First reading, then writing, okay? I'm torn between writing a tome, and getting it over with already, although even the latter will take multiple posts, at the minimum.
{And of course I can't resist adding photos of our recent visit from our little Philip.} |
But in one way I just want to say, is it possible you are making this too complicated? And by you I mean the many sweet, earnest, loving moms over the years who have asked me, with only a slight tinge of hysteria in their voices, “What do you do for Language Arts?”
Sometimes they are home schooling.
Sometimes their children are in school and things aren't going well.
Sometimes they have taken their children out of school and found that what they assumed was the process of learning to read actually wasn't taking place, and now they have older, virtual non-readers.
Sometimes they have home schooled for a while and have gotten bogged down in all the possibilities, ditching multiple horses at various points in the educational stream, drowning in curriculum, overwhelmed by the experts, and generally suffering from “latest-program-itis.”
And let's not even talk about grammar or writing.
It all seems so futile or panic-inducing to some of you.
And yet….
After all, as I hinted in the first post, and without getting into methodological issues, our country has been a nation of readers. Since the goal of early Americans was to make reading of Scripture universal, the definition of literacy was held to a fairly high standard. In later times, critics take issue with the figures, and I think that's more than justified.
But in the past there is no question that with very few resources, children learned to read. Often they were taught by a very young woman with only a small amount of education herself, certainly not the recipient of today's decades of training. Even in cities, she taught multiple levels, with nothing but a small shelf of books and plain old paper and pencil. You know very well that sometimes there wasn't even that much in the way of supplies.
In the 18th century, ordinary people read so well that the Federalist Papers, which are listed in book catalogs today as having a target audience of graduate students, were originally published in the New York Times as position papers for the ratification of the Constitution, aimed at the citizens of the colony, most of whom were farmers. Don't think that's an exaggeration; even the most far-flung rural area took its news very seriously.
Okay. Well, if they could do it, so can we. Let's take a quick look at the background.
The most important thing you can teach your child — to read — also just happens to require a way of life from you.
Well, some children learn to read no matter what. But long ago people figured out that for the majority of children to learn to read, they had to grow up a certain way, which is hearing language all about them, and having language elicited from them, that will motivate them to learn to read.
Now that the language that's all around us, for the most part, is either geared to make us buy something or to make us forget that we are rational human beings (advertisements and noisy background music, respectively), it's a little harder to make our children's world one that works for reading — and also happens to be delightful and conducive to a peaceful existence. I don't know how we got to the point where language and sound in general have become assault weapons. But that's another rant.
Click on the pictures below to get to the information about the books (I hope).
Suffice it to say that at home, at least, our goal as parents should be to create an environment that has both order and wonder. Even the smallest child should begin to sense that there is a rhythm to most days, with times built in that provide both silence and purposeful noise, or rather sounds.
Silence.
A wonderful, amazing state of being. Every day there should be some silence in your children's lives.
When there are sounds, make sure they are good ones. If we're just thinking about getting a child ready to read, some sounds are obvious — the sound of your voice (both speaking in complete sentences and reading to them) the sound of them babbling with a book in their hands.
Maybe some are not so obvious: nursery rhymes and old children's songs — these two elements, once so very common in every household, are perhaps the biggest contributors to literacy before the fact, yet the most overlooked today (after a good old translation of the Bible). When a child wraps his little tongue around rhymes that mean something to him, he's learning that individual words have the power to delight when paired with other specific words! When he sings a silly song that incorporates alliteration, rhyme, and repetition, he's getting great practice simply in knowing how words work. I learned this last year when we had a French friend visiting. She had trouble getting comfortable with the words “Go tell so and so that such and such” — as I'm sure I would be in French. But you could get her to sing them (“Go tell Aunt Rhody, Go tell Aunt Rhody!) –especially if she had been used, as a child, to sing.
Words are not just scatter-shot that you hope hit your target. They should have a purpose and be a pleasure to give and receive. And that takes all the practice of the years leading up to learning to read, years that are hard to get back once they go by.
Equally important to the big picture of learning to read: Running around outside. I do think that parents today — certainly schools — are unrealistic about the vital necessity for a child to, as my husband says, get his ya-yas out. Part of every day — scheduled into that order I keep talking about– should be spent simply running around and yelling!
