July 25, 2025 • 48 mins
If your child isn’t reaching for books, don’t panic. It’s not a sign of failure but a clue. In this episode, we explore why a lack of interest in reading often points to a missing foundational step in literacy development. With the Montessori approach, we meet children exactly where they are, reigniting curiosity through hands-on, child-led exploration. Once you see reading through this lens, everything changes._______________________________
RESOURCES:✅ Take our reading level assessment for free report about your child's reading readiness → https://www.childoftheredwoods.com/reading✅ Love themes? Free trial right here ➡️ www.childoftheredwoods.com/trial ✅ Complete Montessori homeschool curriculum that is affordable and fun for ages 2-9: https://www.childoftheredwoods.com_______________________________👋 Get behind the scenes of Child of the Redwoods on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/childoftheredwoods/ If you’re ready to stop guessing and start using Montessori materials the right way, check out our complete step-by-step homeschool at Child of the Redwoods. Our programs provide a complete framework for teaching your preschooler through third grader (ages 2-9). Our homeschooling system makes planning a whole lot easier, with lessons that inspire and guide your child gently in all subject areas. 🌟 Subscribe for fun activities for the whole family and Montessori homeschooling tips!
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Episode Transcript
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(00:01):
Hey there friends, I'm Aubrey Harkis.
Today's episode is a replay fromthe Child of the Redwoods live
show that I host with my husbandin Montessori homeschooling,
partnering crime, David Harkis. You can watch the full episode
on the Child of the Redwoods YouTube channel.
Here's the clip. If your child isn't just
(00:25):
reaching for books yet and sounding out all the words,
maybe using those Montessori materials that we know can teach
the Montessori method to teach reading effectively.
Do not panic. This is normal for many, many
children. You're not alone.
And in this episode, we're goingto actually explore why that
(00:47):
reluctance to learn how to read actually happens, and more
importantly, what you can do about it.
Yeah, that's right. So the Montessori approach, we
in the Montessori approach, we meet children where they are.
And what you see reading throughthis lens, everything is going
to change. That's right.
So let's talk about how to help those reluctant readers.
(01:09):
All right, I know that this is abig one for a lot of parents out
there, so I'm going to tell you First off, drum roll, the number
one thing that you can do to help your reluctant reader learn
how to read is don't rush it. That's kind of anticlimactic,
isn't it? Don't, don't rush the reading
(01:32):
process. Now, I want to preference this
by saying that a lot of parents when they hear like, don't rush
reading, they immediately think,oh, OK, so I'm not supposed to
start teaching reading yet. I'll wait to teach reading until
my child shows some kind of readiness.
And that's actually not exactly what we're saying.
Yeah, that's. Right.
(01:53):
And so the difference is kind ofsubtle, but essentially you need
to really feel secure in your own heart.
A lot of parents feel panic about their child isn't reading
yet or other children around their child have already learned
how to read. What if my child just doesn't
learn how to read? And it it can feel paralyzing.
(02:14):
It can just make us feel very insecure as parents.
And so if you are trying, if you're thinking my child should
be at a different level than they already are, might be time
to like, reassess your expectations of where your child
is supposed to be, right? Yeah, that's right.
(02:35):
I mean, there are some teaching theories and philosophies that
deemphasize early literacy. Yes, and Montessori is not one
of. Them right, Montessori is not
one of them. They're also I think broadly in
our culture, a hyper emphasis onearly reading and it's gotten
younger and younger and younger as like even in the course of
our life, right and even perhapseven in the course of our time
(02:59):
teaching it, it seems to creep down more and more and more.
So I think that a lot of parents, they feel caught,
right? They feel like they have to
teach reading early and if they don't, they're doing something
wrong or there's something wrongwith the child or they they go
out and they embrace a, well, you know, more laissez faire
(03:23):
type approach like maybe or theyapproach something like maybe
Waldorf or something that maybe deemphasizes literacy.
I. Honestly, I think that most
parents don't just jump into teaching reading because they're
scared. Yeah.
But I think that if they, but I think that there is an
expectation. We have a lot of expectations on
(03:43):
parents and children to do things that aren't necessarily
normal in terms of like the scope of development, human
development and what we expectedfrom people even within the last
50 years. And there's not actually,
there's not really always good evidence that these techniques
are better for children. They're just popular or they
(04:07):
make us feel more in control. And that's the keyword, right?
I think when we try to introduceearly reading to children and
really, really get worried when they don't pick it up like the
book says or the video says they're supposed to, then we get
really scared and they're there Could be this like reaction of
control or they can just give upor something like that.
(04:29):
In Montessori, it's a neither nor right.
We do teach reading early, but we don't expect children to
learn at our pace. We allow the child to learn at
his or her natural pace and thatwill come and it will vary.
Yeah. And so let's talk about like,
(04:51):
what does don't rush it mean. And because we know like as
Monasterians, we do believe thatoffering children as young is
like three, 3 1/2. There's the tools, the keys to
to reading, to learning how to read and write.
It does. We offer that very, very early,
but we have to have the expectation, like we push our
(05:12):
expectations for a little further down the road.
Yeah. And I'll also say, having taken
my lower elementary training through AMS, that one of the
first things we learned was thata lot of the kids coming into
lower elementary will not be reading yet.
And that that, you know, is an expectation that that's
(05:34):
something that you would start to teach as an elementary school
teacher. Yeah, and that is like an older
model too. Doesn't need to happen in the
early preschool years like I think a lot of people think.
Yeah, that. And that's a change, right?
Like in the past, like even whenwe were in school or I think
maybe into the 90s, you didn't, you know, what was kindergarten
and preschool, there wasn't an emphasis on learning to read and
(05:55):
do math. You might have that available,
but the expectation was you would teach reading in first
graders. I actually think that prior,
maybe even in our generation andyounger or older kids would get
excited about learning how to read when they entered first
grade. Yeah.
You know, like it wasn't until elementary school that children
(06:17):
themselves expected to learn howto read like an older brother or
sister. And maybe if they learned to
read earlier, it was because they kind of naturally were
exposed to a lot of their older sibling learning how to read and
the kind of things that they were doing or elicit watching
them sound out the the sounds ofthe letters to make words or
(06:39):
watching them write. Some children can absorb
learning how to read and write that way.
All children will. But I think before, in the
before times before we had this extreme pressure to teach young
children how to look, to read and write.
I think it was something that children looked forward to being
able to do when they were older.You know, like when I am old
(07:01):
enough, then I will learn how toread.
And they would get, they would get excited about learning how
to do it when they entered this new phase of elementary.
Now, what Maria Montessori did was she kind of broke this by
saying like, hey, like everybodythinks that these very young
children, these preschoolers arelike, just kind of like, not
(07:22):
worthy of having a real education.
Let's just play with that and see what happens.
If we were to give these children things to play with,
that might naturally lead them to teaching themselves how to
read and write, you know, and see if it happens.
And it was surprising to her. Yeah.
And when they did learn how to read and, and write and.
(07:44):
And then it became known in the Montessori classroom community
of teachers and parents that young children could teach
themselves how to read and writeif given these keys, like using
the movable alphabet, starting with those sandpaper letters.
But I think that sometimes, because I think that sometimes
(08:06):
people really misinterpret it and they think that just because
it's part of the Montessori curriculum in the primary years,
they think that it's something that all children are supposed
to be good at by the time they exit those primary.
Yeah, it's like we build an expectation because some
children can learn to read earlier.
(08:27):
Or want to? Yeah, or want to read earlier?
Then all children should be expected to do the same.
And it doesn't have any. It doesn't really respect the
child's developmental path. It doesn't respect their
absorbent mind and it doesn't trust that just because they
don't really become fluent at reading, let's say till 7:00 or
(08:47):
8:00, it doesn't mean that they aren't going to be just as
academically gifted or successful in life as the child
who started reading at 3 or 4, right?
There's it doesn't, there's, there's those things are not the
same like early reading and slightly later reading doesn't
equal long term success. If you're approaching education
(09:11):
with the right mindset. That's right.
Like I think when we create these barriers very early, and
this is maybe a reason to consider Montessori and home
schooling. And on top of that is that there
are like these gates that children have to pass through.
And so if a child can't read by first grade in certain systems,
then they're slotted into certain paths because they're
(09:33):
considered needing remediation or something.
And that again, it's, it's just not a healthy expectation.
It sets kids up for a lot of pressure and not a success.
It, it pushes down onto the parents and they feel the sense
of guilt. And that can then turn into sort
of like I, I just don't know what to do.
You, you figure it out. You hear that too, right?
Like, well, the teacher's job isto teach the reading, right?
(09:56):
You know, it, it comes out of it.
It's a byproduct of all this. Yeah, a lot of parents will send
their preschoolers to preschool with the expectation that the
teacher will teach their kid howto read.
Yeah, and it's. It's not.
Necessarily real. Yeah.
I will feel like that's an advantage of homeschooling is
that in a lot of ways you can byremoving your child from that
(10:18):
outside pressure to learn a certain thing at a certain time
period, you have a little more flexibility with your timeline.
And so I think that this first number one thing that you can do
is to kind of to not feel pressured to rush this process
because it's going to make you feel more anxious if you have a
(10:40):
set timeline on when your child needs to learn how to read by.
