AT WHAT AGE DO CHILDREN LEARN TO READ IN USA
During the Christmas holidays, I have remembered through a sudden flash of my memory, that pilgrimage through the open days of the schools of the Infernal Village the year in which we had to school my little bug. Our preferred center, a priori, was ruled out during a personal interview with the director by exactly 2 points: children with diapers were not admitted there, because in 35 years of history no 3-year-old child had ever urinated on himself (mine would begin on school with 2 years and 10 months and with 2 and a half years we had not even started the diaper operation, which generated many doubts in this area); and all the children of that school could read and write when they were 4 years old. Not one more day, not one day less. It may be because I am naturally at ease with this upbringing, but this restriction of such strict dates seemed so unreasonable to me that we no longer had anything to talk about there.
We ended up in a semi-hippy learning community where 3-year-olds could piss themselves as long as they needed, nap if they wanted, and learn to read around 6 years old, but respecting each other's rhythm. When my little owl began to show literacy skills during P4, I was very excited, because I thought that without forcing, without having set that age as the deadline for her to learn, in the end, she had achieved it anyway. But no, she still doesn't know how to read or write at the age of 5, which is why I now wonder at what age children learn to read in Spain to discover that the process that mine follows is more than normal, even if it doesn't go so fast as demanded that school.
1. What can my daughter write when she is 5 years old?
Little thing and with some oddities ... For example, he dominates his name, common words such as papa, mama, and all the short words with the most frequent letters, such as poop, house, cat, baby ... The longer the word is, the more likely it is of making mistakes like skipping letters. Because she writes everything by hearsay: she repeats to herself the sound of each of the letters that she thinks are part of the word in question and after becoming familiar with their sound she transcribes them. This leads to the typical spelling mistakes, such as skipping an H because it does not sound, or putting a B instead of V, G instead of J ... Normal. But also, the ear takes her along with some very curious paths in which the word "dinner" sounds like "Sina" to her and she composes some texts for me on her own initiative that are the most original.
2. At what age do children learn to read in Spain?
I know that all parents love to exaggerate a little (or too much) the abilities of our children, but my daughter read, what we understand as reading, she does not know. To begin with, in her school only uppercase letters work, so when she comes across lowercase, some of them distinguish them and others are a hieroglyph for her. As for the words in common use (your name, mom, dad, house, names of your companions, etc.) you can read them at once. But if you give him a text or single words, you'll want to die before he can advance 3 words! In her school, literacy is learned not by letters but by their sound, so she does not spell (for example, she does not call C CE, she calls it KK), but instead makes the individual sounds that each letter would have if it were In isolation, and miraculously, a while later, it links everything that is verbalized and reads the word. It seems like a super laborious process, but the truth is that you can read almost any word with this method, albeit at a snail's speed, so neither our patience nor yours give for more than a couple of words in a row. And this is usual since until the age of 6 they will not make blood with the subject.
3. Can we motivate her at home?
Currently, quite a little. The first day I gave him some calligraphy booklets during a vacation period, he took them very eagerly and I thought he would end up making a lot of progress with writing. But it was an oasis in the desert and the next day I no longer had any interest in "working so hard, Mommy, that I get tired." Forcing her is ruled out, because we are not in a hurry, because things that are done in a forced way never end well, and because curricular, until she finishes 1st grade, with 6 long years, she is not expected to have these competencies. So sometimes, with some playdough, or coloring or drawing, or filling in his calendar to know what day he lives, and what events are coming up, we managed to write a word, but little else. She has also become fond of leaving us secret messages when she wants to agree to something, and this comes out of her, that she goes to look for her notebook of white sheets and her pencils to return with a torn page and a mystery to decipher. Nor do stories inspire her to read: she wants to hear stories, many, the newer the better, and be in charge of turning the pages, but not racking her brains deciphering the words.
We see that it makes progress little by little. Sometimes a few weeks go by without us putting his learning to the test in this field and he surprises us with great progress that we did not even suspect. So now even more than when we were looking for a school, I am surprised that such strict methods are still used so that children manage to hate literacy, frustrated at demanding results too soon. As in so many other areas of their learning, each one will have its own pace but in the end, they will all have more or less the same skills. I like to think that the best part of this type of knowledge is that no matter how long it takes, once learned, it will remain forever! They will not unlearn them. There we have some European neighbors, who do not care to initiate their owlets in these matters until they are 7 years old and they live divinely. Does it overwhelm you that they are not small geniuses or excessively advanced in these matters? Have you reason to worry about a genuine stalemate?
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