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Tuesday, September 04, 2007

Learning the 3 R's...reading, reading, reading!

Chance got the best reading score out of all of the first graders in his school. This is fabulous news! Deaf children have been known to struggle in the past with reading often stagnating at a 4th grade level. This is changing, but deaf children have traditionally struggled in reading which makes sense since spoken language and reading are related.

We are just beginning our school career with Chance as he is still young, but what a great start!

When I heard that he had done so well, I had flashbacks to this time last year when reading with Chance was a bit of a struggle. I remember specifically coming across the word 'taxi' and Chance flopping his head over on my shoulder in deep despair because he did not know what that word was. Even after sounding it out correctly, he just had no idea what a taxi was. We don't have many taxi's around here so Chance lacked exposure.

I got books I thought would interest Chance and set them in a basket on the desk.. Each night he would choose one to read to me.

He also went through a reading recovery program at school and brought home a book to read each night from that program, as well as a book to read each night from his mainstream class.

It is nice when you see the results of your labors. And I am very grateful to Chance and his drive to excel.
Only 10 more years to keep this up until Chance graduates from high school :)

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