And let's say it's under the ageof up to the age of like 8 or
so. You know, if you're under the
age of like 8 years old and you're like having this big
anxiety about when your child isgoing to learn how to read, then
(11:01):
it's not going to make you a very effective teacher because
you're just going to be so anxious about it.
And when you are more anxious and you are pushing your, you
seem to be like pushing your child too soon to learn to do
something that developmentally their heart just isn't really
in, then it's going to create and anxiety in your child.
(11:24):
And I feel like this is, this iskind of a hard, this is a hard
thing to, to hear for a lot of parents and for me too, you
know, but I think it is there issome truth to it that if there's
something that you are anxious about, your child is going to
take on some of the anxiety about and they're going to feel
(11:45):
it. I mean, we say this like in
response to like the horse can sense your anxiety.
You know, like maybe that came from all those pony books I read
when I was a child. But I found that in my head,
like, or like a dog, like if you're coming up to a strange
dog and they're like, they can sense it when you're anxious and
they won't relax around you. I think that there is some truth
(12:06):
to that. As for ponies, SO2 for children.
That's right. It's just like with your pony.
I know you're fictional Black Beauty.
Your child can sometimes sense when you're anxious about
something, and in fact, this is a developmental thing.
They are attuned to your face almost at all times, especially
when they're. It's one of the very first
(12:28):
things they recognize. When they're under the age of 6
especially, like they're highly attuned to your face.
And if you look like you're nervous about something, they're
going to internalize to be nervous about something.
And this is protective because you know what?
If you're out in the wild and there is something to be nervous
about and you need your child tolike be quiet and, you know, cut
(12:48):
a lot. They need to know it's real.
Protective, right? So they naturally sense that.
And so if they see it when you're dealing, giving these
reading lessons, and they see that you're tense and anxious
about it. I just keep telling you this is
the letter A. Why don't you get what it is?
You know it's gonna come through.
Right. It is gonna come through.
And so really the first thing that you can do is you can
recognize your child has the power of their absorbent mind.
(13:14):
They are going through their sensitive periods, but there is
actually no sensitive period forlearning how to read.
Yeah, you can. Read to read, even.
In. That's not to say that your
child will be. So, Yeah.
So there's no particular period where your child is going to be
at the perfect age for learning how to read.
But your child may be more interested in learning a
(13:36):
different subject during different developmental periods.
So say the sensitive period for order or for tiny things or for,
I don't know, whatever else. It is like really strong during
a particular period or your child's just interest is really,
really strong in one particular area.
(13:57):
That might not be the moment where your child is really
interested in taking in doing a reading lesson.
You might need to wait until that intense interest.
I'm thinking like trains or I don't know outside and playing
or like child just might be reading.
On the junk, you know, jungle. Gym interested in something else
developmentally might not be theright time to start the reading
(14:19):
direct teaching lessons, you know, So there's no one right
time period to teach your child how to read, and there's no rush
to it. Yeah, OK.
Vidya has a a comment here. She says sometimes it is also
peer pressure, talking about theexpectation of parents.
Yeah, even amongst homeschoolingfamilies, when some parents
(14:39):
share how advanced their kids are in reading, there is real
pressure lurking. Yeah, that is absolutely true.
I mean, it's, yeah. I mean, it's like those bumper
stickers. My child went to someone like
Einstein Academy for the Gifted or whatever.
Like my son's an honor roll student at Cool Dude Academy or
something. You know it's normal to be.
(15:01):
Proud of your children, but I dothink sometimes you can have a
FOMO or a sense of guilt or something.
And I mean, so rule #1 lesson #1is follow your child.
I mean, that's really what it comes down to.
Don't rush it. Your child will come to it.
As we talked about last week, ifthere is a developmental delay,
(15:23):
let's say dyslexia or something else, it will emerge and you
will eventually be able to identify that you.
Shouldn't worry about it until age that's.
Right, that's right. But up until about the age of 7
or 8, just continue going through the lessons and they
will eventually stick. Now, following your child
doesn't mean not knowing where your child is.
So it's good to observe and document and have a sense of
(15:46):
your child's readiness in that level.
In fact, we developed a tool recently.
We did. This is a great time to announce
it too. That's right.
We were developed a tool recently that is on our website.
You go to childoftheredwoods.com/reading
and you can take a real quick quiz That's, it's about 18
questions. It'll take about 3 minutes and
(16:06):
it'll come back with a, an evaluation of where in the six
level system your child might be.
And again, we're not saying thatlevel 1 is this age and level 6
is that age. That's not the way it works.
That's right. What you're wanting to know is
where in the where in these the level system my child might be.
And and then you're gonna get a report that will tell you here
(16:28):
are some lessons that you might give some tricks and tips that
can go with it. And then if you're in our
community and part of our complete or unlimited
curriculum, you can go find evenmore lessons for that level and
start working through those. Again, this is not an age it's
about. Lessons here that help children
develop the kinds of skills thatthey need in order to learn how
(16:50):
to read. So yeah, definitely you're not
gonna enter the reading curriculum and just start with
like Lesson 1. We're teaching phonics lesson.
That's a lot of. Things to do ahead of time,
Yeah, while you're not rushing. Right, So.
And where can people find the quiz?
That childhood of the redwoods.com/reading, yeah.
So go check that out if you havea chance.
Beautiful. All right, well, you know,
(17:11):
there's also another thing that parents can do.
If you want to learn the way to teach your child how to read,
come join us, of course, in our curriculum.
But there's one thing that parents are probably already
doing that is teaching children how to read and write.
And it's really, really helping those reluctant readers,
(17:33):
especially they might not going to be thinking about.
What is it? It is modeling the reading
process, yes. So every time you read a story
to your child, or if you have a little library at home or you
have a collection of picture books and you're regularly
getting them out and reading those books to your child, that
is part of the reading process of the teaching, how to teach
(17:57):
your child how to read. And parents probably undervalue
it. Yeah, just because your child is
reluctant to read doesn't mean that they are reluctant to hear
stories that be read too. And you know that.
And it shouldn't dissuade you. In fact, it might even encourage
you to go extra into that modeling.
So your child seeing you read for pleasure, right, your own
(18:21):
books or how or on a tablet, if that's how you read an e-book or
listening to an audio book in the car.
And of course, having books around your house.
Yes, and pulling those books offthe shelf and reading them aloud
to your child. Or if your child is like, I
don't want to go pick out a book.
I'm nervous. You know, sometimes that'll
(18:43):
happen. Are you going out and picking
out a book and saying, Oh, I love this book.
It's, this is a good, I want to read this.
And then you open it up and, andstart to kind of model that
because modeling, especially in those young years is crucial.
It really is a situation where the child sees what you're doing
and wants to do it too. That's why in Montessori, one of
(19:05):
the that's why we give them child size things.
So you give them a little broom so they can sweep.
It's because they see real work.They see you sweeping the
kitchen floor or whatever and they want to do that too.
They have a natural desire to follow and do real work, which
they would call play. And the same goes for reading.
(19:27):
So get those books out. Keep a big box of books, put
them all over your house, yes, baskets of books wherever.
And just model that reading as often as you can't.
Yes. Now what do we do if our
children seem really reluctant to even be read too?
I know that there are some parents out there who swear up
and down their children just don't like sitting and listening
(19:49):
to stories. Now, our kids did, so we're a
little biased, but I also feel like it's part of the way we set
up our parenting structure in our home.
You have to read anyway. You've got to read anyway, yeah?
So they know that'll sound sillyor you may feel self-conscious
about it or sort of frustrated, like I'm reading this, you know,
(20:10):
you know, Pat the Bunny book foryou, not for me.
I already know what happens whenyou pat the Bunny a lot.
Of parents are like, let's read this book, you know, or I'm
gonna read this book and your child's like, no, I don't wanna
go do this. Instead I'm gonna play with my
train, so I'm gonna play with mydolls or I don't want to do
that. And so I think at that point, a
lot of parents will put the bookaway.
(20:30):
That's right. And say like, well, I guess that
was open. Up here, you don't want to hear
a story. And then I think it can become a
habit of like, especially if your child feels like they're
trying to, you're kind of tryingto manipulate them totally.
You're listening for an educational purpose or.
Yeah, cuz they'll know like, oh,you only wanted to read Pat the
Bunny because I was here, right?Or whatever it is like, whatever
(20:53):
your book. Is and so we actually did, we
both did that with our kids kindof preemptively just as part of
our parenting. You literally have to just read
it to yourself out loud. And what the science says is
that it actually doesn't matter what you are reading.
You could be reading your book out loud.
(21:14):
You know, maybe you're, I don't know what you're reading, but
whatever it is, as long as it's kid appropriate, read it out
loud. Meridian.
Probably not. I know thinking like part of
Game of Thrones. I don't know, like, like, you
know, the appropriate parts, like read it, read it out loud.
(21:34):
And it doesn't really matter if your child or what I love to do
with our own kids is like read aMaria Montessori book out loud,
you know, pick up The Absorbent Mind or The Secret of Childhood.
And I would literally just sit there and read, you know, my own
stuff out loud sometimes. And sometimes that's nice
because you can hear yourself read to yourself, but it's also
(21:55):
such good modeling for your kids.
And then you're kind of breakingthe expectation that you're only
reading out loud for them. Yeah, like reading is academic
and only about school or being controlled in some way or.
Bedtime. Yeah.
You know, or, or it's time for bed.