Outside, of course. We smart, strong, intense, discipline-oriented parenting types forget what it's like to be a child. We have lost touch with how parenting has gone over the centuries, when children didn't get smothered by the intensive grip of their unoccupied mothers, and yes, I do consider, when compared to families of the past, that we are unoccupied. And even moms who are not disciplinarians are yet wimpily confining in their approach. The wimpy confiners don't require anything of their children, but they also never really let them run wild, even for a minute. Their children are still constrained, albeit not to any effect.
Children, even small ones, long ago spent a lot more time just running around. Thus, when asked to sit still for 20 minutes to learn something, they didn't regard such an request as the sheer injustice their counterparts today do.
Oh, make no mistake about it. When your child squirms, giggles, slumps, drops his pencil repeatedly, cries, or otherwise misbehaves at school (home or “real”), he's registering (in the only way he knows how, so give him credit) resistance at the sheer injustice of your requirements for his day. And I for one don't blame him one bit.
Next I will share some specific materials for early reading, along with the criteria for choosing them — just as important!
{Next post in this series: Part I of Teaching your child to read.}
raven says
thank you! i shared this with my daughters who have little ones!
Glenda Childers says
I love reading and I love teaching kids to read . . . but it is hard to really digest your post . . . with the beautiful pictures of your daughters and their children. You are truly blessed.
Fondly,
Glenda
_Leila says
Glenda, that is my daughter on the left and her college roommate with her baby on the right! She is my honorary daughter 🙂
Karen says
My first child taught herself to read which then set me up for some unrealistic expectations when teaching the next sibling. I was hell bent for leather that he would read fluently by the end of kindergarten. After all his sister was reading Charlotte's Web in kindergarten, he could at least read something.
It was miserable. He was miserable, I was miserable. There were tears and yelling….I don't know what I was thinking. He did read well by the end of kindergarten but NEVER developed a love of reading and while his test scores are more than adequate he only reads if he must. 🙁
Karen says
Continued from above….
I relaxed for the next child but he was on of those kids where the switch flips and all those lines and circles on the page almost simultaneously decode and he went from basic phoncs to reading at a 2nd grade level in a matter of weeks. Ever since then I've alternated between the ones who picked up reading easily and the ones that don't but I have never again forced it into my children like I did with poor #2. All of my children that are old enoguh to read with the exception of that particular son are all voracious readers, even the ones who found reading challenging at the beginning.
Right now I have a 7 year old who 'got it' in the last few weeks / and a just 5 year old who isn't far behind. Last year that 7 year old could barely remember each letter sound, let alone sound out a whole word. Give him another year and he'll be plowing through books on his own like nobody's business. He is just like my oldest boy who had a hard time learning to read but unlike poor J. who wants nothing to do with books, B. wants to be an author.
Anne says
Your books are pretty. 🙂 I love to see my kids “reading” to themselves. At one year old for Ann this means flipping through a book, usually many pages at a time babbling happily. At three for Jack this means flipping each page and reciting from memory what each page says. I am amazed at how many of them he has picked up!
On another note, Jack could totally be a girl in that picture. I need to cut his hair…:( But it's soo pretty! and he HATES hair cuts. 🙁
brooke says
I had the experience of teaching my oldest child to read in such a gentle and lovely fashion. It worked like a charm. I assumed it would be the same with my second. It wasn't. As far back as the 1800's, they have documented dyslexia by varying descriptions and names. And they know so much about it now (although most teachers do not) which they never knew in the past. That is what he has. And my third as well. Possibly the fourth. We now embark on a completely different plan from teaching my first to read. Still gentle, but incredibly systematic and slow and yet, intense at the very same time. I'm so glad we discovered it.
Emily C says
I'm so grateful for your guidance! My boys are 4, 2, and 9 months, and I find so much wisdom here! When I ask my mother and her sisters for advice, so much of it seems to be, “I don't really remember, it was so long ago.”
Thank you.
RCG says
“I don't know how we got to the point where language and sound in general have become assault weapons. ”
Too true.
Classic and Quotable as usual.
There are now $180 headphones so you can hear your comrades on MMORPG's (Massively multiplayer online role-playing games) scream the f bomb and other choice R and X rated insults in technicolor surround sound! Sigh.
