Before I started home educating Nuh I read extensively around the subject ( I am a voracious reader) and one thing I was determined to do was to wait until Nuh was 7 to begin reading. This was due to the plethora of research and information regarding age and reading. Which basically found that children who started reading instruction at age 5 were no more advanced than those who started at age 7 and in fact starting early could be damaging by putting children off of reading. It is thought that intensive phonics instruction at 5 can be too much for a lot of children and can put them off of reading because they struggle with some of the concepts being taught. As I stated in another post, Nuh was keen to start reading at 5 as his friend who had gone to school had started phonics. I agonised over this and I decided that I would teach him the alphabet and basic cvc words so that is what I did, we managed to stretch this out over about 1 yr and a bit of homeschooling. We did Montessori Pink series, I do not think that there is a finer method of teaching children their alphabet. We also did some of Blue Series but then we just dilly dallied until he was 7. I remember times when he was 5 and 6 that he was in tears over reading, telling me that he hated it and so on, I think I would have been totally stressed out if I had not already taken the decision to go easy. It meant that during these difficult times we could just ease off and leave reading for a week or so.
Watching him now flying through the All About Reading program, I am glad that I waited.
If you read this article in the New Scientist, you find links to all the major research into reading instruction and age.
new scientist
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