So we're going to read a story. So, you know, if you're going to
(22:18):
take this to heart, this modelling reading and writing to
more than you think, what we literally mean is make reading
part of your lifestyle. You know, you're going to put
books into your kitchen, you're going to read them at the
counter, you're going to read them in bed, You're going to
read them on the living room couch.
(22:39):
You're going to leave. You're.
Waiting for the rice to cook andyou're standing there and you're
reading your books about. Body and you've got books next
to them. Like we're talking about really
like books are just in your house.
You actually don't have to have an enormous abundance of them.
Cuz kids will wanna read the same.
Things they often do, yeah, but have make them part of your
(23:00):
lifestyle, make them part of your home.
And we talk a lot about this in our courses, ways to integrate
the reading experience and booksinto our homes.
There are also little lessons that you can teach right from
our curriculum that don't even feel like lessons that you can
give to your child while you're while you're reading or, you
(23:21):
know, sharing books together. Yeah, many of the early reading
lessons are in the literature the lessons are simply read
books of different genre. That's right, mystery novel or a
book, meet a read, a folk tale reads, right?
Just exposure to a variety of kinds of literature of all
levels. Because what you're doing is
(23:42):
you're trying to demystify the process, right?
You are modeling something and saying this is just what humans
do. They read, they read, they sit
around and they read, and they read in the kitchen and they
read in bed and they read walking around, and they read
while they're waiting for the train and response.
(24:04):
If you guys have comments or questions or suggestions out
there I would love to hear live from you in the chat as well.
But I will tell you, I actually do most of my real life reading
now on my Libby app on my phone.Or.
Like reading things on the Internet.
I know like both of us will readnews on it on our phones.
We'll and you know, I read tons of books.
(24:27):
I mean, it's so rare for me to get to reprint anymore.
Right. And so, you know, and then
sadly, sadly, this, you know, even though, like, reading aloud
from your phone does count, yourchildren will still be hearing
the vocabulary, but it doesn't translate to reading.
(24:48):
Make a paper book. Yeah.
So usually what we want our children to start, they're
reading. So the guidance there would be,
if you're really working with a child, to introduce model
reading and modeling it. You need some physical books, I
know, so go to your library. Sadly, ditch the phone.
Read on your phone for yourself.Read from your phone sometimes,
but not all the time. Like if you're making that
(25:10):
modeling reading part of your Montessori lifestyle paper
books. Yeah, they need to be tangible,
physical. They need to be able to see
them. You want them to do that early
pretend reading where they open up the book and they're
pretending to read it to their stuffy or to themselves.
There's that's where you're wanting to kind of get to even
before they're ready to actuallyread because you're again,
(25:34):
breaking down the barrier. You're creating an expectation
that this is just a normal thing.
Like, you know, adults and humans have to sweep the floor
and they have to cook food and they have to give hogs and all
the other things that are part of our everyday life.
Reading is one of those. It is.
So now again, we have some comments here.
Let me see here. So Vidya again says she
(25:57):
encourages encourage audio booksif they are reluctant.
Yes, audio books are great. Yeah, I agree.
It's also nice when you have an audio book and the physical book
too. We did that with our kids,
especially our youngest who is dyslexic.
We would buy the audio book and a physical copy as well so that
he could follow along. Yeah.
(26:18):
When he was older. When he was older, of course,
yeah. I will say I think that people
don't realize how much reading aloud is, is, like, healthy for
children. I mean, I probably read aloud to
our kids while I was homeschooling them in the
younger years, like, up to hoursa day.
Yeah, that's probably true. I know it's a lot.
(26:41):
I mean, we really prioritized it.
And again, it did not. Me reading aloud constantly did
not teach our dyslexic child howto read earlier, OK, But it did
give him a love of stories. It gave, you know, it really
increased his vocabulary. He loves.
Books. I mean he.
(27:01):
Loves stories he loves. He loves the ideas.
Gave him a love of literature, even though it's the challenge,
the reading part is challenging for him.
And so yes to the audio books, you know, read aloud as much as
you can. And if you just feel like you
physically can't read aloud as much, I got there as well.
(27:22):
Like, read, let an audio book read aloud.
Yeah. They're like they developed in.
The car or. Podcast as well that were
basically storytelling podcast, so there's a lot.
Of kid podcasts out there that are great.
Yeah, you're trying to introducethis kind of excitement for the
story and then that can kind of translate.
It Yeah, the great comment. All of that counts.
So another comment, also from Vinci, says reading aloud is
(27:45):
very, very crucial. She also says that her one of
her children was reluctant but is enjoying audiobooks since she
was four. And now she's 8 and can finally
read words and has skipped various lessons.
She just uses the basic sounds. That's perfect.
Yeah, that's right. So that that actually reminds me
a bit of our youngest journey too, right?
(28:06):
Like they started, he started toreally kind of hear the stories.
Of course, we read out loud a ton, developed a love for story
and then in time began to develop the skill to read.
Now again, he's under if your your child, I think is 8 or
under. So I would say at this point
like, but no worries, like in terms of development delay
(28:30):
person, you know, necessarily, but I think that process
regardless is kind of similar. Stacy is also here.
She says yes to all this. Her son loves books and loves
listening to audio books on his Yoto YO.
Yeah. Do you know about the Yoto?
No. Yeah, it's it's came out after
(28:51):
we've we've finished our raisingour own kids.
It's like it's like music or maybe it's just audio books.
You could correct me on that. It's like a player that is
physical, that kids can manipulate.
Nice. Yeah, I got it.
Cool. Yeah.
Well, if it's working, then it'sworking.
(29:11):
I think that's the thing, you know, and kind of tied into
this. We didn't emphasize it too much,
but I just want to under score, like when you're reading aloud
and you're talking about books, you want to express a love of
it. Like you need to be like, I love
this book. I want to read this book to you.
And if they wander off, that's fine.
You told them you loved it, and you were going to demonstrate
that you love it by reading it aloud.
(29:33):
That's right. And also talking about the books
that you're reading that you love totally or when you go to
the library talk just being really positive about your
interaction with literature out there.
That's right. And explaining.
I think like, I love this so much because of maybe it's
because pictures, maybe it's because of the way the author
(29:53):
constructed their words, maybe because it rhymes, you know, the
rhyming, or maybe it's because it's funny.
But I think that people undervalue that part of the
reading process a lot. And so just be really emphatic
about your love of books. It will and it's going to
translate. So if you're wondering where do
(30:15):
I start? Or you know, how do I, you know,
how do I make my path easier? Remember you can take our
reading quiz at childoftheredwoods.com/reading
and we will give you an exact level of where your child is
right now. Yeah, you'll take the quiz.
It'll it's about 3 minutes long.Childoftheredwoods.com/reading
(30:37):
If you want to report, just giveus your e-mail.
We'll send you a full report that gives tips and tricks
related to that level. And if you want to go deeper, of
course, we have a full scoop andsequence all about reading and
writing, plus every other subject in the Montessori
curriculum. Perfect.
All right now. What is next?
Here is something that I have noticed parents really have a
(30:58):
misconception of when thinking about teaching their reluctant
reader how to get more excited about the reading process.
And that is that parents I oftenthink that a reading lesson
needs to be really long. Yeah, that they need to.
You need to be like teaching reading is this big process.
Yeah, they're not getting it, soI must just need to do more.
(31:19):
Yeah. And I think that that is one of
the reasons why those programs, like, I think there's like a
book like how to teach your child to read 100 easy lessons
or something. I think that's why those
programs are so enticing. Yeah.
Or even the online programs where you're like, we'll just do
it for you. Yeah, do this app.
And it'll it's a star for every little.
(31:39):
It'll count the hours they spent.
Right. And So what I want to emphasize
is that when you are helping your child learn how to read,
your direct instruction of actually giving the reading
lesson does not need to be that long, in fact.
Yeah, in fact, it should not. Be a really effective reading
lesson. Could be as short as 2 to 5
(32:01):
minutes, all right, And it couldbe throughout your day.
It doesn't even have to be at the same time of day.
It doesn't need to be formal. You don't have to be sitting
down together saying, OK, now we're gonna have a reading
lesson like I think a lot of parents see themselves
potentially doing. Like your reading lessons can be
just very, very short and super,super impactful and powerful
(32:23):
just in that very short amount of time.
We tend to think that children need long lessons and that the
longer the lesson and the more time you spend on it, that is a
direct. Yeah, it's going to correlate
and. Correlates to bigger learning
outcomes. And in fact, it's actually the
reverse. And real Montessori set up the
(32:44):
whole Montessori classroom the opposite way.
Like, so we're giving itty bitty, teeny tiny modeling like
lessons lots of times, Yeah. And they're supposed to be very,
very short. You know, it occurs to me, I
wonder if this comes out of a like the same place as the
10,000 hours or whatever that old thing is.
(33:04):
Like you have to do something for 1000 hours or 10,000 hours
to get good at it. And so we just like more and
more and more like if I really want to get good at basketball
hoop, you know, sinking a basketball in a hoop, I've got
to like do it over and over and over or whatever the here's I
want everybody to practice this.You are not learning how to
(33:24):
read. You are not learning how to
read. You aren't learning how to read.
So you're going to give your child a little bit of
information. They are going to apply that
information. They're the ones who have to do
the 1000 hours. That's right.
And it's not going to be sittingnext to you going through the
books. You for the learning to be real,
(33:45):
it has to be meaningful to them and it has to be in creative
application in real world settings.
