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Kids/Parenting

Hayden: cool boy, school boy

I’d post a video of Hayden reading, but I still don’t have a way to upload videos from my video camera to our newer desktop. Barring that, here is a list of words Hayden read (yes, READ) one evening last week:

Sounding out
bat
black cat
block cut                
pin
pen
pan
cob
cap
cub
cup
pup
up
yup
nap
Sight words
like
see
can
no
go
am
he
and
at
it
yes
I
love
you

challenge word: pumpkin

Sentence: I can see like you.

(The sight words came from a school list, and from words I know he knows already; everything else I made up. They’re working on sight words at school, which mystifies me to some extent. When I hear “sight words,” I assume you’d focus on words that aren’t phonetic, and then focus on phonics for the rest of the words. The first sight words Hayden learned [I, am, can, see, like] follow regular phonetic rules. While there’s definitely something to be said for the feeling of accomplishment at reading a whole word, it seems more worthwhile to focus on teaching broadly applicable phonetic rules. I mean, the only reason the kid can read is because I’ve been teaching him his vowel sounds. </rant>)

I’m suitably proud of him. I might be praising him a bit too much. The other night, after he put together a toy, he sighed in satisfaction and said under his breath, “I’m always a genius.” He turned to me and added more loudly, “I’m always thinkin’, Mom!”

Yep.

6 replies on “Hayden: cool boy, school boy”

Oh Haydie bug! He’s growing up! Jasmine and I lol’d.

I thought sight words were just really commonly used words but I was only a PreK teacher.

Yeah, that seems to be the guideline. But then, why not call them “top words” or “common words”?

Because you need to know them by sight without having to think about them.

I have worked on sight words with middle school kids who don’t have them yet.

Very proud of the Genius Hayden!

Yeah, from that article: “Many of the 220 Dolch words cannot be ‘sounded out’ and have to be learned by ‘sight,’ that is memorized.” THAT I agree with totally. Nonphonetic words (or even words that have “advanced” phonetic rules) are perfect for rote memorization.

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