All About Getting Help for Students Weak in English

[Dino_Mummy]

Hi MMM,


Would you mind sharing how much is the fees at Lcentral?
Also, did you practice with your daughter further at home to spur the picking up on literacy level?

Can you please PM me?

Many thanks.

[dokomo]

Hi,


We have already stopped his ICR. :nailbite: Hope to find another centre which can teach him the foundation for reading.. that's where we were thinking of trying whole-word since phonics may not be suitable. It seems majority of english enrichment for pre-schoolers nowadays are phonics. If he has difficulties blending, and he goes into another phonics enrichment, the same problem is going to come back again. (or maybe not? then i will :spank: ICR!)

Ok, is time to get his eyes and ears checked too. Meanwhile, hopefully by exposing him to leapfrog dvds and reading books, he can pick up some blending skills there.. (while searching for another school :xedfingers: )

[buds]

jedamum:

Btw, is it common for 4yo toknow blending n reading? I thought average is k1 or k2. :oops:

No. It's not.

Usually K1. By K2 can finish Grammar foundation already.

A normal 4 year old can blend 3-letter phonetic words.

Sight reading should be included in good Phonics programmes.
Phonics alone is not enough to decipher all the English words in the world.

[Imami]

buds:

jedamum:

Btw, is it common for 4yo toknow blending n reading? I thought average is k1 or k2. :oops:

No. It's not.

Usually K1. By K2 can finish Grammar foundation already.

A normal 4 year old can blend 3-letter phonetic words.

Sight reading should be included in good Phonics programmes.
Phonics alone is not enough to decipher all the English words in the world.

3-letter phonetic words = c-a-n? N-u-t?

[buds]

Hi dokomo, your nephew has wasted 2 long years already in ICR. This isn’t the first few times i’ve heard parents and fellow frenz complaining about the ineffectiveness of ICR and the big group of children they take in. On top of all that, there were also observations of teacher being unable to handle the children and no gradual feedback on child’s progress.


I would not advise you to jump into another group programme anymore. He needs one to one and this intervention will help to zoom into his challenged areas. While there have been one or two students whom i’ve taken who were totally not cut out for Phonics (cos they really have no ear for it ie. just can’t listen and make out the sounds and its combinations… with the parents support we have not left any child behind being unable to read upon graduating from the programme. A good teacher can observe the weaknesses of the children and using other ways to tailor to the specific areas banking on their learning styles, to bring out the strengths in them.

[buds]

Yes Imami. That is correct. And also… short one liner sentences like.

Fat cat sat on a mat. Bug on a rug. Hot dog on a log. Plus simple one
liner story books and good sight readers.

[iLoveChubby]

Hey buds...

It's me again...your \"stalker\"... :rotflmao:
Dont :siam: first , want to chk w u sth...really lah.... ....:
Does purely reading storybooks suffice on their memory of sight words or do we really have to get \"sight word readers\"?
Do you have gd recommendations on any specific titles on sight word readers? I thk there are some under Scholastic?

[cherrygal]

jedamum:

Btw, is it common for 4yo toknow blending n reading? I thought average is k1 or k2. :oops:

Dun worry, he started at 4yo (N2) and after 1 year, he could read and blend the phonics. That meant he was K1 by then.

So sister buds was right, K1 is the more common age to be able to read and blend.

But my personal preference is Zoophonics coz they laid a good foundation within 1 year and he didn't need any more help after that. We went to enquire at LCentral when he was 4yo and he wasn't really comfortable in their small group setting (guess he didn't like too much attention from their native speaker teacher). So we settled on Zoophonics which was slightly cheaper and had more students too. My boy thrives in larger groups.

Within 3 months, he was trying to read by himself. So that was a great achievement to us. After 6 months, he even started to read food labels.

So dokomo, whether you finally select another group setting or settle for one-to-one intervention actually depends on your nephew's learning style. In my boy's case, he likes big groups and he doesn't do well when there are only 1-2 pple in the class. Weird but true.

[hokkiengirl]

Hello!


One resource to consider would be the Usborne series of books for beginning readers. There's 'Shark in the Park', 'Toad on the Road', 'Ted in a Red Bed'... well, you get the idea. Can try ordering them from Book Depository. This will hopefully help him get used to the vowel sounds.

Apart from reading to the child, it is imperative to make him read to you out loud daily, after he has learnt the basic phonic blends. Erm, but the key is that you Must. Be. Patient. Some kids (like my number two) are not instinctive readers and need a lot more time to get used to the irregularity of the English language. However, after months of persevering, I am glad to say that my K2 boy is now reading books his kor kor picked up in Primary One!!!

Choice of books is also very important. If he likes planes, borrow books on planes. If he's into animals, there is a lot of good children's lit about that. And not all books are recreated equal. There are badly written books which have 'flat' characterisation and there is really good kids' lit which can make them cry. Gotta browse around for them.

[dokomo]

:thankyou: for all ur replies.


Buds, ur post really got me worried, not to mention money down the drain. (which is small compared to his 2precious years wasted) One to one is good, but go where to find unless have recommendations, now whole family scurrying around finding school, pressing panic button. Do u hv recommendation for 1 to 1? Do u still teach 1 to 1? If 1 to 1 is not possible, small group setting (6 or will it help? I was even thinking of coaching him myself with the keywords commonly found (ladybird keywords) to help him kick-start his independent reading. (sigh, i dun know phonics so cant teach him on tt)

Cherrygal, where is this zoophonics conducted? I cant seem to find a specific school tt teaches zoophonics?

Went to popular but cant find the usborne readers, will probably order fr bookdepository then.