So you want to introduce, let's make I was thinking about like
CVC words, right? So let's say you're working on
CVC words, cat, dog, something like that.
You might introduce a few variation of C blank T words,
(34:07):
cut, caught cat, right. And that's it.
And then you're going to have added in these other things that
we've already talked about. You have books around the house.
You're going to be reading thosebooks aloud.
When you see a CVC where you're going to be at, you're going to
be saying it, kind of emphasizing it, demonstrating
(34:30):
the decoding and getting really excited like cat.
Yeah, right. So you are going to keep that
instruction very short and then you're going to give the child
lots of opportunities because the you already know how to
read. They're the ones who are trying
to learn to read, and it has to happen inside.
But I think you made a really valid point that like, that's a
(34:52):
lot of hours. And it's true.
If you want to get good at something, you do have to
practice it for sure. But it's not just that direct
reading lesson just counts as one tiny part of it, right?
Like all of the, you know, exactly thing around them, all
of that environmental print around them.
Well, that's why the 1000 hours isn't yours.
You're not learning to read. That they see and that they're
(35:13):
looking at the S and trying to make sense out of it.
You. Go to the park and you see a
sign and you read the sign like playground like.
Right, all of it counts. Like it's all part of those
hours that is attributed to practice reading and.
That's happening inside them, right?
So I think that parents, sometimes we have this
expectation that we have to spend thousands of hours in
(35:34):
direct instruction. It's and it's not just for
reading and it's not just homeschool.
It's a common misconception in all parts of our educational
system because we think more is better and in fact, more can be
better, but only if it's in the right place, the right places
inside the child, him or herself.
So your child is the one learning to read.
(35:55):
Give them a little nugget and let them practice, practice,
practice, practice in as many real and diverse ways that they
can. Yeah, It also occurred to me
while we're talking about this urge to keep your direct
instruction short is that your direct instruction should also
be consistent. And this is something that a lot
(36:16):
of parents miss. You know, you think, OK, I'm
going to teach a reading lesson.I'll do it twice a week.
You do it once on Monday, You doit once on Thursday.
And you're like, taught the lessons.
Like it's so much better for your child if you have more
lessons that are very consistent.
Like it's daily practice. The lessons are really, really
(36:38):
short. Every morning you're gonna do
the move something with the movea lot for.
Better. And I also think that especially
when we're talking about reluctant children who are
reluctant to learn to read or kind of resisting the reading
process, I mean, the more consistent you make it, if you
could do it like, every day, yeah, it's just better for your
kid. You're more likely to get
(36:59):
children who get on board if they have the expectation that
we have breakfast and we have a little mini reading lesson.
And if you're really good about keeping it short, if you're
like, it's gonna only take two minutes and we're gonna
demonstrate this, you know, the,the reading or we're just going
to go through these sandpaper letters.
(37:19):
And but we're going to do it every single day after
breakfast. Your child learns to become less
anxious about it. Like it they, they start to
trust you that it's not going toturn into this long, complicated
thing that makes them feel like they're under pressure.
You're keeping it short. You're keeping it really, really
consistent. So they know what to expect and
(37:40):
they know that it's going to be over.
You know, when it's over, they're going to say, OK, we're
going to have our reading lesson.
Great. Here's the here's the lesson.
We'll do it once it's done, moveon to other things, OK, and.
Then I'm gonna under score your word expectation because that
actually is the throughput for all of these tips that we're
giving. Set the expectation that in this
(38:02):
house we read. Yep, and it's apparent through
the. We're in this house.
We love reading. Exactly.
It's it's apparent through our joy of reading, the number of
books we have, how often we talkor think about books, how we can
describe our favorite books, howmany books are sitting around,
how frequently I go and pick up a book to read it.
(38:25):
And also in that we respect reading and we practice reading.
Like everybody practices reading.
And we're going to practice reading this morning after
breakfast. We're going to do our short
reading lesson. And we're not going to then
spend an hour going through workbook pages or just like
drilling, drilling, drilling, drilling.
We're going to have a little bitof a lesson and we're going to
(38:47):
then go on with our day and we're going to find ways to
bring that to life because it islike the air we breathe.
Like we love reading in this house.
We read, we clean the kitchen, we go to church, we go visit
grandma. We.
Love to play in the. Playground we, whatever it is
that is in your family's rhythm,reading is a part of that.
(39:09):
And so when we make these instructions short, then they
will naturally flow into that expectation than into that
rhythm. But and but when we, I think
hammer in and say now we're going to do 3 hours on reading,
it becomes oressive, overwhelming.
It's not following the child. It can actually turn them off.
It can make them more anxious and that'll make you more
anxious because you're not goingto get the results you want.
(39:31):
O Kee, that instruction short now if you're wanting to know
where you might start again, if you're wondering like what kinds
of lessons I might want to give my child who's just going
through this process of reading,what should those little lessons
be that we have you covered. We have a full reading
curriculum as part of the Montessori approach.
It goes from levels one to six. That's not age based, it's level
(39:54):
based. So.
It's actually both boxes. That's right, the primary and
lower elementary. You'll teach you everything from
going to the very, very, very start of introducing shape
recognition all the way. Through grammar and literary
analysis and paragraph writing and short story writing, right.
The whole journey of a child going through the learning to
(40:15):
read. And in fact, we've just now
released the new tool. It's a quiz that you can take.
It's free. Go to childoftheredwoods.com
reading and you take a 3 minute quiz and it'll tell you where in
that levels curriculum your child would fall.
And if you give us your e-mail address, we'll send you a report
that has some tips and tricks that go along with that level.
(40:38):
And if it's enticing to you and you want to go further, then
join us over at Child of the Redwoods and unlock the entire
Montessori reading, writing, andother curriculum.
That's right. All right.
Beautiful. Just to see, Oh yes, there's
some good conversation about thevalue or on value of screen
time. I don't disagree with that.
(41:01):
And then there, there are so many out there and so many keep
coming up in terms of like apps and things.
I think she means and then also recommends 1000 hours outside.
Yeah, now. Which I know is a thing.
It is a thing and she's getting some good publicity.
The the originator of 1000 hoursoutside, yeah, which is very
(41:23):
exciting. Cuz yeah, being outside is
awesome. Kudos to that and all.
We're all about getting kids outin nature more often as well in
Montessori. That's right.
Yeah. All right.
Well, beautiful. It's been a good topic and I
think that, you know, like I said, the three thread for me is
it's like, what is your expectation as a family?
(41:44):
That's. Right.
You set your expectation that inthis house, in our family, we
value reading. It's just what we do.
And you don't have to be scared of it.
You don't have to worry about it.
It's just something we do just like we clean the kitchen and we
give each other a hugs and we brush our teeth at night and we
(42:07):
do other fun things. And a way that we can embody
that are we can make sure that we follow the child, not try and
force that child into some sort of rigid structure and not give
in to the FOMO or to the peer pressure, but to really trust
the child's ability to learn andteach himself and herself.
And you will be rewarded for that.
(42:28):
The second is to really make that love of reading come alive
in your home. Read out loud a lot.
Have books around, make them available.
Read even if your child wanders off.
Read your own material, talk about books you love.
Go. You know, I remember there were
children's books I loved and we had copies of them and you did
(42:49):
too. And we would talk, oh, I love
Johnny Lyon. That was one of my favorite
books when I was a kid and I wanted to read this book.
Oh, I love this book. Or even new books that you come
across that you just love to read with your kids, right?
Whatever that book might be, talk about how much you love it.
And then the third is to oh gosh, I forgot.
(43:12):
The third is to keep your directinstruction.
Keep your direct instruction. Sure, we have a full There is a
full Montessori method, a whole curriculum for teaching children
how to read. It could be at your fingertips
if you are a member of our complete curriculum.
Absolutely. All right, Well.
Did somebody say reading Hey? Mr. Bunny, that we like a whole
(43:33):
lot about reading. I love to read, too.
Yes. It's one of my very favorite
things I love here. I would put it.
I'm gonna put a fifth on the list of things that I love to
do. Yeah.
Fifth. Yeah, yeah.
Well, what are the 123 and 4? Well, of course carrots come #1.
Of course. Singing is high, really high up
(43:54):
there. I really love to sing.
A whole lot, yeah. Yeah, I also love that I I love
grooming my ears. Yep, that's a pretty popular
one. And of course, hanging out with
my family. Now, I'm going to be clear,
these are not in any particular order, but I am pretty sure that
reading is in the top five. So maybe, Yeah, top five for
(44:15):
sure, Yes. You know what?
And I spent a lot of time with the library.
Yeah, you. Do.
Yeah, that's where I get a lot of my books.
Yeah. And I know the you know, the
library I could tell is very popular.
I'm not the only one. Yeah, you could really tell.
Do you know how you could tell? Yeah.
It's got a lot of letters. Yeah.
You. Mean you mean like like mailing
(44:38):
letter like mail letters that you mail or?
Yeah, that's right. Lots of letters.
Yeah. It's also very tall.
Did you know that? Yeah.
Yeah, it. Is library.
Yeah, it's got all those stories, Yeah.
Now I have to be careful though,when I go to the library because
sometimes I get a little bit excited and I check out too many
(45:01):
books, you know? But I have to tell myself, don't
overdo it. Don't overdo it.
Yeah. Because they might get overdue
books. What?
Yeah, that's right. Why?
