In Reply to: AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHH!!!!!! sm posted by Estelle on March 08, 2006 at 08:29:05:
I forget how old Trey is now but your story was mine just a few short years ago.
Our DILEMMA with my son, Paul, was that he was barely reading at grade level and this all became very, very frustrating by third grade. The history (which you may or may not remember, lol) was that he was tested as gifted in reading and math. We took him to specialists, reading coaches, tutoring sessions at Sylvan's AND another private tutoring center; all to no avail. Reading made him nervous and very unhappy.
A lot of the pressure and unhappiness was MY FAULT...I see that now in hindsight. But I thought that pressure and expectations would be beneficial for him to rise to the challenge. I think I just made him nervous and very unsure of himself (oh yay, The Mother's Mea Culpa, lol).
His fourth grade reading teacher had 35 years in the school system and, thankfully, turned all of this around for us. She personally chose books for the 'slow' readers and ALWAYS hit the bull's eye with my kid. What worked at that level: Very little if any narrative or description, ACTION, ACTION, ACTION, fantasy, dragons, castles, etc. She was subtle and not 'demanding' and always asked debate questions that stimulated opinions.
Unfortunately, I can't package her up and send her your way...so that suggestion isn't an 'easy' answer, lol. But I did want to bring up the point about caution with too much pressure and action stories for boys being an idea to explore.
I don't know if Trey is reading chapter books yet? A series of books is sometimes easier and one of my kid's earliest fave series was "My Father's Dragon". Just an idea. Oh, and I guess don't be too Nazi-ish about those bungled and skipped over words...I think it's pretty common to gloss over the hard stuff as a 'novice reader'.
P.S. I told you a long time ago, Paul was in that FT gifted program. Well, mom get-togethers in 3rd grade had moms of boys totally frustrated with their sons' lack of reading skills and the moms of girls were tearing out their hair over their kids' math problems. FWIW LOL