what can do do to help my advanced KG girl in reading?

[Anonymous]

she's the highest reader in her public school KG (entirely a product of her wonderful montessori preschool) and i am finding that there are so many children in teh room who are lower readers that they get tons of attention and help while DD is done with her "work" very quickly and spends a lot of time coloring. While coloring is absolutely wonderful, I just want to knwo what you would suggest I do at home to keep her engaged and interested in reading. I am also going to ask her old montessori teachers.

We read a ton at home - both me to her and her to me. And she reads to her brother.

Any thing else?

i have tried to start journals with her a million times over, but she is not a fan of anything that seems like "work."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:she's the highest reader in her public school KG (entirely a product of her wonderful montessori preschool) and i am finding that there are so many children in teh room who are lower readers that they get tons of attention and help while DD is done with her "work" very quickly and spends a lot of time coloring. While coloring is absolutely wonderful, I just want to knwo what you would suggest I do at home to keep her engaged and interested in reading. I am also going to ask her old montessori teachers.

We read a ton at home - both me to her and her to me. And she reads to her brother.

Any thing else?

i have tried to start journals with her a million times over, but she is not a fan of anything that seems like "work."

I would find her lots of interesting books to read, and give her lots of opportunities to read them.

[Anonymous]

Ask the teacher to let her read rather than color?

At home:
Set up a library night once a week where you let her pick whatever books she wants from the library.
Get her a subscription to a kids' magazine (Cricket, Nat Geo Kids, something that falls in her field of interest)
Keep reading to her
Find books slightly ahead of her reading level to read aloud to her, then let her read the book by herself. Also, audiobooks are good for this. If you are in DC, DCPL has an app (Overdrive) and you can borrow kids' audiobooks for 3 weeks. You can download to your computer or tablet or smartphone. We listen to audiobooks then get the book from the library as a way to support my kid reading books that are just above his current level.

[Anonymous]

Yours is an all too common problem, just because the range of reading ability is extreme in K and most of the children cannot do any independent academic work at that age.

Your daughter should be able to read what she wants during her free time in class - either books from the reading corner, or books she brings from home. My son would bring Magic Treehouse books, and then started on Harry Potter that summer.

But most of all, don't push her to read chapter books all the time! That's not how it works. Some picture books, while short on words, may be very advanced conceptually. She will sustain her interest by having variety, and having "downtime" by doing other things like coloring, or reading baby books.

[Anonymous]

Lots of picture books are also complex texts but are short and good for younger attention spans and interests.

[Anonymous]

Is she actually losing interest in reading? My son was in a similar situation and never lost interest. Just kept reading at home. Basically he didn't learn much at all in K but had a fun time and made a lot of friends. First grade the writing requirements really kicked up and that added some challenge. Although in retrospect he should have been working on that in K instead of coloring. Unfortunately this is the way of it. You have to wait until some of the other kids catch up in first and second grade for the reading to get even remotely challenging.

[Anonymous]

Agree to ask that your child read rather than color during that free time. As for ways to keep working with her, I would focus more on comprehension / reading to learn - ask her what's going on in the book, how it relates to her life, to other books she has read, get her some how to books (cooking, crafts, card games), etc.

I also agree with the library trips / having stacks of books at home. I know my child (1st) won't necessarily ask for books and can seem like she's lost her interest in reading, but when I bring home a big stack she dives right in and is hard to drag out of them. However it's also the challenge of figuring out the right books for her reading / developmental level - she loved Magic Treehouse a year and a half ago but since then chapter books are really hit or miss, but Shel Silverstein has been a huge hit as are lots of non-fiction books. To deal with that I've found some book resource lists online to use for suggestions, try to query her to figure out what she's interested in, and then I just collect a pile of 20 books or so hoping some of them will be winners.

[Anonymous]

Coloring? or drawing and other art? I taught K and am not a fan of coloring.

[Anonymous]

cont. If she is advanced in reading, just encourage her to read. Don't force Journals at this time. However, if she likes art, you might suggest that she create a book and encourage her to write with the pictures.

[Anonymous]

Read to her, give her good books to read, let her bring books with her.

[Anonymous]

How about asking the teacher to focus on writing with her instead. There are many kids in DC's K class who can read at 2-3rd grade levels but are right at the K level in writing.

[Anonymous]

Is your information from the teacher, your child, or observation?

[Anonymous]

how do you know your child is the top reader? i volunteer in my child's classroom and only have a sense of who is in what broad category. that is, who's still learning the alphabet and who can read pretty fluently but no idea who is the "highest" reader or the "lowest."

[Anonymous]

I'm not the OP, but when my DD was in K, I was told by the teacher that she'd never seen a child score so highly on the initial reading assessment, so I did know she was the top reader in her class.
In my experience, the K teachers usually give the advanced readers are more sophisticated version of the same assignment -- so while other kids are maybe drawing a picture of what they did over the weekend, the kids that are already reading are asked to write a sentence describing their picture. Most K classes also have an in-classroom library where the kids can pick out a book for their free time. My child does this every day.
You can also ask the K teacher if your child can go to the school library more frequently than once a week -- my kids teacher lets them go every day if they are done with the book they checked out.
But my advice in general is, so long as your kid is happy, don't push it. Take them to the public library on the weekend and help them pick out some decent books so that they're not just reading Pokemon Novellas all the time (which is what they'll pick out at the school library).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Coloring? or drawing and other art? I taught K and am not a fan of coloring.

Why nor have ypur DD draw what she read - beginning, middle, end - good way to check her comprehension. It's one thing to read, but can she tell you what it's about?