My 4yr old is having a hard time reading. Most classmates already can. She is upset. What can I do?

Question

She seems to have photographic memory, she´s bilingual, can count to 100, is very creative, until she started to work on reading in school, she enjoyed it and hardly ever missed a day, now she´s whiny and sad. I tell her not to worry that somethings are harder for some people and that she has a lot of time to master reading. However, I want to help her, without making a big fuss. I was planning on taking her to an eye doctor (maybe she needs glasses) and once summer vacation is over, have her tested by her school for dyslexia. We read a lot, but she memorizes the books, so when we change and she cant join the sounds of the words, she gets upset.

Answer 1

have her tested for a learning disability. A lot of very smart children (the gifted and talented) also tend ot have learning disabilities they are categorized as twice exceptional children. So she might be off the charts smart but have a reading disability.


Good Luck!!!

Answer 2

It sounds like she has become used to her photographic memory and is now having trouble separating between sounding out and memorizing words. My daughter does the same thing, she can tell you what a letter is but she has no idea how to use it or what it sounds like. The fact shes 4 years old does play some factor here I'm sure. If this is something she is wanting to pursue and getting mad then just offer help, but at that age I wouldn't force her to learn to read. I'm not any expert by all means and I hope a reading teacher jumps in here and explains it much better than me :) Good Luck.

Answer 3

She's only four, she doesn't have to be reading. It sounds like you're doing all the right things (getting her tested etc.) Kids that are as smart as her will sometimes learn to read differently than other kids. My daughter didn't take very well to phonics and wanted to learn every word by sight (this is actually possible if you have a photographic memory) so you might want to try her on some sight words.

I made word cards for my daughter and she got stickers for every word she could read. That was one way we got around her memorizing the books-- we shuffled the cards so she had to learn to read the words.

Answer 4

It is okay, she will learn when she can handle it. It sounds like a great opportunity to teach her that she is special and unique and there is no pressure to be like her classmates. She doesn't have a learning disability...at least not now anyways. If she can't read when she is six or seven, teach her then yourself. As for her sadness....that is terrible for her to feel that kind of pressure. Maybe re-evaluate expectations of her. Testing her is only going to compound the problem. Does she show any signs of reading readiness? Like recognizing common words (it, the, cat, dog...and so on) Does she have interest? Does she rhyme words or try to sound out words? Does she know all letters upper and lower case? If she doesn't show signs of readiness, then she isn't ready.

Answer 5

Many parents are putting FAR too much pressure on their kids today. A four year old should be enjoying PREschool. Pressuring children to start reading and doing things that they wouldn't normally be doing for a good two years isn't fair to the child. (My son and nephew are preschoolers they're not learning to "read" yet, my niece is almost seven and she just started reading last year in first grade) Children should have a childhood. They only get to be four once, they have at least 12+ years ahead of them to be bombarded with school work.

Of course parents should be working with their kids, but making them start doing advanced work for their age (very few preschoolers are "reading") is taking away some of the very few carefree years they'll have in life.

Answer 6

I used to teach Kindergarten and most kids didn't not come to school reading - tell your daughter she is wonderful and amazing and very talented - she can already do so many things. I wouldn't stress.

If you want to do some little things to help your daughter - work on sight words with her (words like can, said, the, etc that you can't sounds out and just need to know, these words are found in books a lot so you need to know them) - she can trace them with crayons and markers, make them in glitter, playdough, puffy paint, etc. Look for them in the newpaper and magazines, books, etc. Make a word frame out of pipe cleaners or whatever you want and see can use this to frame the word when she sees it. Also, make sure she has the correct sound for the letters in the alphabet. Once she can do the sounds, then she can work on putting the sounds together. Give her simple 3 sound words (car, dog, fan, etc.) to try to use the sounds to make the word. you also don't always have to use a real word - it can be a nonsense word (zut, liz, pim, etc.) just to see if she is putting sounds together. After time, she will be able to use these ideas and strategies as she reads. Also, reading at this age should be simple and repetative texts such as I see the blue bird, I see a yellow cat, I see a brown dog (they can read I, see, the from the sight word practice - bird, cat, dog from the sound practice, and the color word from seeing it in the picture). One final thing to work on is what is called one-to-one matching - knowing that if there are 5 words on a page that you read 5 words (so for instance, not saying I see the dog when it says I see the brown dog)

Most importantly, know that she has LOTS of time to work on this and she is young - it will come. Read together lots like you do and praise her for all her efforts - it will come!

Answer 7

Definitly get her tested to be sure it's not a disability or eye problem. And she is normal in some respects. The fact that she's bilingual (depending on the languages) can actually stunt her reading....... she thinks in a different way than those that read better because she is more vocal oriented. My brother had a similar problem. In the end it wasn't a defined disability, but we treated it like one. Now he's reading better than I do (and I started at 2)

Answer 8

Be very patient first. Offer small rewards. You can also try flashcards to teach her one word at a time and associate them with a color so she can remember or maybe make a game giving her one word a day or week and be consistent and eventually she will know the words once she sees them. Like every time I'm driving with my 4 year old I'll show her the stop sign. Then we'll spell the word together and then I tell her what it says. Now when she sees the stop sign she knows it says stop.

Answer 9

Flash cards of frequently used words to start with.
That way she builds confidence by being able to read by sight. (Not memorizing the storyline) Use words that can create a simple story.
Then begin with phonics to help her be able to pronounce any word.
Have her eyes checked and the dyslexia sure is a good start also.

Answer 10

Wow! I never realized that reading was such a big deal at 4 years old! What is a stay at home mom to do?
Sorry - not trying to be judgemental (at least not to you but the system) but isn't that early to worry about it? No wonder kids have so much pressure in school. My son is two - is this what have to look forward to?