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Hello! We are absolutely loving Beyond! My son is going through the Emerging Reader set and he is reading the CLP Nature Reader. He's on about week 3 or 4 of reading it and each week seems to be a little harder for him. Basically, it's the length. He's skipping easy words, mixing up easy words, and keeps asking when we are done. He does enjoy the content, but I think we need to mix it up a bit. I'm thinking of breaking the reading into two segments throughout the day. The other option is to just read half a day and stretch the book out longer. Has anyone else's kids kind of hit a wall when reading this? Great book, the day's reading is just a bit long. . . would love some feedback.

Hi.

We are day 2 into unit 16. Our book right now is Prairie School. I think the Nature book is 2 books away. I can't speak about that book yet, but I am finding that my ds is a little TOO fast in general and I have to make him go back and re-read sentences for me. He subs words quite a bit (he will say 'the' instead of 'a', sometimes puts an s on the end of some words that do not end in s, add words when they are not there, etc). They are all mistakes that he makes by not paying enough attention to detail. These mistakes, in my opinion do not change the content and may even sound better to him to read it that way, but I am quite strict about him reading EACH sentence correctly before I let him move on. He is VERY interested in the content and I am very interested in him reading it the way it is written. With the nature book, it may be different content, but I would still have him read it as directed (for us in one sitting) and make him correct his mistakes as he reads. With my ds, re-reading a sentence a few times will cause him to read more carefully in order to get it done!

When my boys read Nature Reader it got long for us too. I found that if I would do one or two days of Nature Reader and alternate with the alternate book for the week it really helped. It did take us a little longer to get through the book. There were a few times that I would have them practice reading silently with the Nature Reader and just read the alternate book out loud to me. After, reading silently then I would as them the questions to go with the section. My middle, especially, thought this was neat because he was doing school more like his big brother:)

I understand! What we actually did was did Nature Reader during the "Science" box in addition to the science activity and she also continued through the rest of the Emerging Readers as scheduled. She got double "read aloud" time, but the Nature Reader we just took in smaller sections since it was "science" instead of reading. I didn't want her discouraged and she was really loving reading, so this was a great way to adapt it and get it all in.

You could just read a little less each day. You will be off for the comprehension questions, but you can always just ask 2 or 3 questions. We had to adjust once in the course of the emerging readers. We are on the Nature Reader right now and loving it, but I have to admit I didn't ever get back to the schedule once we were off so I don't know if we are reading the amount the guide has you read or not. I am just choosing the amount based on how ds is doing and making sure I am slowly increasing over time.

I'm glad you are enjoying Beyond! The Nature Reader is a longer book, and the readings have more to them then the previous book. I agree it would be just fine to slow it down. You can just half the readings and ask whichever comprehension questions fit the part ds read for the day. You may find a few weeks of this is enough for your ds to hit his stride, or you may find this pace to be good for him for the remainder of the book. I think it is very important to do the comprehension questions though, so if you half the speed, I'd be sure to still discuss the questions too. DITHOR 2/3 is what follows The Emerging Reader's Set, and it is incredibly flexible and can be started at any point in the school year, so don't feel ds must complete The Emerging Reader's Set in 9 months. If your ds needs to stay at a level a bit longer, the supplemental titles (any from "The Nature Reader" or earlier), can be used to stretch the reading. HTH!

In Christ,
Julie