It's almost like you rehearsed with me.
Now wait a minute. Do you have any favorite books?
(45:23):
Yes. What are they?
I, I don't know, like Goodnight Moon is probably one of my
favorite. That's a good one.
I also like blueberries for Sal.And I also like blueberries and
Sal, so I guess I would like blueberries for Sal.
Yeah, that's a good one for me. Of course, I love the runaway
(45:43):
Bunny. Naturally.
Peter Rabbit. No relation.
Oh, definitely Bunnicula. Yes, that's a good one.
Also the Bunny in the hat, Jamesand the giant carrot.
The very hungry Bunny pillar, The Giving Tree, the.
(46:03):
Giving tree. I like that one too.
Yeah, me too. That's right.
They originally were going to call it the Giving Bunny, but
then everybody got confused withSanta Claus.
What? No, it's the Giving Tree.
Everybody knows that it's such an uplifting story.
That's why people love it. Well, I'm glad that you like to
read and thank you so much for coming to share us.
(46:26):
Share that with us. Yeah, I hope you guys have a
great time and go beat the summer heat with a great book,
Mr. Popper's Bunnies. That's a good one.
Bye, bye bye Mr. Bunny. You had so many.
He had so many puns in there I could not keep.
Up He did have a lot of puns today.
(46:49):
This was a punny episode for Mr.Bunny, but you know, sometimes
Mr. Bunny just needs a laugh. Yes.
It's fun to have a laugh. It is fun.
Well, if you would enjoy some more laughter in your life,
perhaps you could join us at childoftheredwoods.com.
Not because we're particularly hilarious all the time, but we
have such fun with our communitymembers.
(47:11):
And community is a big part of what we do at Child of the
Redwoods. So if you want to know more
about our work, head over to childoftheredwoods.com and you
can learn all about our plans, all of which include community
and some. And sometimes Mr. Bunny doesn't
make behind the scenes appearances.
For those who are big fans, you.Know sometimes he does.
I don't know who's a big fan of Mr. Bunny, but I'm certain
(47:31):
somewhere out there there's a Mr. Bunny fan.
I know there is. We want to thank everybody who's
joined us live as well and for this really fun episode.
We have another one coming up onreading next week.
This is going to be on selectinggood literature, which I think
(47:52):
is going to be a nice follow on to this.
Maybe Mr. Bunny's list can help us.
Yes, we've got a lot of tips foryou from the Montessori
perspective. We.
Do that's right, And also a rapid perspective, apparently.
Apparently. All right, everybody, you guys
have a great day. We will see you in one week.
All right. Love you friends.
Hey there friends, I'm Aubrey Harkis.
Today's episode is a replay fromthe Child of the Redwoods live
show that I host with my husbandin Montessori homeschooling,
partnering crime, David Harkis. You can watch the full episode
on the Child of the Redwoods YouTube channel.
Here's the clip. If your child isn't just
(00:25):
reaching for books yet and sounding out all the words,
maybe using those Montessori materials that we know can teach
the Montessori method to teach reading effectively.
Do not panic. This is normal for many, many
children. You're not alone.
And in this episode, we're goingto actually explore why that
(00:47):
reluctance to learn how to read actually happens, and more
importantly, what you can do about it.
Yeah, that's right. So the Montessori approach, we
in the Montessori approach, we meet children where they are.
And what you see reading throughthis lens, everything is going
to change. That's right.
So let's talk about how to help those reluctant readers.
(01:09):
All right, I know that this is abig one for a lot of parents out
there, so I'm going to tell you First off, drum roll, the number
one thing that you can do to help your reluctant reader learn
how to read is don't rush it. That's kind of anticlimactic,
isn't it? Don't, don't rush the reading
(01:32):
process. Now, I want to preference this
by saying that a lot of parents when they hear like, don't rush
reading, they immediately think,oh, OK, so I'm not supposed to
start teaching reading yet. I'll wait to teach reading until
my child shows some kind of readiness.
And that's actually not exactly what we're saying.
Yeah, that's. Right.
(01:53):
And so the difference is kind ofsubtle, but essentially you need
to really feel secure in your own heart.
A lot of parents feel panic about their child isn't reading
yet or other children around their child have already learned
how to read. What if my child just doesn't
learn how to read? And it it can feel paralyzing.
(02:14):
It can just make us feel very insecure as parents.
And so if you are trying, if you're thinking my child should
be at a different level than they already are, might be time
to like, reassess your expectations of where your child
is supposed to be, right? Yeah, that's right.
(02:35):
I mean, there are some teaching theories and philosophies that
deemphasize early literacy. Yes, and Montessori is not one
of. Them right, Montessori is not
one of them. They're also I think broadly in
our culture, a hyper emphasis onearly reading and it's gotten
younger and younger and younger as like even in the course of
our life, right and even perhapseven in the course of our time
(02:59):
teaching it, it seems to creep down more and more and more.
So I think that a lot of parents, they feel caught,
right? They feel like they have to
teach reading early and if they don't, they're doing something
wrong or there's something wrongwith the child or they they go
out and they embrace a, well, you know, more laissez faire
(03:23):
type approach like maybe or theyapproach something like maybe
Waldorf or something that maybe deemphasizes literacy.
I. Honestly, I think that most
parents don't just jump into teaching reading because they're
scared. Yeah.
But I think that if they, but I think that there is an
expectation. We have a lot of expectations on
(03:43):
parents and children to do things that aren't necessarily
normal in terms of like the scope of development, human
development and what we expectedfrom people even within the last
50 years. And there's not actually,
there's not really always good evidence that these techniques
are better for children. They're just popular or they
(04:07):
make us feel more in control. And that's the keyword, right?
I think when we try to introduceearly reading to children and
really, really get worried when they don't pick it up like the
book says or the video says they're supposed to, then we get
really scared and they're there Could be this like reaction of
control or they can just give upor something like that.
(04:29):
In Montessori, it's a neither nor right.
We do teach reading early, but we don't expect children to
learn at our pace. We allow the child to learn at
his or her natural pace and thatwill come and it will vary.
Yeah. And so let's talk about like,
(04:51):
what does don't rush it mean. And because we know like as
Monasterians, we do believe thatoffering children as young is
like three, 3 1/2. There's the tools, the keys to
to reading, to learning how to read and write.
It does. We offer that very, very early,
but we have to have the expectation, like we push our
(05:12):
expectations for a little further down the road.
Yeah. And I'll also say, having taken
my lower elementary training through AMS, that one of the
first things we learned was thata lot of the kids coming into
lower elementary will not be reading yet.
And that that, you know, is an expectation that that's
(05:34):
something that you would start to teach as an elementary school
teacher. Yeah, and that is like an older
model too. Doesn't need to happen in the
early preschool years like I think a lot of people think.
Yeah, that. And that's a change, right?
Like in the past, like even whenwe were in school or I think
maybe into the 90s, you didn't, you know, what was kindergarten
and preschool, there wasn't an emphasis on learning to read and
(05:55):
do math. You might have that available,
but the expectation was you would teach reading in first
graders. I actually think that prior,
maybe even in our generation andyounger or older kids would get
excited about learning how to read when they entered first
grade. Yeah.
You know, like it wasn't until elementary school that children
(06:17):
themselves expected to learn howto read like an older brother or
sister. And maybe if they learned to
read earlier, it was because they kind of naturally were
exposed to a lot of their older sibling learning how to read and
the kind of things that they were doing or elicit watching
them sound out the the sounds ofthe letters to make words or
(06:39):
watching them write. Some children can absorb
learning how to read and write that way.
All children will. But I think before, in the
before times before we had this extreme pressure to teach young
children how to look, to read and write.
I think it was something that children looked forward to being
able to do when they were older.You know, like when I am old
(07:01):
enough, then I will learn how toread.
And they would get, they would get excited about learning how
to do it when they entered this new phase of elementary.
Now, what Maria Montessori did was she kind of broke this by
saying like, hey, like everybodythinks that these very young
children, these preschoolers arelike, just kind of like, not
(07:22):
worthy of having a real education.
Let's just play with that and see what happens.
If we were to give these children things to play with,
that might naturally lead them to teaching themselves how to
read and write, you know, and see if it happens.
And it was surprising to her. Yeah.
And when they did learn how to read and, and write and.
(07:44):
And then it became known in the Montessori classroom community
of teachers and parents that young children could teach
themselves how to read and writeif given these keys, like using
the movable alphabet, starting with those sandpaper letters.
But I think that sometimes, because I think that sometimes
(08:06):
people really misinterpret it and they think that just because
it's part of the Montessori curriculum in the primary years,
they think that it's something that all children are supposed
to be good at by the time they exit those primary.
Yeah, it's like we build an expectation because some
children can learn to read earlier.
(08:27):
Or want to? Yeah, or want to read earlier?
Then all children should be expected to do the same.
And it doesn't have any. It doesn't really respect the
child's developmental path. It doesn't respect their
absorbent mind and it doesn't trust that just because they
don't really become fluent at reading, let's say till 7:00 or
(08:47):
8:00, it doesn't mean that they aren't going to be just as
academically gifted or successful in life as the child
who started reading at 3 or 4, right?
There's it doesn't, there's, there's those things are not the
same like early reading and slightly later reading doesn't
equal long term success. If you're approaching education
(09:11):
with the right mindset. That's right.
