Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

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ourmaminhavana
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Joined: Mon Sep 07, 2009 11:14 am

Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by ourmaminhavana »

Hi,
I'm sorry but I need to pick people's brains again please. I'm intending to work with a 12/13 year old boy who has the reading age of a 6 and a half year old and urgently require some suitable material as he needs to get his reading cracked in order to access the curriculum!
I think KS10 you might have mentioned something, but I can't find it?
PS Has anyone tried these?
http://www.pandorabooks.co.uk/ecommerce ... ading-Age/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Okanagan
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Re: Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by Okanagan »

I was going to suggest Barrington Stoke but it looks like some of their titles are already on the link you gave.

Edit: extra link removed as not accessible.
Okanagan
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Re: Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by Okanagan »

You could also try here and here.
KS10
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Re: Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by KS10 »

Okanagan, I tried to have a look at your earlier thread link, but I am not authorised to do so.

OMIH, I can't remember what I posted so I have asked a former colleague to let me know which books they ordered recently and whether or not they are going down well. I may have mentioned Horowitz and the Diamond Brothers series.
Okanagan
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Re: Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by Okanagan »

KS10 wrote:Okanagan, I tried to have a look at your earlier thread link, but I am not authorised to do so.
Sorry - the bit I was trying to highlight was:
yoyo123 wrote:how about audio books? They will be able to access age appropriate literature ( sorry for the ..edu-b.ollocks as my husband calls it) loads of good vocab etc but won;t be held back by their reading abilities.

Not in place of books, but alongside.

I always found it difficult when I had a SEN class to find stuff for their reading ability which wasn't all Fluffy Bunnies and Teddy goes on an adventure..

Joke books are good too, and tapes (cd's) with a book to read along with the narrative.
KS10
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Re: Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by KS10 »

Thanks
Okanagan
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Re: Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by Okanagan »

Following on from the suggestion of audiobooks / audiobooks alongside the print version, a couple of links you might find interesting are SoundLearning and Young Calibre (this one has a Dyslexia focus - not sure if that's applicable in your case).
mystery
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Joined: Tue Jul 21, 2009 10:56 pm

Re: Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by mystery »

Might this be a possibility: http://www.piperbooks.co.uk/shop-online ... rammes.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; - look at the Mature Reading Instruction series of books. You'll need some money though, but I think this publisher is cheaper than the big name publishers.

He has a very low reading age indeed for a teenager. What do other tests show? What GPC knowledge does he have? Can he work out a new simple word he has never read before e.g. ret, or can he only read words he already "knows"?

I would suggest that you might also need to look at a range of reading schemes that are aimed at older children / young adults which gradually bring in new GPCs systematically with sufficient practice. Quite a few of the big publishers do this now - but you have to be choosy as some of the schemes are a bit junky - lots of interesting pictures but not much thought has gone into text that will really teach a child to read little by little.

If he was going to "crack the code" for himself just by reading he probably would have done so I'm thinking something very gradual and systematic is going to be needed or confusion will continue to reign in his brain.

It sounds a great challenge - I love that kind of thing. How much time do get to work with him each week and is there also another adult who can work with him one to one at home or at school? Take a look at the reviews of Toe by Toe on A***** - if someone could work with him for say 10 mins a day on this it could work wonders.
mystery
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Re: Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by mystery »

Some other ideas:

http://www.forwardwithphonics.com/Resources.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Phonetics for Phonics: Underpinning Knowledge for Adult Literacy Practitioners
Maxine Burton
http://shop.niace.org.uk/phonetics-for-phonics.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Also google Tricia Millar "That reading thing"

Tricia has 2 websites:

http://thatreadingthing.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://www.phonics-for-adult-literacy.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Amber
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Re: Books for teenagers at reading age of a six year old?

Post by Amber »

I have worked with many children who can barely read at the age of 13 and have always made my own materials based on their interests. I adapt online news or sport items on subjects such as music downloads, health (drinking, tattoos and piercings are some I have done), weird and wonderful science-type topics. . I always have a session to find out what a child enjoys first. For me the challenges of this kind of work require 'outside the box' thinking - just rattling through material which looks anything like what they have encountered in the past is in my view setting yourself and them up to fail. Kids know when they are being patronised and it is damn hard work to tailor make materials, but several years of working like this have led me to think it is the only way.
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