RubberChickenGirl
Angela says
Yes, yes, yes. More please.
Grace says
This is a fabulous post! My husband and I spent the weekend attending our states Catholic Homeschool Conference of which Andrew Pudewa (Institute for Excellence in Writing) was the keynote. In both his keynote addresses he stressed the importance of freedom in education (liberal arts) to learn naturally through the creation of a world of order and wonder and the importance of music and memorization for the mind through poetry (rhymes or other) and the study of an instrument. In his workshop sessions he stressed the importance of reading aloud to children (either by you or through the use of audiobooks) and getting outside (nature studies). Your post fits perfectly with all we soaked up this weekend! This is yet another affirmation that God is calling us to simplify in our homeschool. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Sara says
I tend to vacillate between getting stressed about teaching my almost four year old, and being totally laissez faire about it. The latter usually wins out. I really do think playing is the job of a small child but occasionally I see what other people are doing and I feel like I should do something, too.
I recently got a book about teaching a child to read with children's books. The system is one I know my sister has used to teach 1st graders, so I called her to ask about it. She gave wise advice: almost all children will learn to read with whatever method you use. And, my child will not have any problems, so don't worry about it.
Sue in Japan says
Yes! I am with you, and ready for the next installment. No pressure, though. Whenever you get to it in between baby kissing and whatnot is just fine.
It seems that a lot of moms have found out the hard way that what works with the first child doesn't necessarily work well with the second (myself included). I have heard the same thing that commenter Sara was told by her sister – that no matter what method is used almost all children will learn to read. Well, yes, they may learn it, but some methods are easier for a child than others, depending on his learning style. My first absolutely hated phonics and finally took off with reading basically on her own, by sight, after I stopped beating that dead horse. As it turned out, my second loved phonics, but was so frustrated when we got to all the “exceptions” he just wanted everything to follow the rules properly. He still kind of struggles with that. But, in the end, they both learned to read, in his/her own time, and I often think that it was largely in spite of me! That being said, I did do all of the things that you talked about in this post, so they definitely had that solid foundation.
Lori says
What a great post! I had my husband reading over my shoulder on this one. 🙂 Good sounds and good silence, lots of outside play – it makes so much sense. I would LOVE more posts on this topic and hear more from other mothers about their experiences, too.
I also wonder about the role of prayer in learning about how words work and, eventually, in learning how to read. (I suspect saying and singing the Liturgy of the Hours has a place in the environment you are describing.) I would enjoy hearing about this, if it fits into your grand scheme of future posts…
nt12many says
Beautiful! As the mother of several late readers (one did not read until the age of 13) who absolutely took off suddenly in their reading and are now gifted writers, I know that reading aloud and speaking to our children is crucial for reading develop. Reading aloud gives them the desire to read.
I also believe that our brains are created in a special way for words. Jesus is called The Word and God revealed Himself (largely but not entirely) through the Holy Scriptures. He certainly could have chosen another way to communicate with us but He didn't. When our brains hear and see words they are stimulated in way that does not occur when our brains see movies or pictures. As a matter of fact, DVD and t.v. watching stimulates the sleep center of the brain which is why children are so hard to motivate after watching something on t.v.!
thank you again1
Jill Farris ” target=”_blank”>http://www.generationalwomanhood.wordpress.com (I wrote a post about our son the late reader entitled “Our son graduates from the University this week).
Kristen says
I'd love to hear more about teaching reading and such, but also about how you made silence a part of the day for your kids. Do you mean simply that you don't have radio/TV/music on all the time in the background? Or are you thinking of something more structured, like a daily “quiet time” alone in their rooms. My girls do have quiet time every afternoon, but I've allowed them to have books on tape or soft music to listen to during that hour. Today after reading your post, however, I sort of hesitated before pushing the play button. I'd love to hear your thoughts on that.
Also about the outside time — do you recommend it before/after/in between schooling? I have girly-girls who sometimes would rather not go outside (especially during our Minnesota winters, but I don't really blame them). Again, was outside time mandatory or merely an option in your daily schedule?
