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> You end up with no books that are an appropriate reading challenge but also developmentally appropriate What? It's just the opposite. What about the books th

by SamBam 6y ago

> You end up with no books that are an appropriate reading challenge but also developmentally appropriate What? It's just the opposite. What about the books that a parent typically reads kids that age at bedtime? Those are generally above the reading level, but at the developmental level. Indeed, the whole annoying thing with kids learning to read is that -- at least for kids who have been read to frequently -- their taste in books is well above the "see spot run" level that their reading is at. At age 4 and 5, my kids were into Ramona, Roald Dahl, Charlotte's Web, Pipi Longstocking, etc. It took them til age 6 or 7 to be able to read those comfortably. Learning to read early is in no way a curse, or a "party trick." For my kids, and many others, it has instilled a love of reading. Also the notion of a "party trick" is gross, like it's something the parents do to show off. The kids who learn to read early do so because they are interested in it. > At the same time, calling out math problems to the back seat was a way that I kept kids busy during road trips, and I wouldn't change that at all Ah, so you're just biased against kids who read early.

zdragnar 6y ago
My personal experience as an early reader lines up pretty well with the post you're replying to. School was interesting, but the lack of challenge meant that I didn't really develop a lot of habits that would have been really beneficial later on. Conversely, rather than be held back by not reading as early, I wish there were more opportunities for students who were well past their peers but not so much that they could skip a grade. Unfortunately, one of the drawbacks to not having much choice in schools is being stuck with the lowest common denominator of expectation for students.
- caddemon 6y ago
  I think the bad study habits thing isn't really specific to learning to read early though. Even if you were deprived of all outside of school reading you probably wouldn't have been particularly challenged by school. So it's not something that could be changed by "not encouraging early reading", it's something that can really only be changed by revamping our school system, or being lucky enough to have parents with the background/resources necessary to provide academic challenges outside of the school. I also think a lot more kids would be academically able to skip a grade than currently do. Skipping forward can be a nightmare socially, unless you do the skip really early and not more than a year or so ahead. When I was in 3rd grade the teacher actually told my parents to move me to a better school if they could - and they were willing/able to afford the tuition to send me to a good private school, but I liked my friends and refused to switch. I wish there were a good way to disentangle the social and babysitting elements of school from the academic ones somewhat. That could allow students to progress at a more personalized pace.
  - em-bee 6y ago
    that's what montessori is doing. they actually mix kids over a three year age-range into the same class. kids learning faster don't cause a problem at all. the older kids take part in teaching the younger ones, so even if a child already completed the curriculum, there is no end in interesting activities to do that they learn something from.
mlyle 6y ago
> What? It's just the opposite. What about the books that a parent typically reads kids that age at bedtime? Those are generally above the reading level, but at the developmental level. All those "adult-directed" books, heavy on pictures, etc-- are not optimal for a skilled early reader. Yes, they can read them, but they read them fast. There's also what e.g. Lexile calls "NC" https://lexile.com/parents-students/find-books-at-the-right-level/about-lexile-text-codes/#NC https://lexile.com/parents-students/find-books-at-the-right-... -- nonconforming. These are great. Simpler, developmentally-appropriate situations, higher level writing. But there's not many... E.g. you can't even find the book they name as an example anymore. When you have a kid who is ready to read chapter books with long words, but all of them talk about social situations he doesn't really have the experience to understand, you have a problem. My boys would read books and know everything that happened in them... but really not be able to understand why someone would do something described or how they'd be feeling in a given situation. > Learning to read early is in no way a curse, or a "party trick." It's not a curse, but it's not well-correlated with better outcomes. > For my kids, and many others, it has instilled a love of reading. My kids eventually got back to a love of reading, but the hole in reading material around 2nd grade and having to read below-level books was a speedbump in it. And it's still hard. My 4th grader should be reading young adult books, but he still thinks kissing is gross... > like it's something the parents do to show off. Oh, trust me, that applies too, to plenty of families. > Ah, so you're just biased against kids who read early. ??? I say that my kids read very early above. My kids could have read Charlotte's Web at age 5, and given you the play by play, and known an appropriate amount of the vocabulary... but they would not understand any of the subtexts or real messages until much later.
- em-bee 6y ago
  is it necessary to understand the subtext or messages when reading a book the first time? isn't it enough for the kids to enjoy the story at the level they can understand it? sure, teenage romance novels are inappropriate for a 10 year old, but there are plenty of adult adventure stories that do make sense to a 10 year old even if they don't understand every detail in it. white fang, horatio hornblower, adventures of people traveling the world on bikes, horseback or other ways were among my favorites where i can't remember anything inappropriate for any age. i think huckleberry finn too, but i didn't read that one myself. in fact i don't even remember reading anything that was targeted at a particular age. but even among childrens books i think there is plenty of choices with a wide age range. roald dahl, erich kästner and many other well known childrensbook authors have written stories that are enjoyable at a wide age range. i find it hard to imagine that there wasn't anything enjoyable for your 2nd grader.
caddemon 6y ago
Yeah it's possible things have changed in the last 20 years but when I was growing up any pressure to read above grade level was purely social. I remember showing up to kindergarten very proud that I was reading Ramona, and one of my friends totally dismissed it because he was reading Harry Potter. So of course I begged my parents for Harry Potter after that, which lead to a pretty good run of advancing my reading over a couple years while "competing" with my friend. It is true I read a bunch of books in early elementary years that I definitely did not have the ability to understand on a higher level, like Animal Farm and Frankenstein. But I still think I got a lot out of the experience. It's funny because I was totally glued to those books at the time, but then when we started reading "real" books for school around grade 7 I lost interest. Perhaps my early fascination was more with the mechanics of language than it was with any broader themes or symbolism. Or maybe I just hate being told to do things, probably a bit of both. So yeah, I think reading early can be great and if the child is showing an interest in that it is great to encourage. I wish the teachers/admins at my school were as helpful as my parents/peers, but instead they forced everybody to do assignments using a particular pool of books each year based on age. In first grade my mom ended up doing a "book report" on Make Way for Ducklings because I straight up refused. I do agree it shouldn't be pressured if the child isn't into it though. Different kids are different, so of course schooling is going to require different approaches.
- mlyle 6y ago
  > In first grade my mom ended up doing a "book report" on Make Way for Ducklings because I straight up refused. See, and that's its own bummer. Make Way for Ducklings is a gorgeous book. Its Lexile measure isn't shabby for a 1st grader, either... but it's not a great book for kids to read on their own (hence it is "AD" -- or adult-directed).
  - caddemon 6y ago
    I actually ended up buying the book when I moved to Boston and really enjoyed the illustrations, so I guess I sort of made up for it haha.

