No Love Of Reading
Fletcher has very little interest in reading, starting with the basics of the alphabet. He has been doing the bare minimum in regards to trying to remember what has already been taught. Making no effort to remember letter shapes and associate them with their sounds or identities.
This, however, is not the case at all with numbers, of which he will happily read and understand. Even with multiple figures and units.
Active learning tried?
Attempts made to engage Fletcher to learn his alphabet include;
- singing the song,
- weeks of copying the alphabet for handwriting practice,
- Reading Egg tablet programme
- and identifying letters in the world.
On top of stories being read to him & him following along daily. Using positive rewards as a carrot hasn’t yielded as much progress as we were hoping for.
Carrot = a Meccano robot kit in reward for reading a basic chapter book cover to cover.
Breakthrough
On the 15th August 2018, we finally had a breakthrough after having a serious chat regarding the need to be able to read to be able to learn what he IS interested in (following instructions to build a robot etc).
Multiple attempts at reciting the alphabet, following along with it written on the whiteboard. Lead to him always missing out the N or larger sections causing aggravation. After a few tears, his elder brother volunteered to work with him. Big brother (8yrs old, very competent reader) made him laugh and encouraged him to keep trying… within 30mins Fletcher had just about cracked it. 10 times correctly recited in a row (following along on the whiteboard) and being asked to recite it each morning for the past couple of days has it finally lodged into his long-term memory.
The Aftermath
Around the dinner table, we took up a discussion started earlier in the day about how somethings you can learn and then they become second nature. Things you just know and don’t need to exert effort to learn again. Life skills like riding a bike, swimming, driving, reading and writing.
Although Fletcher learning the alphabet has been a much larger endeavour than any of us thought it would be, it is good to see his confidence now when he recites it.