_Leila says
Kristen, listening to books on tape or soft music is fine, but there is still the need for true quiet. Think of how the stillness of the house allows your mind to finally relax. I realize that today “background noise” is the new silence, but that's not good enough!
Yes, sometimes girls aren't too motivated to go outside, but it's pretty important. And I've known little boys who sometimes prefer a book. But hey.
You know me, I'm all for schedules but I'm not super rigid. But I do think that getting out of doors every day is essential. I'm sure in Minnesota you have just the right kinds of winter gear. I well remember how futile it sometimes seemed to get everyone suited up and out the door, just to have them tramp in 10 minutes later (it's good to insist on a bathroom trip beforehand and maybe a little snack, right?). And maybe the 2 yo could be napping if you just can't face the toddler indecision. But the others need to get out there.
One good rule is that you can only shout and run outside. So if you want to shout and run, out you go! 🙂
Kh. Patty says
I've always liked the idea of a daily quiet time, but have never consistently implemented one… for a very active nearly 6y.o. and more normal 3y.o., what would you suggest? How long? Would they be allowed to read books to themselves or must they BE quiet as well as surrounded by quiet? Knowing the nearly 6y.o., if I denied her a stack of books to read, she'd balk for sure, but I'd like to hear what you suggest.
Kristen says
Ok, I'll have to break it to the 6 yr old that the CD player is going to take a little holiday. 🙂 Good thoughts on the outside time too. It is the back and forth that drives me nuts.
_Rosie says
As far as whether outside time was mandatory or not, I distinctly remember being hustled out the back door (in the most loving possible way, I'm sure) with my brothers and sisters, with instructions that we were not to come back inside until it was dark out.
You should hear us when we get together these days, remembering all the fun games we played together!
Kristen says
Aha — a view from the inside! 🙂
We only have two little girls (and given my age, it seems that may be all that God intends for us), and while I would never suggest that mothering 2 is harder than mothering 5-7, I do think mothers of large families do have an advantage in the “you kids go play” department. From what I've observed, somewhere between 4-5 kids a sibling comaraderie develops which is hard to replicate in smaller families — it seems to require a critical mass.
Thanks for sharing your memories — your little guy is precious, btw.
Kh. Patty says
How I wish we lived somewhere where this were possible! I remember spending hours upon hours outside in our giant backyard, inventing names for each part of it… the “green meadow,” the “bush house,”… playing in the sandbox, climbing the big tree… my poor kids are growing up in Chicago and I just don't feel safe letting them play outside without me there! They're only 5 and 3, so I'm sure the time will come sooner than I think, but just not yet….
annkroeker says
Early in our homeschool adventure I encountered Charlotte Mason's philosophy of education and found that it fit my own. That was just about the same time people sort of packaged her ideas into other books and websites. She advocates lots of outside time and stresses reading “real” books (as opposed to what she coined “twaddle”).
Thanks for the reminders. My girls are all teenagers, and my son will turn ten this summer, but we all need to get outside–every person, regardless of age–and reading is essential. I totally agree.
Margo says
oh good – all my mother guilt just vanished! We do lots of running, reading, singing, and “mommy has work to do” at our house. whew. My daughter is 5.5 and seems to me to be on the cusp of reading. It's so exciting. I love your sensible approach!
Diane in TX says
Attn: BROOKE! I realize that this is a blog and not a forum; but I would desperately like from BROOKE to give us more details about teaching dyslexic children how to read. What is the “completely different plan” that is gentle but systematic and intense at the same time??? Please! It would be a lifesaver to this mom that is overboard and drowning from the reading ship!
Thank you so much for this post. It is very timely and I look forward to more wisdom!
Brenda says
This is just lovely…..and all so true! The wholesomeness of this approach to reading (actually, to language in general) fosters such an eager attitude in most children. It's a joy & privilege to experience the world anew, through their eyes & ears, as they catch on to this wonderful thing we call “communication”.
Brenda
p.s. the babies are adorable! :o)
Heidi says
Three things:
1. Thank you – THANK YOU – for this series of posts! My 4yo and I read and read, and she's grasping it, but as I prepare to start homeschooling her in the fall, I've been looking for more concrete direction for reading and writing.
