BTW, I have a friend who didn't learn to read until age 7 (no LDs). She is now a writer-- and well-reviewed by the NYT.

There are one or two weird posters on this thread. Really? Hieroglyphics? Except the new readers speak English (or whatever) and generally understand most of what they just read (agree it's less than if it had been read to them, because they are working on two skills at once). This isn't people simply learning to sound out foreign text. Maybe "just a parlor trick" if there's an unusual young toddler who has memorized sight words without much comprehension or has a set of SN that includes a form of hyperlexia or what-have-you.

I consider it reading if kid can pick up something new with few/no pictures and read it as written, maybe struggling with a few words, NBD. The text doesn't have to contain really complex words, either, as long as it's not pure Dick and Jane, cat sat on mat stuff.

I'm not sure exactly when I learned to read, but my parents snuck me into a private school K at 4 years and 3 months because I could already read well before then. I definitely remember reading the teacher's goals for the day on the blackboard before she got around to reading them out loud, so I'd say I was "reading" by then. Seems young, but not outrageous, especially in the DMV.

I had an early reader -- started reading at 3.5, reading very fluently with comprehension by 4, reading complex chapter books by 4.5.

BUT this is extremely unusual. I didn't realize how unusual at the time. Child is now 8 and have not come across any child at any point who has anywhere near the level of reading comprehension of my child at that age. I didn't realize quite how unusual it was at the time. So please anyone reading this, don't use children like mine as your yardstick for working out what is normal or when your child will read. most learn at 5-6 or so. And even later readers catch up.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To many it just means picking up a new book and reading it with little trouble, but without comprehension, it's not reading to me. I think a reader is a child who picks up new text, reads it, can retell it in detail (not just using pronouns), and can identify the theme/plot, the setting, and the message/what the author was trying to say. Anything short of that is just parlor tricks to me. Something to show Aunt June when she comes to visit.

That would be grade 3 for some kids

That's sad. This is required by at least the end of 1st and many are doing in mid-1st grade. My K is doing this. She's was DRA 20 at the first parent teacher conference back in Nov.

OK. My kid was reading all of the Wizard of Oz books in first grade and E. Nesbit in second grade, and she still couldn't have told you the theme or "the message/what the author was trying to say" to save her life. Parlor tricks, I guess.

Without comprehension, reading is nothing more than tracking symbols on a page with your eyes and sounding them out. Imagine being handed a story written in Egyptian hieroglyphics with no understanding of their meaning. You may appreciate the words aesthetically and even be able to draw some small bits of meaning from the page, but you are not truly reading the story. The words on the page have no meaning. They are simply symbols. People read to understand. Understanding is always a part of the purpose. Without understanding, you are not reading.

And if you kid was tested for reading level, he or she would not test on Wizard of Oz or E. Nesbit level, despite his/her ability to know the words because he/she does not understand or comprehend the book.

NP here. really? my child read Wizard of Oz in kindergarten. he was 5. why do you think that a first grader wouldn't understand or comprehend the book? My child certainly could, and discussed it in much detail. likewise he read all the magic treehouse books when he was four and learned a ton about history and geography from them.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most kids learn to decode, but there are a few that don't. I've seen kids test using nonsense words that they are supposed to sound out; a child who decodes can do them easily, but a child who reads can't.

As I have read, normal readers are more successful at the nonsense word test than dyslexic readers. Isn't it also true for dyslexics that comprehension is always stronger than decoding?

In that context, normal readers are children who decode. Kids who started reading on their own between 2-4 don't decode, they weren't taught to do that. Comprehension varies. Any child who is just learning to read will have better comprehension from something that is read to them versus something they read; dyslexic children usually have a more prolonged issue linking comprehension and decoding, but it's very hard to increase comprehension when the child is doing the reading, because the brain is concentrating so much on parsing the words.

I'm a tutor. I've volunteered in an elementary school for years, and every year I've helped administer the nonsense word tests. I remember doing the nonsense word test in school, and I hated it. In third grade, my reading rate was 80+ words per minute, reading comprehension was 7-9th grade depending on type of text, but I bombed that test, just as I had every year since kindergarten. It's used to test whether kids can decode words that they've never seen, not to test reading ability, yet teachers believe that it's good indicator of whether the child is really trying to read.