Phonics

Caralie's kindergarten teacher says she's one of the best phonetic spellers in her class. In other words, she's great at spelling out words as they sound. I thought I'd share a few that came home yesterday that made me smile:

shoo = shoe
seenc = sink
biscl = bicycle
sammich = sandwich
nrs = nurse
trtl = turtle
octpoos = octopus
ladee bug = lady bug
rocit = rocket
macs = mask

Today I volunteered in the classroom, helping the kids with reading. Mrs. Haynie sends each kid home with a little book to practice reading. They are not to bring it back to school until:

1. they can read it fluently (no sounding out the words)
2. the parents have signed the reading sheet acknowledging that their child can read it fluently

I guess I shouldn't be surprised by the number of kids who return their books to school WITH parent signatures that STILL can't read the books. There is one girl in particular whose parents I would like to kick in the shins. Because they don't take the time to read with her and DO THEIR JOB, she is repeatedly disappointed and has to take her book back home instead of getting a new one. Twice now, I made her cry because I couldn't pass her off. That sucks.

Today I couldn't take it anymore. When she came to my table and "read" her book - sounding out each and every word - I decided I'd had enough. So, instead of telling her to take the book back home and try again, I read the book over and over with her until she began to be fluent. Then I passed her off and gave her a new book. Keep in mind, I really don't have the time to do this in the time I am allotted. In fact, I wasn't able to get to the last kid because I took so much time with her. But SOMEBODY had to do it! This poor kid needed a positive experience with reading.

Now she understands what she needs to do to read her book fluently. I'm praying that our little session made an impact and that with or without her stupid parents, she will practice until she is ready to return her book and pass it off. One can hope.

I really, really hope.