Alan & Brenda Leonard

2/24/03 19:20:

> I have found the late reader stories very reassuring, but I wonder if there
> are very many unschooling early readers?

Mine read his first little Hello Reader type book a month shy of his fifth
birthday, and was into chapter books within about 6 months. I saw the same
kind of progression that unschoolers talk about, just earlier.

Kids who aren't taught to read seem to start to read when they want to, and
when they're ready just take off. No waiting for the teacher to teach them
those hard words. Tim's technique was to just skip anything he couldn't
figure out fast enough for his tastes. Eventually he recognized writen
sounds fast enough that he could identify the word because he knew them
aurally, and didn't skip so many words. He's 6 now, by the way, and hasn't
met anything he can't read, although he only survived 3 pages of one of his
father's beloved theology tomes before declaring it "offensively boring".
<g>

The point to me wasn't when he read, but that he wasn't forced to learn to
read. He learned happily, himself. (We were in the process of moving
overseas. Mom was frazzled. Definitely no teaching going on here!) Now I
see where Tim reads much the way I do. Most days, he reads signs, the
funnies, some other parts of the newspaper, maybe a magazine article, and
that's about it. Occasionally he reads a book. Swallows it whole, more
like. Never let the sun go down on your book is our motto! But he doesn't
"Drop Everything And Read" for 20 minutes, twice a day, as the school thinks
he should. My mother told him about that, and how he should do that. I
think that was a turning point for Tim and advice from my Mom. He looked at
her like she was just bananas.

Anyway, yes, 8 or 10 may be average, but 16 is fine as is 3 like my friend's
son who learned to read when his older sister did; he just never bothered to
mention that he was listening to her reading lessons (a story in and of
itself, but I'm goin' to bed!).

brenda

Angela

My first dd learned to read just before she turned 5. The other just after
she turned 5. (both wanted to learn to read then) My first dd within few
short weeks could read about anything. She is 8 now. My second who is only
6 now, spent several weeks learning how to read and can probably read on a
second grade level. With both of them, after they got it, they had no
interest in reading any more. They wanted to know *how* to read, learned,
and then went on with other things in life. They do read board game spaces,
cereal boxes, real-life stuff they want to know, and some non-fiction
caption type stuff, but don't read books for entertainment. I always
pictured them curled up in a chair reading a good book and loving it. I
never imagined them strewing the books around the living room and using them
for beds for their stuffed animals. BUT, they love books, they love to be
read to, and they know how to read. I have learned to wait patiently for
the day to come when they want to read and curl up in a chair with a good
book. It's been over 3 years now since my first dd learned to read.....I am
still waiting........trying to be patient......I know someday she will enjoy
it........she is only 8.............she hates to do anything unless she can
do it perfectly..........waiting........patiently................

My dh and I always have a book in our face (or a pc screen) it's inevitable
that she will too, eventually. :0)



Angela in Maine-unschooling@...
http://userpages.prexar.com/rickshaw/

"What you are shouts so loudly in my ears I cannot hear what you say."
Emerson






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