[Grovenet] GroveNet Digest, Vol 54, Issue 1

Sat May 2 12:26:38 PDT 2009

I think you're right about the need for individual attention. When my son was four years old, I taught him to read. I could see early on from his pre-school experiences that he would have trouble in school. I believed that if he had a leg up on other kids with respect to reading, that might help to compensate for some of his other difficulties. So, I found Bob Books. I cannot say enough for this amazing systematic system for reading that was developed by a kindergarten teacher at Catlin Gabel School in Portland. I have seen no better system for teaching kids to read. There are three boxes of twelve books and each box contains a graduated group of books that becomes increasingly more challenging as you move forward. In the first box of books, each book teaches three or four new letter sounds and each book builds on the previous ones. By they time you make your way through the first box of books, the child has learned the sounds of all 26 letters of the
 alphabet except for the letter Q. The second and third boxes of books move on to consonate blends and vowel combinations. The last book in the third box contains a fairly complicated fairy tale. By the time the kid reads that final book, they're ready to pick up easy readers at the libary and run with them. The books contain all these funny stick figure illustrations that were drawn by the author's husband. And unlike the Dick and Jane books, Bob Books are often very funny and interesting. 

My son loved to play the game Connect Four. It's a very fast game that involves connecting discs together in groups of four--either vertically, horizontally, or diagonally--before your opponent does. Like tic-tac-toe, it doesn't take long for one person to win. So, to keep my son motivated toward getting through the Bob Books, I used to tell him, "Let's play Connect Four. If you win, we keep playing the game. If I win, we read another five pages of this Bob Book". He got so good at Connect Four that I could hardly beat him by the time we got through all 36 Bob Books.

I can't say enough about how effective and systematic Bob Books can be in teaching kids how to read. And, they contain instructions inside that are easy for parents and teachers to follow.

Honestly, I cannot figure out why Bob Books are not used more by school districts to help kids learn to read. They work for anyone--particularly kids who are struggling. I even have a friend who tutors adults from Samalia in learning English and she uses Bob Books in teaching them how to read.

Holly

________________________________
From: Theresa Carter <theresacus at yahoo.com>
To: grovenet at rdrop.com
Sent: Saturday, May 2, 2009 4:45:05 AM
Subject: Re: [Grovenet] GroveNet Digest, Vol 54, Issue 1

Has anyone done any research as to what the best teaching methods are for children of Autism and ADD?  I have friends, with children, who have been tagged with those labels. They are both off the scale as far as intelligence too. That in itself does not make it any easier.  One mom ended up quiting her job, to home school her son and he is now studying to become a dentist.  The other battled the schools and her son is in Alaska fishing. Both are doing well for themselves and the families seem to be happy.  

I am not sure that with the labeling that the child actually gets a better education.  The parents too are questioning whether, that was the best thing to do but at the time it all seemed to be guided or driven, by the school.  Unless the school is able to truly teach these kids using different methods then it seems pointless to me, to put both parents and students through the testing.  

I have to mention that my younger sister, who has now been diagnosed with dyslexia. My mom saw her falling behind in school and spent countless hours teaching her to read.  Later, a tutor that my parents hired.  (She is 46 years old and at that time there was no additional help in the schools.)  My sister went on to a community college, in electronics.  She struggled but was determined in chasing her dream.  Now she is pushing polygons around as a mask designer, at Intel and doing very well for herself.  

My mom then became a reading tutor at the grade school, as a volunteer.  Some students simply needed a stronger foundation in reading and others had some severe family issues, that were distracting them from learning.  The one thing that she did see is that the individual attention helped with not just their reading but their self esteem and behavior as well.  She couldn't imagine putting any child through 13 years, of failure.  The one thing that she used to say to me as my sons were growing up.  "A child who can not find possitive attention will find negative attention.  No attention is the worst kind of lonliness."  

In defense of the teachers, the class sizes in Forest Grove are huge. My youngest son, a senior, at the high school dropped two classes this year because there were not enough seats to accommodate the class size. One was an AP class too.  It is next to impossible to give the attention that is necessary to just one or two in a class of twenty-five or thirty.  I do know that some of the students have a special person that shadows the students, who tend to be disruptive.  Maybe it would be better to have those people actually giving individual education, rather than having them in a classroom as a child's behavioral monitor, all day.  I personally feel that those dollars could be better spent on educating because the socializing will come with the students success.  

Theresa Carter

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