27%

When this number comes up, unless you're considering such things as the chance you'll get cancer or something, is not a good number. It is a number that causes concern, consideration, worry, anxiety. True to form, when I got Ms. R's third 6 week report card back this week I became very worried. This is her sight reading test score. Of 16 children in her class she is in the bottom 3% for reading score. 70% of the kids in her class are already taking home "Zip Books" to read. She is not one of them.
You would possibly think I am just a slacker mom, relying on the teacher to do the work of teaching her what she needs to know for grade one. Not so, as I am afraid if she doesn't know her sight words by the end of the year she will be forced to redo the year. It wouldn't KILL her, but I know it would bruise her little heart. So I have been following through on suggested ways to help her learn her words: Hopscotch with words instead of #'s, Magnet letters to make up the words, Flash cards (ones she know on left, the ones we're still working with on the right), Concentration using sight words instead of pictures, I read at least 20 minutes to her every day letting her say the words that are on the list ... It's like she has no interest in words and when I press her into giving me the time to learn them she usually ends up in tears, frustrated because McKenna, Stephen, Tai, Peyton, blah blah blah can read and SHE can't. I gently point out to her that she has to keep on trying to learn these words before she can read. That just makes her angry, like all of it should just COME to her. Like osmosis. Maybe I'll put a book under her head as she sleeps tonight and see if it works.
Jerry and I have been contemplating using bribery for this one too. He promised her a television when she knew her alphabet (which she now displays proudly to one and all in her room). Maybe bribery would help her overcome her lack of ambition towards learning words. You know I'm desperate when I'm considering bribery.