Thanks everyone!
Kristy, yeah it's odd. Maybe it's because it's kindergarten? They're trying to teacher her sight words (such as colors, days of the week, high frequency, non-phonetic words) and I can see how trying to phontecally decode "of", "to", "was", or "wednesday" might be an issue. They are teaching letters and sounds (she's mastered all of those, obviously), so I'm guessing they do work on sounding out phonetic words at some point - maybe that doesn't start until first grade? Not sure - my son could also read going into first grade, so I never really got anything indicating that they were working on sounding stuff out.
I'm going to continue to let them sound out words, I think the trick is to just make them understand that some words are "funny" and can't be sounded out, and that you just have to "know" them.
Fred...it sounds like having the girls seperated and mainstreamed was a great decision. I bet there are a few "NT" kids who don't do so well in PE either. Must make you one proud and relieved Daddy.
Glad to hear she's doing so well. You must be so proud of her!
Fred,
Overall that sounds awesome. Very encouraging. I hope you are able to get some help with the PE (PT et. al.). My son is very artistic too but "often contrary" and wants to do things his own way so I can relate to that!
This comment floored me:
[QUOTE=fred]
One problem cited is that she "sounds out" her words
[/QUOTE]
At our school they teach all the kids using a GATE curriculum in the thought that all children can benefit from a "gifted" curriculum. (I don't know the right emoticon for "gag" or I would insert it here.) Anyway, my NT son's teacher called us about a month ago and was concerned with R's reading because he tends to memorize the site words but struggles when sounding out words. Both my kids are being taught that they have to sound out the words. The guidance I am being given for both boys (2 different teachers at 2 different schools in 2 different districts) is that they should be pointing to each word when they read and sounding out any word they don't know. We should be praising them heavily for correctly sounding out words. What you are being told sounds like a 180 from what I'm being told. How incredibly bizarre! At the end of the day, I don't think it matters how they learn to read, as long as they learn to read but it's fascinating to me the great variation in approaches in different schools around the country.
So, today DW went to meet with Abbie's teacher for her mid-term parent/teacher meeting. As many of you know, Abbie is in a regular class for the first time - a mainsteram kindergarten class in the public school system. It's mostly good, some really good, and some not so good. First, the bad news:
Like Evie, Abbie is not working up to grade level in PE. She spoke with the PE teacher, and he indicated that he knew of her disability, and really didn't want to write the 'warning', but he's required to by law. He kind of said that it wasn't such a big deal and that there were three or four other kids in her class that had to get the warning, too.
Abbie is also not working up to level in Art, which is kind of annoying, since she's the best drawer in her class! The art teacher's note said, "Very Arty! Though, sometimes contrary and does her own thing!". Yup, that's her :)
The good news:
She has exactly one goal on her IEP from last year (all the other goals have been mastered) and that goal is assessed at a 3+ (out of four), so, getting near mastered. The goal is: In a structured setting with verbal and visual cues, Abigail will increase her receptive and expressive language". Her SLP made a nice comment:
"Abigail has been such a pleasure to work with! She is bright and curious and doing a fantastic job in speech class. Abigail is able to successfully perform most of her receptive/expressive language goals; she is sometimes inconsistent due to attention however she is easily redirected. Abbie will ask for clarification if she does not understand. Overall, I am very pleased with her language progress."
The SLP also commented that she has been seeing nice social progress with Abbie, such as approaching groups of peers and asking them what they are doing and if she can play with them.
As far as regular class, so far, so good. She's performing about grade level in math. Nothing special, but no real problems.
For reading, she's doing great. The teacher has indicated that she's already mastered most of her end-of-year reading/writing goals and that her reading level is actually at end-of-kindergarten level already. One problem cited is that she "sounds out" her words
She needs some help with retelling stories and sequencing and stuff, but overall, the reading side of things seems to coming very good.
Her teacher said that she's been very good in class, is following routine, getting along with her classmates (who she says are fond of her), participating, following rules, etc.
So far, so good (mostly)!
Wow Fred ... awesome ... stunning! Just wonderful.
That's what they're teaching my ds. A combination of sight words (words you just need to know by sight) and how to sound out words. There are varying schools of thought and phonics has had its ups and downs. In some parts of the country - it is on its way down I guess!
I have read that a lot of kids on the spectrum have a hard time sounding out words. They do better at just memorizing and knowing the words. But then they can't generalize when they get to a new word they haven't seen before.
My ds is definitely sounding out words - he just sounded out "help" today on a Halloween item I bought at Target at their post-Halloween sale. I also bought some great big books yesterday at our local home-schooling store (I'm not home-schooling, but I certainly do a lot of teaching at home!) and ds is able to sound out a lot of the words in that book.
I too am floored that they don't want your kids sounding out words - that just doesn't make sense to me! But if it is just for the words like "and", "of", "the" - they do want the kids to just look at them and know them. Otherwise, it does take a long time.
Remember this is just a few months into the year! Ds' teacher told my ds that SOME of the kids in the class would be reading by the end of the year - but certainly not all. Ds told me that he is DEFINITELY going to be one of those who are reading by the end of the year - which totally warms my heart since he had no interest in it at all even three months ago! Do you happen to know where your kids are expected to be at the end of the year in terms of reading? Because I think as the year goes on, your kids WILL have the sight words down - it just takes time!
This is a great report!!! You and your dw I am sure are beaming!
ttfn
What can I say that hasnt been said?? Your girls are doing amazing!
I think sounding out the words is wonderful..much better than just memorizing to me~it shows she understands phonics and how to sound them out. Sarah knew to read over 200 words at 2 1/2 but we thought she was just memorizing them..turned out she also knew how to sound out phonitically words she didnt know as well. I do think the standards are much higher nowadays compared to twenty years ago! Sarah is doing some double digit addition and substraction already in first grade! I talk to her PE teacher and stated she is doing fine..kkeps up and participates well...all I still see her funny gawky slow running still and cant help but be worried.
Sounds amazing! you should be so proud. what are "warnings"? sounds
Thanks!
They're actually called "interim reports" :)
[QUOTE]
Do you happen to know where your kids are expected to be at the end of the year in terms of reading? Because I think as the year goes on, your kids WILL have the sight words down - it just takes time!
[/QUOTE]
All letters and letter sounds.
They have a list of 'high frequency' sight words that they want them to know (Abbie already knows about half of them). I'm not sure if they ever get to decoding - but the girls have been decoding phonetically since the summer, so they should not have a problem there. The teacher basically said that their reading level is end of year already, but that she will continue to try to push them forward.
She told DW that they want the kids to be writing 2 sentence, legible "stories" by the end of the year - which she can already do (well, not always legible and with very creative spelling because they just try to spell everything phonetically - for example, I'm looking at a picture of a "haunted house" that Abbie drew and below it she wrote, "Honid Hos" :).