Hi Friends,
I want few suggestions regarding my daughter who is going to turn 3 by next month. I did early learning for my DD from 6 months. But after 1.5 yrs I couldn’t continue bcz I became pregnant again so I was not able to take care of her. My question is I don’t know whether she can read or not. If I show simple words and ask her to read she is not doing it correctly.
But one day I showed her some flash cards she did correctly for first 2 words after that she started playing with it and started reading it wrongly. I don’t know how to make her read. If we read a book or do flash cards she wants to look only at the picture not the word. If I ask her to look at the word she opens her eyes wide open goes near the words and she stares at the words. I don’t know how to make her read. Give me some ideas to make her read.
If we read the same book next day, by seeing the picture she says the sentence sometimes correctly. If we try to make her read the words she blabbers something and closes the book and walks away.
Right now we are in USA but we are planning to move to India in 2 r 3 yrs. I am so much worried that if we go back there she will not be able to cope up with the syllabus there.
I think your daughter can read some things but not all and she is not confident in her abilities and is under a little bit of stress to perform.
I would suggest a few things. Firstly stop asking her to read to you. She is only just turning three, you should be teaching her not feasting her. Your focus needs to be on IMPUT not on her output. Your job is to show her words, lots of them. Don’t ask her to read any until she volunteers to.
Also she seems to be at the point of reading where some systematic phonics instruction would be useful to her. Use any method you like, thrass, Spaulding, LR, star fall, reading whisper, or my suggestion add readingbear to your day. It’s free and teaches both phonics and blending which is what she needs to learn next anyway.
If you show her lots of words for 6 months and show her reading bear each day, and teach her her alphabet sounds ( sounds not letter names) she will have all the tools she needs to read. After 6 months of doing this if she still hasn’t volunteered to demonstrate her skills then its time for reading games and buddy reading of books.
Overall I just think she needs more IMPUT. Teach her more words and phonics. You are doing a great job so far! Keep it up.she is almost there
Thanks Mandaplus for the suggestions. I will start doing lot reading with her. I will wait her to read by herself.
1.I have question like If i read a book with her she just looks at the picture but not the words so will she be able to read the words even if she sees the pictures while i am reading to her.
2.I have hooked on phonics set with me if i put the video she doesnt like it, she says to switch off the video. I am not good at phonics so i dont know how to teach her.
3.I have another baby who is 6 months old. Can you suggest me what kind of activities i should do with her and how many times a day. I already show her flash cards once daily. If i put YBCR videos she doesnt want to sit and watch till end. what can i do about this?
Thank you so much for your help and adivce.
- My sister “kiwimum” had a similar experience with YBCR. Her daughter Chloe really focused on the DVD but she would cry/scream when she got to a part of the DVD she wasn’t familiar with, even with us sitting right there, talking about the words and pictures with her. It took time and repetition for her to get to the stage of seeing the whole DVD.
I suggest just turning it off when she loses interest (or in our case screaming). Start again from the start the next time/next day. Your 6month baby will get to the end eventually.
Kiwimum also started sign about 6months, my mother (“Ilala” on the forum) made a bunch of mini flashcards with words, pictures an sign on them.
- With your elder daughter i think she WILL be taking in any reading that you do. My niece (almost 2 now) is often busy doing other things and appears not to be paying attention when we read to her but if you pause before saying a word she will finish the sentence for you.
When she is on my knee for a cuddle while reading I run my finger under the words as i go, she is following the story AND looking at and pointing out the pictures. I think that learning whole words means that she can scan the text much faster than i can read it.
I think it is likely to be the same with your daughter. It appears that she is only looking at the pictures but maybe she has already looked at the words that she knows?
- Chloe is very vocal about getting us to switch off programs she doesn’t know / enjoy.
But there’s always another way to try to introduce the same concept.
Maybe you can watch the phonics video yourself after your daughter is in bed to get the basic idea of what its about and use the techniques occasionally in your story reading?
For your baby show lots of flash cards a few times a day. Show her 5-10 word cards as many as she will watch without getting distracted. When shuffle them and show the same cards at least once more during the day ( up to five times in a day but at least twice) each day take out one word card and put in a new one. So she gets a new word every day. If you are doing 10 cards add two new words a day.
If that all sounds too hard then definitely buy Little reader software. It saves SOOOO much time in making flash cards. Try out the free trial if you haven’t already!
For you older child
Looking at the pictures.- try to get books with the writing on one page and the pictures on the opposite page. Then you can cover the pictures while you read. Always run your finger under the words as you read so she is naturally drawn to read along. Don’t treat every reading session as a lesson in reading. Sometimes it is OK to read a book just for pleasure to her. So let her look at the pictures at least once a day.
Also use flash cards with both of your children.start flashing the sight words to your oldest one ( baby can watch them too!)
Phonics- use startfall.com to teach all the letter sounds. Do two letters a day for about 6 weeks and she will have them covered. Then start her watching readingbear.org every day do a lesson. She will learn why she learnt her letter sounds and how to blend words using phonics.
If she doesn’t like the DVD don’t use it. Or put it on while she is busy doing something else.
I wouldn’t expect any of my kids to sit through the entire DVD from YBCR but play it in the room they are playing in as background information if they don’t want to sit and watch. The YBCR DVDs are a particular style and some kids just don’t gel with it. You could try MEET the phonics DVDs my kids preferred these and the Meet the sight words DVD had a huge impact on my sons reading ability.
Hope that gives you more guidance.
Actually, child can read some simple worlds in 3 years old, I wonder if your daughter read it uncorrectly on purpose, maybe she just did not want to study in attitude.
- When my older kid (5) asked for a cartoon I used to say “well, after you will tidy your toys”. Once she said that she is very tired and so on and I said “well, you will get your cartoon if you will teach A. (my youngest kid) something. Playdooh, books, drawing etc”.
It was a success. She started to teach my son all the time, and talk to him all the time!
Currently she is reading aloud a book for my youngest one 
- My almost 3 year old started to read with this material http://library.brillkids.com/download.php?cid=6&tid=&lid=104&fid=9287
I also used powerpoints with family pictures. Picture, than sentence (one word per slide), than picture again. My son is very active so I changed my approach all the time. He has his own profile and he was allowed to press buttons. Now he is reading. It is very funny because he is a bit speech-delayed.
I did a lot of circle time with my 3 year old son. I think repetition is key as well as a routine! That is what i use to do inside my classroom when I was a preschool teacher. I bought a circle time center chart, made a journal book and personalized trace letters for him to start writing out the letters and his name. I use sight words first on our chalk board that I had bought from IKEA (turns into a chalk, paint, and dry-marker board). I put simple 3 letter words such as ‘pig’ asked him to sound out the letters (we go over the sounds of letters) and we say it together slowly. Once he figures out how to say it faster, he figures out the word! Then I will change the first letter of the sight word into another letter and he figures it out pretty quick. I buy a lot of the first books for the first year readers at my local used book store (but look new!!..sometimes) and we read the books together slowly during his lunch time and a few books before bed.
I work with a lot of preschool kids ages 2, 3, and 4 online - check us out and the demos: https://www.facebook.com/EarlyLearnersOnline
I think she is just not interested at the word you provided at all. Try to give her some interesting word with colorful picture, I think it’s gonna work!