by SamBam 6y ago

zdragnar 6y ago

My personal experience as an early reader lines up pretty well with the post you're replying to. School was interesting, but the lack of challenge meant that I didn't really develop a lot of habits that would have been really beneficial later on. Conversely, rather than be held back by not reading as early, I wish there were more opportunities for students who were well past their peers but not so much that they could skip a grade. Unfortunately, one of the drawbacks to not having much choice in schools is being stuck with the lowest common denominator of expectation for students.

caddemon 6y ago
I think the bad study habits thing isn't really specific to learning to read early though. Even if you were deprived of all outside of school reading you probably wouldn't have been particularly challenged by school. So it's not something that could be changed by "not encouraging early reading", it's something that can really only be changed by revamping our school system, or being lucky enough to have parents with the background/resources necessary to provide academic challenges outside of the school. I also think a lot more kids would be academically able to skip a grade than currently do. Skipping forward can be a nightmare socially, unless you do the skip really early and not more than a year or so ahead. When I was in 3rd grade the teacher actually told my parents to move me to a better school if they could - and they were willing/able to afford the tuition to send me to a good private school, but I liked my friends and refused to switch. I wish there were a good way to disentangle the social and babysitting elements of school from the academic ones somewhat. That could allow students to progress at a more personalized pace.
- em-bee 6y ago
  that's what montessori is doing. they actually mix kids over a three year age-range into the same class. kids learning faster don't cause a problem at all. the older kids take part in teaching the younger ones, so even if a child already completed the curriculum, there is no end in interesting activities to do that they learn something from.

