Reading!

Another milestone in our family! Lily has been doing lessons with me from a book called "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons." A friend from church recommended it to me. I'd wanted to do home preschool with Lily for a long time and either she or I when we tried it would make it too elaborate to be practical so we didn't follow through with it as a regular thing. We read a lot, and sang songs at times, but I wanted to do more. She was ready to learn more and I wanted to send her to school a little better prepared in some way to give her added confidence because she gets very shy and nervous around new people and in new situations. Mike and I figured reading was the most important thing we could teach her. So when we heard about this book - lessons all ready to go it sounded like just the thing. We've been doing it for (what feels like) a long time (much more than 100 days) and tracking our progress on a sticker chart.

It hasn't been easy. Actually, it was pretty easy at first and for a while -- it was going really well. It was super exciting to see her learning to sound things out and watch her progress...but somewhere in the middle or maybe about 75% through it got very difficult. It started to turn into a battle - get a little boring, get a little more difficult with a baby sister grabbing at the book wanting to eat it, etc, etc. We tried mixing it up -- doing it during baby's nap, throwing some math lessons in there some days of the week, changing the look of the format (so it didn't look so long) going through the material just once instead of twice, changing up the incentives so that what was supposed to be a twenty minute lesson wouldn't take us 2 hours... (Trying to add an incentive to speed it up actually had the opposite effect and ended up being scrapped.) There were many days where other things in life just kept us from getting to her lesson, or Lily just wasn't cooperating. I thought about quitting, worried that pushing her would make Lily hate reading, but ultimately decided I wanted her to see it through. (Besides any kid who loves reading bedtime stories with her dad as much as she does, and is part me - just isn't likely to end up hating reading!) So I don't even know how many days later...We finally reached the end. Lesson 100! Woo hoo!!! I can't even tell you how excited I am to be done with this book! The learning to read journey is not over, and we plan to continue on in our own way, but it is so nice that we completed our goal, Lily earned her reward, and now we can change it up even more  and move forward! 

Dun da dun tah!

 A big sticker to finish off such a big accomplishment - we use what we have - this was Lily's choice :)

So proud! 

The original plan to celebrate was to go to a movie with her Dad and get popcorn and candy, but like most of our plans they got changed up. Lily decided she wanted to pick out a movie to buy and watch at home instead, and we went out for McDonald's and she got to spend $10 however she wanted and pick out a candy. She picked out a DVD pack of Max and Ruby epidsodes, a Barbie fridge for her doll house, and Starburst. On the way to pick out her reward she was reading me street signs. "Mom, I just read 'No Park, and I thought it was a park, but then I realized it was No Park-ing!" "Mom, I just read part of another sign that said 'No Stopping!'"

Here's a little sample of her reading...and me trying to correct without helping her too much.

She tries to go too fast, and maybe I do too. We still have a lot to work on, but I am so proud of my girl!!! I remember learning to read being very hard for me - I certainly wasn't doing it at age 4! Go, Lily Go!