Buddy Reading

In the AmblesideOnline World, it is generally recommended that the students start taking responsibility for reading their material in Year 3 and be reading it all on their own by Year 4. When we started this past summer with Year 1, Pooh was 10 and could read very simple stuff. He was just getting into Frog and Toad style books. Now his reading has taken off. So, even though we're still in Year 1, I'm starting to turn some simple reading responsibilities over to him. (I also feel this is appropriate due to his age. He's starting AO late due to his developmental delays, but once I see an area he takes off in, I may quickly bring him up to age appropriate material. Example: I'm considering starting with very easy dictation to work on spelling and writing. I'll post about that when I decide to start it.)

Buddy reading is a great way to start the process of turning reading over to your student. For those new to the term, buddy reading is simply sitting beside your child and the two of you taking turns reading. It can be as easy as having your child read a word here and there in a sentence (holding your finger under the words for reference). Then you can move onto taking turns with sentences, paragraphs and short chapters. This is where you as the parent need to key in to the 'zone of proximal development' that your child is at. You want to slowly bring them along with their skills, challenging them little by little. Only you know your child's breaking point. You DO NOT want to reach the breaking point. I'm a firm believer in 'any lesson ending in tears will be remembered negatively'. So make sure you offer enough challenge to move them along but are still able to end on a successful note.

Pooh and I are up to buddy reading sections of our bible reading, paragraphs in stories etc. With our Year 1 book Paddle to the Sea, I let him read the chapter but I'm still there to help with difficult words. Last week when we were behind on things for the day, I actually had him read a chapter of Genesis to me while I was getting dinner ready. That way any difficult words were also taken care of by my simply going over to have a look. Another thing I'm teaching Pooh, is when he wants me to help him with a word, to let me know the beginning of it by either sounding out the beginning or giving me the beginning letters. A lot of the time I can tell him what the word is without having to look at it because of the sentence it's in. There are some words he'll sound out in reading that are done incorrectly and I can correct those immediately when we buddy read. Charlotte Mason advised that a child always be corrected right away so that a bad habit of spelling/reading isn't ingrained in the brain. Buddy reading is great for that.

It always helps me to know some of the 'in-between' things you do to get to the next level, so I hope this helps some others who aren't quite sure how you get from A. Reading all the material of Year 1 to your student to B. Your student reading all the material. It's great that we have this blogworld to help one another scaffold these tasks.

Happy Reading Everyone!