We have about 5 more weeks till we officially start school again. Dd is reading pretty well, but still has some phonics issues, so I'm going through those again with her to make sure they are solid. Then I thought that maybe I should do the same thing with ds.
This is kind of embarrassing.
He is going into 4th grade, but still hates reading and makes more mistakes than he should be making and doesn't read fluently. I kept hearing that you should start at the beginning with a struggling reader and go through phonics, but I kept thinking, "He already knows his phonics. He learned those in Kindergarten and first grade! He's not getting the word wrong because he doesn't know what sound an "i" makes or an "e" makes. He's getting it wrong because he's not concentrating enough or something." So even though he thought it was dumb, I went over a few phonics pages with him and was surprised how many times he messed up. So is it possible for a kid to learn their phonics and start out reading well, but then forget their phonics? Well, I'm going back over them with him.
I am also doing eye exercises with him to develop his eye strength and see if it helps, which I should have done before, but didn't. I also did a free online dyslexia test and am waiting for them to get back to me with the results. It's hard to tell if he's having a hard time because he hates reading or if he hates reading because he's having a hard time. I figure with all of these things we're doing, something has to work to improve his reading. I want to see him read well with confidence and not struggle.