MY SON IS READING!

Well, by golly, my son has finally gotten over the reading hurdle. He can now read on grade level. He continues to progress every day.

You see, when Caleb was 4 NO ONE but his sister could understand him. I was constantly asking her, "What did your brother say?" We called his language, "Caleb-ese." I researched how we could get him tested. We found out that you could test through the public school. I took him in Feb. of 2005 (he would have turned 5 in July). He tested 1%, meaning that in a group of 100 (Caleb being one of them), 99 boys would speak better than him. His speech therapist at the time said that if she wasn't looking at a picture or context, she would not know what he was saying. We took Caleb to 30 minutes of Speech Therapy twice a week (an hour each week). We spent kindergarten trying to just get him to say the sounds of the letters. He just couldn't do it. First grade, the same. Something happened in second grade as he was getting better. He could say the beginnings, middle, and endings of more and more words. But, between driving there and back again, I felt that I could better utilize our time. We decided to end his therapy and work with him at home.

At first, it wasn't hard. I continued to work on the sounds. But putting sounds together was another story. Turns out, I stink at teaching reading. My husband took over in the evenings and we worked on math and other subjects during the day. I still read to him during the day, but did not require him to do any reading unless David asked me.

I don't know if it was maturity or the great work of my husband enstilling in him that he needs to learn to read. Whatever the case, my son finally said to me yesterday, "My favorite thing to do now is read." He also said, "Now, I know how Erin [his sister] feels when she reads a book. Once you start reading, it's hard to put it down."

I am VERY proud of you son!