Rising 2nd grader not reading

[Anonymous]

Do not retain. Get a tutor. Talk to the school. Or better yet, look into your public school where there will more likely be staff trained in reading instruction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do not retain. Get a tutor. Talk to the school. Or better yet, look into your public school where there will more likely be staff trained in reading instruction.

Agree. Don’t retain - get an evaluation to determine whether your child is dyslexic and then get a qualified reading tutor. The school likely doesn’t have a strong reading curriculum (most don’t) so more of the same is t going to help your son.

[Anonymous]

Get a full testing panel. It is expensive but worth it. Do not retain. It may be a learning difference and you need an outside, professional assessment before you can know what interventions make sense.

Use the summer to get an assessment.

[Anonymous]

Another thing: when was his last eye exam? A lot of kids are way behind on eye exams at the pediatrician. Get his vision checked to rule out the need for glasses. I have a cataract in one eye and reading is becoming a real pain. Reading too much gives me headaches. So it's on my radar, I guess.

[Anonymous]

Reading specialists at schools use decodable reader sets. It's phonics, each book builds on last one. Search for decodable reader set.

Point to each word as you read.

You can also do Kumon reading. It's booklets you do at home plus 1 or 2 video sessions a week for maybe $150/month.

If DC only age 6 through 2021, I would hold back.

[Anonymous]

OP here, thanks for all of the helpful feedback. The comments have confirmed that my suspicions are correct. He turned 7 in February so is not young for the grade. The school was very focused on social emotional learning this year and I would say didn’t focus on the issue. We will pursue private testing and consider other school options including public depending on what the assessment shows. I’m thinking if all of the other kids were able to learn it might not be the right school. He is very aware that he is behind.

[Anonymous]

Get a tutor to work with him over the summer. My 8 year old girl was reading only very basic books (easy K-level) at the end of first grade and worked with a tutor over the summer that got her to beginning of first grade level by the beginning of second grade. She continued working with the tutor and had a good teacher and got up to mid-2nd grade by the end of 2nd grade. The goal is to hopefully get up to beginning of 3rd grade level by the end of the summer. Fingers crossed!!

[Anonymous]

One thing to consider is that even the math instruction gets more reading heavy in 2nd grade at many schools, with kids needing to decode short story problems and instructions to answer the questions.

What was his preK experience? Was there any pre-literacy or was he starting from scratch in Kindergarten?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My rising second grader really cannot read (Bob books are a struggle). Our school has promoted him to second grade but I am starting to get concerned because he is way behind his peers who seem to all be reading chapter books (boys and girls). Would you press the school to keep him back a grade or consider holding back and sending to public? I can’t really blame virtual school because he was in person most of the year. I’m worried that school is going to become incredibly demoralizing next year and I’m not sure he will be able to catch up even with summer work. Should we give it another year at this private or act now?

Reading experts, based on data, will tell you learning to read prior to 4th grade varies greatly. And ahead of 4th grade when a child learns to read has no correlation to intelligence and how well they will do in school longterm. If the school isn't concerned, I wouldn't be.

[Anonymous]

This was my son. Diagnosed with dyslexia. Don’t waste too much time with tutors. If you think there’s a wide gap between his reading and his intelligence (judging yourself by vocabulary, attention span, interest when being read to, curiously, or just your gut) then pay for the psycho educational testing. Tutoring for dyslexics is very different than regular tutoring and you’ll waste very valuable time (and money) if you just start tutoring without knowing about possible learning disability.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This was my son. Diagnosed with dyslexia. Don’t waste too much time with tutors. If you think there’s a wide gap between his reading and his intelligence (judging yourself by vocabulary, attention span, interest when being read to, curiously, or just your gut) then pay for the psycho educational testing. Tutoring for dyslexics is very different than regular tutoring and you’ll waste very valuable time (and money) if you just start tutoring without knowing about possible learning disability.

I agree. At this point you could even hire a tutor to use materials designed for dyslexic kids (for example, a Wilson certified tutor). It will work even if your son isn’t dyslexic and may be the only thing that will work if your son is. Don’t spin your wheels for 2 months, start with dyslexic materials.

If you want to try to do it yourself at home, look into Barton. $$$ but it does work.

[Anonymous]

We had the same issue when my child was transitioning from 1st to 2nd grade. We paid $4k for an assortment of testing and turned out everything was fine. She caught up once she had a new teacher for 2nd grade.

I sort of blame the school for not staying on top of it, and we also had a changeover of teachers during the time my child couldn't read. We kept asking various teachers and administrators if our child needed testing, and finally one teacher said she thought we should do it. Even though it turned out okay for us, I'm still glad we got the testing done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, thanks for all of the helpful feedback. The comments have confirmed that my suspicions are correct. He turned 7 in February so is not young for the grade. The school was very focused on social emotional learning this year and I would say didn’t focus on the issue. We will pursue private testing and consider other school options including public depending on what the assessment shows. I’m thinking if all of the other kids were able to learn it might not be the right school. He is very aware that he is behind.

NP: good. Also, keep in mind that third grade is the money year when it comes to reading, i.e., kids need to be strong readers by the *end* of third grade. So, he has time.

Good luck!

[Anonymous]

Both of my kids entered 2nd behind their peers in reading, but met 1st grade standards, so keep in mind these are different markers. One of my kids in particular had an advanced reading group of friends.

Both of my kids progressed substantially in 2nd grade and were big readers by the end of the year. I agree with others that it may be worth an evaluation to determine if there’s something else going on, especially if 1st grade standards were iffy. However, I will also echo that learning to read doesn’t happen at the same time/pace for all kids and that’s fine too.

[Anonymous]

Get him evaluated for dyslexia, get him a reading tutor as often as you can afford it and work with him every night. Also, get some fun apps like endless reader.