2. For those who can't think of a single children's song and need some direction, I highly recommend recordings by Elizabeth Mitchell. She records on the Smithsonian Folkways label and has five or six (or seven?) albums of mostly acoustic and easy-on-the-grownups'-ears children's songs. Some are renditions of more popular songs (Three Little Birds by Bob Marley), some are original compositions by her family, and some are folk songs from around the world. They are fantastic, peaceful, and easy to learn.
3. Eloise Wilkins is possibly the best children's book illustrator ever. My mother-in-law introduced me to her work; I sort of feel like my life might have gone a different direction if I'd been exposed to her when I was young (not sure how I missed her as a child, but I certainly don't remember her books).
Rachel P. says
I absolutely agree that children today do not get enough time to “get their ya-yas out.” I like that expression! Recess for my son in his Kindergarten class was fifteen minutes for four hours of sitting still and paying close attention to instruction. This was absolutely unacceptable in my mind. My children are in love with the outdoors and it helps a great deal in teaching them to let them go outside, play a bit, water and weed the garden and then approach the task of schoolwork. Although I must say, my first born does much better if he gets school out of the way first. Children aren't all the same, after all.
sibyl says
The part I'd like to concur with (“with which I'd like to concur,” just for sniffy grammar types like myself) is the part about the readers being the right sort. Could I give all moms of younger children some advice? Stay away from Dora the Explorer, Barbie, and Iron Man books, and all books written by computer, committee, or ad-copy writers. These books will kill you with boredom as you sit with your young one as she/he tries to sound out each painfully banal word.
Books written by real writers, illustrated with charming or catchy pictures by real artists; this will do a lot of the job of focusing the child's attention. Real books are unpredictable, in language, plot, and style. They please through clever or elegant writing, even at this first level.
Some readers I have found to be in this category are the Mr. Putter and Tabby series, some Henry and Mudge books, and even the Bob Books series, as amateurish as they may at first appear. As picture books, those of Eloise Wilkin are almost without parallel, as are those illustrated by Barbara Cooney. The Richard Scarry books are captivating once the child has a grasp on basic sounding-out.
Debbie says
Love the photo of MaryBeth, Rosie, and the babies! Have Rosie and MaryBeth already arranged the wedding date for the two little ones? Her little girl is as beautiful as one would epect of a child of two such gorgeous parents…
Love,
Debbie
_Leila says
Well, Debbie, of course.
`The engagement between them is of a peculiar kind. From their infancy, they have been intended for each other. It was the favourite wish of his mother, as well as of her's. While in their cradles, we planned the union…'
Debbie says
Touche- okay, okay, that one didn't work out too well, did it; but only because Lady Anne was so terribly insipid (poor thing, growing up under an overbearing mother like that who never let her get a word in edgewise), which no child of MaryBeth's will be!
brooke says
I just saw this, Diane in Texas. I'm very sorry to have missed it, so hopefully you will get this.
The plan we have had to use for remediation has been the Susan Barton plan. Expensive, however, much much much cheaper than tutoring. It is totally helping my dyslexic son to read AND spell and I am watching it teach my dyslexic 7 year old how to read without issues. Some advice to wait ends up being “wait until they fail” … but with dyslexia (which about 1/4 of the population has in varying degrees) it ends up in a long, difficult remediation. However, if you work on it early, a good percentage of the children (this is a statistic … studied and tested) go on to not have reading difficulties at all. I highly recommend you look into it. Actually, most people should look into it, just to rule it out early on. And the truth is, not everyone can learn to read in the easy way … but everyone can learn to read with an Orton-Gillingham method (which is what Susan Barton is based on … any Orton-Gillingham method will work, they are all boring, they all work, but the Barton program is also written for ease of homeschooling use and ease of use if the parent is dyslexic … which is often the case). Actually, a lot of adult-diagnosed dyslexics are diagnosed after they see their child diagnosed. The chance is 50% that you or your spouse is dyslexic if your child is. There are varying degrees … mild/moderate/severe/profound and varying things that come along with it (dysgraphia, ADHD, …) which can all factor in … but at it's most basic, that's what the percentages show. A great book is, Overcoming Dyslexia, by Sally Shaywitz. Now I'm off to read more of these lovely installments on teaching to read and dreaming that some of my children may possibly be like my first!