Like I think when we create these barriers very early, and
this is maybe a reason to consider Montessori and home
schooling. And on top of that is that there
are like these gates that children have to pass through.
And so if a child can't read by first grade in certain systems,
then they're slotted into certain paths because they're
(09:33):
considered needing remediation or something.
And that again, it's, it's just not a healthy expectation.
It sets kids up for a lot of pressure and not a success.
It, it pushes down onto the parents and they feel the sense
of guilt. And that can then turn into sort
of like I, I just don't know what to do.
You, you figure it out. You hear that too, right?
Like, well, the teacher's job isto teach the reading, right?
(09:56):
You know, it, it comes out of it.
It's a byproduct of all this. Yeah, a lot of parents will send
their preschoolers to preschool with the expectation that the
teacher will teach their kid howto read.
Yeah, and it's. It's not.
Necessarily real. Yeah.
I will feel like that's an advantage of homeschooling is
that in a lot of ways you can byremoving your child from that
(10:18):
outside pressure to learn a certain thing at a certain time
period, you have a little more flexibility with your timeline.
And so I think that this first number one thing that you can do
is to kind of to not feel pressured to rush this process
because it's going to make you feel more anxious if you have a
(10:40):
set timeline on when your child needs to learn how to read by.
And let's say it's under the ageof up to the age of like 8 or
so. You know, if you're under the
age of like 8 years old and you're like having this big
anxiety about when your child isgoing to learn how to read, then
(11:01):
it's not going to make you a very effective teacher because
you're just going to be so anxious about it.
And when you are more anxious and you are pushing your, you
seem to be like pushing your child too soon to learn to do
something that developmentally their heart just isn't really
in, then it's going to create and anxiety in your child.
(11:24):
And I feel like this is, this iskind of a hard, this is a hard
thing to, to hear for a lot of parents and for me too, you
know, but I think it is there issome truth to it that if there's
something that you are anxious about, your child is going to
take on some of the anxiety about and they're going to feel
(11:45):
it. I mean, we say this like in
response to like the horse can sense your anxiety.
You know, like maybe that came from all those pony books I read
when I was a child. But I found that in my head,
like, or like a dog, like if you're coming up to a strange
dog and they're like, they can sense it when you're anxious and
they won't relax around you. I think that there is some truth
(12:06):
to that. As for ponies, SO2 for children.
That's right. It's just like with your pony.
I know you're fictional Black Beauty.
Your child can sometimes sense when you're anxious about
something, and in fact, this is a developmental thing.
They are attuned to your face almost at all times, especially
when they're. It's one of the very first
(12:28):
things they recognize. When they're under the age of 6
especially, like they're highly attuned to your face.
And if you look like you're nervous about something, they're
going to internalize to be nervous about something.
And this is protective because you know what?
If you're out in the wild and there is something to be nervous
about and you need your child tolike be quiet and, you know, cut
(12:48):
a lot. They need to know it's real.
Protective, right? So they naturally sense that.
And so if they see it when you're dealing, giving these
reading lessons, and they see that you're tense and anxious
about it. I just keep telling you this is
the letter A. Why don't you get what it is?
You know it's gonna come through.
Right. It is gonna come through.
And so really the first thing that you can do is you can
recognize your child has the power of their absorbent mind.
(13:14):
They are going through their sensitive periods, but there is
actually no sensitive period forlearning how to read.
Yeah, you can. Read to read, even.
In. That's not to say that your
child will be. So, Yeah.
So there's no particular period where your child is going to be
at the perfect age for learning how to read.
But your child may be more interested in learning a
(13:36):
different subject during different developmental periods.
So say the sensitive period for order or for tiny things or for,
I don't know, whatever else. It is like really strong during
a particular period or your child's just interest is really,
really strong in one particular area.
(13:57):
That might not be the moment where your child is really
interested in taking in doing a reading lesson.
You might need to wait until that intense interest.
I'm thinking like trains or I don't know outside and playing
or like child just might be reading.
On the junk, you know, jungle. Gym interested in something else
developmentally might not be theright time to start the reading
(14:19):
direct teaching lessons, you know, So there's no one right
time period to teach your child how to read, and there's no rush
to it. Yeah, OK.
Vidya has a a comment here. She says sometimes it is also
peer pressure, talking about theexpectation of parents.
Yeah, even amongst homeschoolingfamilies, when some parents
(14:39):
share how advanced their kids are in reading, there is real
pressure lurking. Yeah, that is absolutely true.
I mean, it's, yeah. I mean, it's like those bumper
stickers. My child went to someone like
Einstein Academy for the Gifted or whatever.
Like my son's an honor roll student at Cool Dude Academy or
something. You know it's normal to be.
(15:01):
Proud of your children, but I dothink sometimes you can have a
FOMO or a sense of guilt or something.
And I mean, so rule #1 lesson #1is follow your child.
I mean, that's really what it comes down to.
Don't rush it. Your child will come to it.
As we talked about last week, ifthere is a developmental delay,
(15:23):
let's say dyslexia or something else, it will emerge and you
will eventually be able to identify that you.
Shouldn't worry about it until age that's.
Right, that's right. But up until about the age of 7
or 8, just continue going through the lessons and they
will eventually stick. Now, following your child
doesn't mean not knowing where your child is.
So it's good to observe and document and have a sense of
(15:46):
your child's readiness in that level.
In fact, we developed a tool recently.
We did. This is a great time to announce
it too. That's right.
We were developed a tool recently that is on our website.
You go to childoftheredwoods.com/reading
and you can take a real quick quiz That's, it's about 18
questions. It'll take about 3 minutes and
(16:06):
it'll come back with a, an evaluation of where in the six
level system your child might be.
And again, we're not saying thatlevel 1 is this age and level 6
is that age. That's not the way it works.
That's right. What you're wanting to know is
where in the where in these the level system my child might be.
And and then you're gonna get a report that will tell you here
(16:28):
are some lessons that you might give some tricks and tips that
can go with it. And then if you're in our
community and part of our complete or unlimited
curriculum, you can go find evenmore lessons for that level and
start working through those. Again, this is not an age it's
about. Lessons here that help children
develop the kinds of skills thatthey need in order to learn how
(16:50):
to read. So yeah, definitely you're not
gonna enter the reading curriculum and just start with
like Lesson 1. We're teaching phonics lesson.
That's a lot of. Things to do ahead of time,
Yeah, while you're not rushing. Right, So.
And where can people find the quiz?
That childhood of the redwoods.com/reading, yeah.
So go check that out if you havea chance.
Beautiful. All right, well, you know,
(17:11):
there's also another thing that parents can do.
If you want to learn the way to teach your child how to read,
come join us, of course, in our curriculum.
But there's one thing that parents are probably already
doing that is teaching children how to read and write.
And it's really, really helping those reluctant readers,
(17:33):
especially they might not going to be thinking about.
What is it? It is modeling the reading
process, yes. So every time you read a story
to your child, or if you have a little library at home or you
have a collection of picture books and you're regularly
getting them out and reading those books to your child, that
is part of the reading process of the teaching, how to teach
(17:57):
your child how to read. And parents probably undervalue
it. Yeah, just because your child is
reluctant to read doesn't mean that they are reluctant to hear
stories that be read too. And you know that.
And it shouldn't dissuade you. In fact, it might even encourage
you to go extra into that modeling.
So your child seeing you read for pleasure, right, your own
(18:21):
books or how or on a tablet, if that's how you read an e-book or
listening to an audio book in the car.
And of course, having books around your house.
Yes, and pulling those books offthe shelf and reading them aloud
to your child. Or if your child is like, I
don't want to go pick out a book.
I'm nervous. You know, sometimes that'll
(18:43):
happen. Are you going out and picking
out a book and saying, Oh, I love this book.
It's, this is a good, I want to read this.
And then you open it up and, andstart to kind of model that
because modeling, especially in those young years is crucial.
It really is a situation where the child sees what you're doing
and wants to do it too. That's why in Montessori, one of
(19:05):
the that's why we give them child size things.
So you give them a little broom so they can sweep.
It's because they see real work.They see you sweeping the
kitchen floor or whatever and they want to do that too.
They have a natural desire to follow and do real work, which
they would call play. And the same goes for reading.
(19:27):
So get those books out. Keep a big box of books, put
them all over your house, yes, baskets of books wherever.
And just model that reading as often as you can't.
Yes. Now what do we do if our
children seem really reluctant to even be read too?
I know that there are some parents out there who swear up
and down their children just don't like sitting and listening
(19:49):
to stories. Now, our kids did, so we're a
little biased, but I also feel like it's part of the way we set
up our parenting structure in our home.
You have to read anyway. You've got to read anyway, yeah?
So they know that'll sound sillyor you may feel self-conscious
about it or sort of frustrated, like I'm reading this, you know,
(20:10):
you know, Pat the Bunny book foryou, not for me.
I already know what happens whenyou pat the Bunny a lot.
Of parents are like, let's read this book, you know, or I'm
gonna read this book and your child's like, no, I don't wanna
go do this. Instead I'm gonna play with my
train, so I'm gonna play with mydolls or I don't want to do
that. And so I think at that point, a
lot of parents will put the bookaway.
(20:30):
That's right. And say like, well, I guess that
was open. Up here, you don't want to hear
a story. And then I think it can become a
habit of like, especially if your child feels like they're
trying to, you're kind of tryingto manipulate them totally.
