It's reading month!

I have stepped back recently from pushing Harry to read as he became very reluctant when we moved onto the next level of our Oxford Reading Tree books. This was a conscious decision because reading is certainly not something I want him to dread doing and I have found that this has happened a couple of times in our learning to read journey. Each time, stepping back has not had any negative consequences, in fact I have found him to be slightly more proficient when we start up again. Although not insisting on him reading, I have still been reading lots to him and encouraging him to read by joining in. He has also been sounding out words to help him spell things he is trying to write. 

So to start us up again I decided that July would be a reading month. We will be doing reading activities and he will be reading every day. I talked about this lots last week in terms of it being a challenge set for him, so he would be ready for it and he hasn't been complaining too much so far! We will also be doing the summer reading challenge at the library so this is good preparation to start that. He will get a certificate and a prize at the end of this month when he has done a reading activity every day.

Today we have been doing a post it note word wall. I write words and sounds on notes and he takes them off the wall when he has read them. He loves the physical nature of this, and Peter makes it quite exciting by running up and down the hall at the same time trying to grab the notes - this is why Harry is smiling in this photo! 

Harry has enjoyed reading Dr Seuss books himself so I borrowed a couple from the library as well as non-fiction reading books to use for his reading practice. He has always enjoyed non-fiction and these make a nice change. 

We are also reading these Oxford Reading Tree read at home books and using this workbook based on phonics. A lot of the book has been covered already by reading eggs but I thought it wouldn't harm to revise it before moving onto the next level.