Reading a Book!

Well, it finally happened, Miss E is reading a chapter book on her own. She's been able to read for about 2 years now, I think, at least a little bit,  but we haven't pushed at all since I don't think kids need to read early and she had such a good imagination and memory that I wanted those to keep going strong. We always read aloud to her and as a result, once she has started to read on her own, she has a good understanding of sentence structure (i.e., you pause after a period) and the emotion of reading (i.e, understands how to read when a character is sad, angry or excited). I am currently helping lead a reading group at her school for 2 boys who are reading long chapter books out loud (advanced for kindergarten) and I can tell they were rushed into reading. We spend most of our time figuring out how to take a breath after a period or not to start reading in the middle of a sentence or how to understand the words and what a character is feeling on a page.

In Kindergarten all the kids start reading groups and right now Miss E is below her actual level but that's OK with us because she is spending time slowing down and really learning the sounds and the language and how words are put together. At home though, she reads us pretty much anything she wants to. But before today, she had never sat down to read a chapter book on her own. So, today comes, and she wanted me to read some of this new fairy book to her and I was busy and told her "later". Well sure enough, I turn around about 2 minutes later and she is reading this book. Pretty soon she is on to chapter 3 and able to tell me what is going on with the characters and the story! Awesome. I love that she just took it upon herself to do this too. I love it when my kids solve their own problems. Not because I don't want to help them of course, but that is just a great skill for them to learn.

Here's what our family is currently reading:

Sarah - travel books on Spain and Backseat Saints by Joshilyn Jackson
Peter - All the Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy
Mr. T - fire books (of course) and we are reading him My Father's Dragon
Miss E - we are reading her Gregor the Overlander and she is reading Vidia Meets her Match of the Disney fairy series (they aren't bad -really.)