You're listening for an educational purpose or.
Yeah, cuz they'll know like, oh,you only wanted to read Pat the
Bunny because I was here, right?Or whatever it is like, whatever
(20:53):
your book. Is and so we actually did, we
both did that with our kids kindof preemptively just as part of
our parenting. You literally have to just read
it to yourself out loud. And what the science says is
that it actually doesn't matter what you are reading.
You could be reading your book out loud.
(21:14):
You know, maybe you're, I don't know what you're reading, but
whatever it is, as long as it's kid appropriate, read it out
loud. Meridian.
Probably not. I know thinking like part of
Game of Thrones. I don't know, like, like, you
know, the appropriate parts, like read it, read it out loud.
(21:34):
And it doesn't really matter if your child or what I love to do
with our own kids is like read aMaria Montessori book out loud,
you know, pick up The Absorbent Mind or The Secret of Childhood.
And I would literally just sit there and read, you know, my own
stuff out loud sometimes. And sometimes that's nice
because you can hear yourself read to yourself, but it's also
(21:55):
such good modeling for your kids.
And then you're kind of breakingthe expectation that you're only
reading out loud for them. Yeah, like reading is academic
and only about school or being controlled in some way or.
Bedtime. Yeah.
You know, or, or it's time for bed.
So we're going to read a story. So, you know, if you're going to
(22:18):
take this to heart, this modelling reading and writing to
more than you think, what we literally mean is make reading
part of your lifestyle. You know, you're going to put
books into your kitchen, you're going to read them at the
counter, you're going to read them in bed, You're going to
read them on the living room couch.
(22:39):
You're going to leave. You're.
Waiting for the rice to cook andyou're standing there and you're
reading your books about. Body and you've got books next
to them. Like we're talking about really
like books are just in your house.
You actually don't have to have an enormous abundance of them.
Cuz kids will wanna read the same.
Things they often do, yeah, but have make them part of your
(23:00):
lifestyle, make them part of your home.
And we talk a lot about this in our courses, ways to integrate
the reading experience and booksinto our homes.
There are also little lessons that you can teach right from
our curriculum that don't even feel like lessons that you can
give to your child while you're while you're reading or, you
(23:21):
know, sharing books together. Yeah, many of the early reading
lessons are in the literature the lessons are simply read
books of different genre. That's right, mystery novel or a
book, meet a read, a folk tale reads, right?
Just exposure to a variety of kinds of literature of all
levels. Because what you're doing is
(23:42):
you're trying to demystify the process, right?
You are modeling something and saying this is just what humans
do. They read, they read, they sit
around and they read, and they read in the kitchen and they
read in bed and they read walking around, and they read
while they're waiting for the train and response.
(24:04):
If you guys have comments or questions or suggestions out
there I would love to hear live from you in the chat as well.
But I will tell you, I actually do most of my real life reading
now on my Libby app on my phone.Or.
Like reading things on the Internet.
I know like both of us will readnews on it on our phones.
We'll and you know, I read tons of books.
(24:27):
I mean, it's so rare for me to get to reprint anymore.
Right. And so, you know, and then
sadly, sadly, this, you know, even though, like, reading aloud
from your phone does count, yourchildren will still be hearing
the vocabulary, but it doesn't translate to reading.
(24:48):
Make a paper book. Yeah.
So usually what we want our children to start, they're
reading. So the guidance there would be,
if you're really working with a child, to introduce model
reading and modeling it. You need some physical books, I
know, so go to your library. Sadly, ditch the phone.
Read on your phone for yourself.Read from your phone sometimes,
but not all the time. Like if you're making that
(25:10):
modeling reading part of your Montessori lifestyle paper
books. Yeah, they need to be tangible,
physical. They need to be able to see
them. You want them to do that early
pretend reading where they open up the book and they're
pretending to read it to their stuffy or to themselves.
There's that's where you're wanting to kind of get to even
before they're ready to actuallyread because you're again,
(25:34):
breaking down the barrier. You're creating an expectation
that this is just a normal thing.
Like, you know, adults and humans have to sweep the floor
and they have to cook food and they have to give hogs and all
the other things that are part of our everyday life.
Reading is one of those. It is.
So now again, we have some comments here.
Let me see here. So Vidya again says she
(25:57):
encourages encourage audio booksif they are reluctant.
Yes, audio books are great. Yeah, I agree.
It's also nice when you have an audio book and the physical book
too. We did that with our kids,
especially our youngest who is dyslexic.
We would buy the audio book and a physical copy as well so that
he could follow along. Yeah.
(26:18):
When he was older. When he was older, of course,
yeah. I will say I think that people
don't realize how much reading aloud is, is, like, healthy for
children. I mean, I probably read aloud to
our kids while I was homeschooling them in the
younger years, like, up to hoursa day.
Yeah, that's probably true. I know it's a lot.
(26:41):
I mean, we really prioritized it.
And again, it did not. Me reading aloud constantly did
not teach our dyslexic child howto read earlier, OK, But it did
give him a love of stories. It gave, you know, it really
increased his vocabulary. He loves.
Books. I mean he.
(27:01):
Loves stories he loves. He loves the ideas.
Gave him a love of literature, even though it's the challenge,
the reading part is challenging for him.
And so yes to the audio books, you know, read aloud as much as
you can. And if you just feel like you
physically can't read aloud as much, I got there as well.
(27:22):
Like, read, let an audio book read aloud.
Yeah. They're like they developed in.
The car or. Podcast as well that were
basically storytelling podcast, so there's a lot.
Of kid podcasts out there that are great.
Yeah, you're trying to introducethis kind of excitement for the
story and then that can kind of translate.
It Yeah, the great comment. All of that counts.
So another comment, also from Vinci, says reading aloud is
(27:45):
very, very crucial. She also says that her one of
her children was reluctant but is enjoying audiobooks since she
was four. And now she's 8 and can finally
read words and has skipped various lessons.
She just uses the basic sounds. That's perfect.
Yeah, that's right. So that that actually reminds me
a bit of our youngest journey too, right?
(28:06):
Like they started, he started toreally kind of hear the stories.
Of course, we read out loud a ton, developed a love for story
and then in time began to develop the skill to read.
Now again, he's under if your your child, I think is 8 or
under. So I would say at this point
like, but no worries, like in terms of development delay
(28:30):
person, you know, necessarily, but I think that process
regardless is kind of similar. Stacy is also here.
She says yes to all this. Her son loves books and loves
listening to audio books on his Yoto YO.
Yeah. Do you know about the Yoto?
No. Yeah, it's it's came out after
(28:51):
we've we've finished our raisingour own kids.
It's like it's like music or maybe it's just audio books.
You could correct me on that. It's like a player that is
physical, that kids can manipulate.
Nice. Yeah, I got it.
Cool. Yeah.
Well, if it's working, then it'sworking.
(29:11):
I think that's the thing, you know, and kind of tied into
this. We didn't emphasize it too much,
but I just want to under score, like when you're reading aloud
and you're talking about books, you want to express a love of
it. Like you need to be like, I love
this book. I want to read this book to you.
And if they wander off, that's fine.
You told them you loved it, and you were going to demonstrate
that you love it by reading it aloud.
(29:33):
That's right. And also talking about the books
that you're reading that you love totally or when you go to
the library talk just being really positive about your
interaction with literature out there.
That's right. And explaining.
I think like, I love this so much because of maybe it's
because pictures, maybe it's because of the way the author
(29:53):
constructed their words, maybe because it rhymes, you know, the
rhyming, or maybe it's because it's funny.
But I think that people undervalue that part of the
reading process a lot. And so just be really emphatic
about your love of books. It will and it's going to
translate. So if you're wondering where do
(30:15):
I start? Or you know, how do I, you know,
how do I make my path easier? Remember you can take our
reading quiz at childoftheredwoods.com/reading
and we will give you an exact level of where your child is
right now. Yeah, you'll take the quiz.
It'll it's about 3 minutes long.Childoftheredwoods.com/reading
(30:37):
If you want to report, just giveus your e-mail.
We'll send you a full report that gives tips and tricks
related to that level. And if you want to go deeper, of
course, we have a full scoop andsequence all about reading and
writing, plus every other subject in the Montessori
curriculum. Perfect.
All right now. What is next?
Here is something that I have noticed parents really have a
(30:58):
misconception of when thinking about teaching their reluctant
reader how to get more excited about the reading process.
And that is that parents I oftenthink that a reading lesson
needs to be really long. Yeah, that they need to.
You need to be like teaching reading is this big process.
Yeah, they're not getting it, soI must just need to do more.
(31:19):
Yeah. And I think that that is one of
the reasons why those programs, like, I think there's like a
book like how to teach your child to read 100 easy lessons
or something. I think that's why those
programs are so enticing. Yeah.
Or even the online programs where you're like, we'll just do
it for you. Yeah, do this app.
And it'll it's a star for every little.
(31:39):
It'll count the hours they spent.
Right. And So what I want to emphasize
is that when you are helping your child learn how to read,
your direct instruction of actually giving the reading
lesson does not need to be that long, in fact.
Yeah, in fact, it should not. Be a really effective reading
lesson. Could be as short as 2 to 5
(32:01):
minutes, all right, And it couldbe throughout your day.
It doesn't even have to be at the same time of day.
