Reading with M.

 Two days ago, M. read a paragraph out loud to me in French! I am so impressed and proud of him, and happy that our approach has worked—since he has followed the CP (first grade) curriculum this past year at his FLAM classes, it seemed like he could read a little (but not a lot) but he never wanted to do it at home. Ever since we spent 15 days in Paris two summers ago, English has been definitively established as our home language. It felt cozy and right, and it is our default. That's okay. We still read a lot at night in French and M. speaks French with L., but I haven't pushed it. So, when I asked if he wanted to read in French for a day instead of doing his English writing homework, and he said "yes," I was pleasantly surprised to hear him sound out words in French. How did we get here? A few things: 1. As his maternelle teacher said during our conference, kids learn to read once—you don't learn to read in English and then French, or vice versa. M. speaks Frenc...

 It has been a while since I updated this but I wanted to provide an update on M's reading. He just finished a tough but ultimately very good second grade year. Despite his intense interest in being read to since age three, only by the end of this academic year has he mastered reading on his own. (And we still have a way to go, but we are now reading at grade level.) As far as we know, M. doesn't have dyslexia, but he did receive an ADHD diagnosis this year. We are also very lucky that our school district uses a phonics-based curriculum (Fundations), as this was key in M. learning to decode. All this said, having begun the year reading Llama Llama Red Pajama , M. finished out the year with the Dragon Masters  series and has nearly finished book five. Some of the books we read on the way: 1. The Jack Book  Series by Mac Barnett and Greg Pizzoli (this was actually at the end of first grade) 2. Grizzwold   by Syd Hoff 3. Danny and the Dinosaur  by Syd Hoff (we als...