mlyle 6y ago

> What? It's just the opposite. What about the books that a parent typically reads kids that age at bedtime? Those are generally above the reading level, but at the developmental level. All those "adult-directed" books, heavy on pictures, etc-- are not optimal for a skilled early reader. Yes, they can read them, but they read them fast. There's also what e.g. Lexile calls "NC" https://lexile.com/parents-students/find-books-at-the-right-level/about-lexile-text-codes/#NC https://lexile.com/parents-students/find-books-at-the-right-... -- nonconforming. These are great. Simpler, developmentally-appropriate situations, higher level writing. But there's not many... E.g. you can't even find the book they name as an example anymore. When you have a kid who is ready to read chapter books with long words, but all of them talk about social situations he doesn't really have the experience to understand, you have a problem. My boys would read books and know everything that happened in them... but really not be able to understand why someone would do something described or how they'd be feeling in a given situation. > Learning to read early is in no way a curse, or a "party trick." It's not a curse, but it's not well-correlated with better outcomes. > For my kids, and many others, it has instilled a love of reading. My kids eventually got back to a love of reading, but the hole in reading material around 2nd grade and having to read below-level books was a speedbump in it. And it's still hard. My 4th grader should be reading young adult books, but he still thinks kissing is gross... > like it's something the parents do to show off. Oh, trust me, that applies too, to plenty of families. > Ah, so you're just biased against kids who read early. ??? I say that my kids read very early above. My kids could have read Charlotte's Web at age 5, and given you the play by play, and known an appropriate amount of the vocabulary... but they would not understand any of the subtexts or real messages until much later.

em-bee 6y ago
is it necessary to understand the subtext or messages when reading a book the first time? isn't it enough for the kids to enjoy the story at the level they can understand it? sure, teenage romance novels are inappropriate for a 10 year old, but there are plenty of adult adventure stories that do make sense to a 10 year old even if they don't understand every detail in it. white fang, horatio hornblower, adventures of people traveling the world on bikes, horseback or other ways were among my favorites where i can't remember anything inappropriate for any age. i think huckleberry finn too, but i didn't read that one myself. in fact i don't even remember reading anything that was targeted at a particular age. but even among childrens books i think there is plenty of choices with a wide age range. roald dahl, erich kästner and many other well known childrensbook authors have written stories that are enjoyable at a wide age range. i find it hard to imagine that there wasn't anything enjoyable for your 2nd grader.

caddemon 6y ago

Yeah it's possible things have changed in the last 20 years but when I was growing up any pressure to read above grade level was purely social. I remember showing up to kindergarten very proud that I was reading Ramona, and one of my friends totally dismissed it because he was reading Harry Potter. So of course I begged my parents for Harry Potter after that, which lead to a pretty good run of advancing my reading over a couple years while "competing" with my friend. It is true I read a bunch of books in early elementary years that I definitely did not have the ability to understand on a higher level, like Animal Farm and Frankenstein. But I still think I got a lot out of the experience. It's funny because I was totally glued to those books at the time, but then when we started reading "real" books for school around grade 7 I lost interest. Perhaps my early fascination was more with the mechanics of language than it was with any broader themes or symbolism. Or maybe I just hate being told to do things, probably a bit of both. So yeah, I think reading early can be great and if the child is showing an interest in that it is great to encourage. I wish the teachers/admins at my school were as helpful as my parents/peers, but instead they forced everybody to do assignments using a particular pool of books each year based on age. In first grade my mom ended up doing a "book report" on Make Way for Ducklings because I straight up refused. I do agree it shouldn't be pressured if the child isn't into it though. Different kids are different, so of course schooling is going to require different approaches.

mlyle 6y ago
> In first grade my mom ended up doing a "book report" on Make Way for Ducklings because I straight up refused. See, and that's its own bummer. Make Way for Ducklings is a gorgeous book. Its Lexile measure isn't shabby for a 1st grader, either... but it's not a great book for kids to read on their own (hence it is "AD" -- or adult-directed).
- caddemon 6y ago
  I actually ended up buying the book when I moved to Boston and really enjoyed the illustrations, so I guess I sort of made up for it haha.