since I can’t afford private school, we now homeschool.
It took several months of homeschooling to get her to even tolerate reading. Which is the hardest part for me, because it used to be her favorite thing in the world. So my advice to you is, as long as the teachers/administratives of your school are willing to work with you/her then it will be ok. But honestly it sounds like they are not. See if you can get her into a different school public or private. One that is more flexible in the way they teach reading. If you can’t do that then maybe you should think about homeschooling. You taught her how to read already and that really is the hardest part of homeschooling the early years.
Whatever you decide please don’t leave her in the situation she is in right now. She may end up not loving reading anymore like my daughter. I truly regret leaving her in that school. If I had known what it would do to her I would have taken her out sooner.
How many options do you have for schools? Will she be forced to attend a particular school? If not, it may be possible to find a school that is more flexible. My niece attends a charter school. Charter schools are becoming much more popular in the US. They are basically privately run public schools. My niece’s school tests all kids twice a year and puts them in reading and math classes based on their ability level rather than their grade level. So, there definitely are schools that are much more flexible in their approach. Hopefully, there are other options available for her wherever you live.
This made me sad to read that schools can ruin such young children by being so rigid. You really need to try to get the school to work with your child or rather not work at all. My daughter showed her teacher she could read when she was 2 years old - I never told the teacher as she went to school because I had to work and she was quite happy playing there - she could read at home rather and here there is no reading instruction til children are 6 years old by which time hopefully I can figure something out.
You need to get the school to work with you and your child or rather to leave it entirely - it is better to do nothing at school than to kill a love of reading by upsetting the child - even keep her in the peach room and do no reading there - it won’t hurt her if she still reads at home. The problem will then come when she moves to the apple room and then you will have to put your foot down - they MUST get her more advanced readers or give her access to a library where she can choose her own books.
When I was in second grade the teacher would pick books for me to read from the library. I read the reader in group work during school but never at home and I never had reading homework - I just had to read as much as I liked of whatever book was chosen for me and they were advanced books. I really would advise that you stop all school reading unless they are going to remember that she is 3 years old AND an advanced reader, not one OR the other - both things must be taken into consideration and if she isn’t comfortable because of either the reading or the apple room then something must change to make her comfortable again. Someone needs to evaluate what the point is - is it to instil a love of learning, to push their curriculum, to follow rules or to teach each child? If they aren’t helping the child its better they stop. Homeschooling if you can, may well be better.
What is happening with your child is horrible. I find it difficult to understand how a school can be so rigid and inflexible when it comes to a childs education. Illiteracy is a problem here in the U.S., and I feel this school is not working with your daughters skills in reading. Is homeschooling an option for you? Have you looked into the Montessori method? From my understanding, the montessori school system allows children to move at their own pace. Since your child is reading at an advanced level compared to her age, montessori would allow her to continue at that pace. She would be encouraged to read at her comfort level.
Your child is gift! Please don’t give into that school.
My is reading sentances & short stories while the other kids in her preschool class don’t even recognize the alphabet. We put her in a social preschool. They do very little academics, which is fine - I prefer to do that at home anyways. We have worked so hard to make sure our dd loves learning that I would hate for that to be ruined by boring her with alphabet/letter sounds drills. My dd has one more year of preschool, so I won’t have to worry about it until the year after that when the other kids will start learning these things. I’m probably just prolonging the misery, but at least I won’t have to worry about it until she is old enough to understand a little better.
Hmm. This sort of thing illustrates why we never put H. in a preschool (apart from a completely non-academic one, for socialization) and we’re homeschooling.
That doesn’t stop me from being absolutely incensed by these stupid teachers and administrators. This is what comes of putting responsibility for education in systems that are inadequately responsive to individual needs–where the smooth running of the school, and bureaucratic requirements, always comes first.
Good luck. Please, for the sake of your little ones, think creatively how you can solve these problems. Try different teachers, programs, schools, try moving, homeschooling, electronic (online) schooling…get counseling…keep thinking…
thank you all - food for thought, and at least I dont feel quite so isolated. Sadly much as I would dealry love to home school I cant as I have to go back to work full time in a 3 months.
I am going to try and have another go at the school owner, though I am sure that she will not like it. It worries me for the future as there is little choice in terms of schooling here - generally your cild will go to the catchment of the school they live in. I could change her pre school but thats about it - and Im torn between the devil you know and the one you dont!!