It doesn't need to be formal. You don't have to be sitting
down together saying, OK, now we're gonna have a reading
lesson like I think a lot of parents see themselves
potentially doing. Like your reading lessons can be
just very, very short and super,super impactful and powerful
(32:23):
just in that very short amount of time.
We tend to think that children need long lessons and that the
longer the lesson and the more time you spend on it, that is a
direct. Yeah, it's going to correlate
and. Correlates to bigger learning
outcomes. And in fact, it's actually the
reverse. And real Montessori set up the
(32:44):
whole Montessori classroom the opposite way.
Like, so we're giving itty bitty, teeny tiny modeling like
lessons lots of times, Yeah. And they're supposed to be very,
very short. You know, it occurs to me, I
wonder if this comes out of a like the same place as the
10,000 hours or whatever that old thing is.
(33:04):
Like you have to do something for 1000 hours or 10,000 hours
to get good at it. And so we just like more and
more and more like if I really want to get good at basketball
hoop, you know, sinking a basketball in a hoop, I've got
to like do it over and over and over or whatever the here's I
want everybody to practice this.You are not learning how to
(33:24):
read. You are not learning how to
read. You aren't learning how to read.
So you're going to give your child a little bit of
information. They are going to apply that
information. They're the ones who have to do
the 1000 hours. That's right.
And it's not going to be sittingnext to you going through the
books. You for the learning to be real,
(33:45):
it has to be meaningful to them and it has to be in creative
application in real world settings.
So you want to introduce, let's make I was thinking about like
CVC words, right? So let's say you're working on
CVC words, cat, dog, something like that.
You might introduce a few variation of C blank T words,
(34:07):
cut, caught cat, right. And that's it.
And then you're going to have added in these other things that
we've already talked about. You have books around the house.
You're going to be reading thosebooks aloud.
When you see a CVC where you're going to be at, you're going to
be saying it, kind of emphasizing it, demonstrating
(34:30):
the decoding and getting really excited like cat.
Yeah, right. So you are going to keep that
instruction very short and then you're going to give the child
lots of opportunities because the you already know how to
read. They're the ones who are trying
to learn to read, and it has to happen inside.
But I think you made a really valid point that like, that's a
(34:52):
lot of hours. And it's true.
If you want to get good at something, you do have to
practice it for sure. But it's not just that direct
reading lesson just counts as one tiny part of it, right?
Like all of the, you know, exactly thing around them, all
of that environmental print around them.
Well, that's why the 1000 hours isn't yours.
You're not learning to read. That they see and that they're
(35:13):
looking at the S and trying to make sense out of it.
You. Go to the park and you see a
sign and you read the sign like playground like.
Right, all of it counts. Like it's all part of those
hours that is attributed to practice reading and.
That's happening inside them, right?
So I think that parents, sometimes we have this
expectation that we have to spend thousands of hours in
(35:34):
direct instruction. It's and it's not just for
reading and it's not just homeschool.
It's a common misconception in all parts of our educational
system because we think more is better and in fact, more can be
better, but only if it's in the right place, the right places
inside the child, him or herself.
So your child is the one learning to read.
(35:55):
Give them a little nugget and let them practice, practice,
practice, practice in as many real and diverse ways that they
can. Yeah, It also occurred to me
while we're talking about this urge to keep your direct
instruction short is that your direct instruction should also
be consistent. And this is something that a lot
(36:16):
of parents miss. You know, you think, OK, I'm
going to teach a reading lesson.I'll do it twice a week.
You do it once on Monday, You doit once on Thursday.
And you're like, taught the lessons.
Like it's so much better for your child if you have more
lessons that are very consistent.
Like it's daily practice. The lessons are really, really
(36:38):
short. Every morning you're gonna do
the move something with the movea lot for.
Better. And I also think that especially
when we're talking about reluctant children who are
reluctant to learn to read or kind of resisting the reading
process, I mean, the more consistent you make it, if you
could do it like, every day, yeah, it's just better for your
kid. You're more likely to get
(36:59):
children who get on board if they have the expectation that
we have breakfast and we have a little mini reading lesson.
And if you're really good about keeping it short, if you're
like, it's gonna only take two minutes and we're gonna
demonstrate this, you know, the,the reading or we're just going
to go through these sandpaper letters.
(37:19):
And but we're going to do it every single day after
breakfast. Your child learns to become less
anxious about it. Like it they, they start to
trust you that it's not going toturn into this long, complicated
thing that makes them feel like they're under pressure.
You're keeping it short. You're keeping it really, really
consistent. So they know what to expect and
(37:40):
they know that it's going to be over.
You know, when it's over, they're going to say, OK, we're
going to have our reading lesson.
Great. Here's the here's the lesson.
We'll do it once it's done, moveon to other things, OK, and.
Then I'm gonna under score your word expectation because that
actually is the throughput for all of these tips that we're
giving. Set the expectation that in this
(38:02):
house we read. Yep, and it's apparent through
the. We're in this house.
We love reading. Exactly.
It's it's apparent through our joy of reading, the number of
books we have, how often we talkor think about books, how we can
describe our favorite books, howmany books are sitting around,
how frequently I go and pick up a book to read it.
(38:25):
And also in that we respect reading and we practice reading.
Like everybody practices reading.
And we're going to practice reading this morning after
breakfast. We're going to do our short
reading lesson. And we're not going to then
spend an hour going through workbook pages or just like
drilling, drilling, drilling, drilling.
We're going to have a little bitof a lesson and we're going to
(38:47):
then go on with our day and we're going to find ways to
bring that to life because it islike the air we breathe.
Like we love reading in this house.
We read, we clean the kitchen, we go to church, we go visit
grandma. We.
Love to play in the. Playground we, whatever it is
that is in your family's rhythm,reading is a part of that.
(39:09):
And so when we make these instructions short, then they
will naturally flow into that expectation than into that
rhythm. But and but when we, I think
hammer in and say now we're going to do 3 hours on reading,
it becomes oressive, overwhelming.
It's not following the child. It can actually turn them off.
It can make them more anxious and that'll make you more
anxious because you're not goingto get the results you want.
(39:31):
O Kee, that instruction short now if you're wanting to know
where you might start again, if you're wondering like what kinds
of lessons I might want to give my child who's just going
through this process of reading,what should those little lessons
be that we have you covered. We have a full reading
curriculum as part of the Montessori approach.
It goes from levels one to six. That's not age based, it's level
(39:54):
based. So.
It's actually both boxes. That's right, the primary and
lower elementary. You'll teach you everything from
going to the very, very, very start of introducing shape
recognition all the way. Through grammar and literary
analysis and paragraph writing and short story writing, right.
The whole journey of a child going through the learning to
(40:15):
read. And in fact, we've just now
released the new tool. It's a quiz that you can take.
It's free. Go to childoftheredwoods.com
reading and you take a 3 minute quiz and it'll tell you where in
that levels curriculum your child would fall.
And if you give us your e-mail address, we'll send you a report
that has some tips and tricks that go along with that level.
(40:38):
And if it's enticing to you and you want to go further, then
join us over at Child of the Redwoods and unlock the entire
Montessori reading, writing, andother curriculum.
That's right. All right.
Beautiful. Just to see, Oh yes, there's
some good conversation about thevalue or on value of screen
time. I don't disagree with that.
(41:01):
And then there, there are so many out there and so many keep
coming up in terms of like apps and things.
I think she means and then also recommends 1000 hours outside.
Yeah, now. Which I know is a thing.
It is a thing and she's getting some good publicity.
The the originator of 1000 hoursoutside, yeah, which is very
(41:23):
exciting. Cuz yeah, being outside is
awesome. Kudos to that and all.
We're all about getting kids outin nature more often as well in
Montessori. That's right.
Yeah. All right.
Well, beautiful. It's been a good topic and I
think that, you know, like I said, the three thread for me is
it's like, what is your expectation as a family?
(41:44):
That's. Right.
You set your expectation that inthis house, in our family, we
value reading. It's just what we do.
And you don't have to be scared of it.
You don't have to worry about it.
It's just something we do just like we clean the kitchen and we
give each other a hugs and we brush our teeth at night and we
(42:07):
do other fun things. And a way that we can embody
that are we can make sure that we follow the child, not try and
force that child into some sort of rigid structure and not give
in to the FOMO or to the peer pressure, but to really trust
the child's ability to learn andteach himself and herself.
And you will be rewarded for that.
(42:28):
The second is to really make that love of reading come alive
in your home. Read out loud a lot.
Have books around, make them available.
Read even if your child wanders off.
Read your own material, talk about books you love.
Go. You know, I remember there were
children's books I loved and we had copies of them and you did
(42:49):
too. And we would talk, oh, I love
Johnny Lyon. That was one of my favorite
books when I was a kid and I wanted to read this book.
Oh, I love this book. Or even new books that you come
across that you just love to read with your kids, right?
Whatever that book might be, talk about how much you love it.
And then the third is to oh gosh, I forgot.
(43:12):
The third is to keep your directinstruction.
Keep your direct instruction. Sure, we have a full There is a
full Montessori method, a whole curriculum for teaching children
how to read. It could be at your fingertips
if you are a member of our complete curriculum.
Absolutely. All right, Well.
Did somebody say reading Hey? Mr. Bunny, that we like a whole
(43:33):
lot about reading. I love to read, too.
Yes. It's one of my very favorite
things I love here. I would put it.
I'm gonna put a fifth on the list of things that I love to
do. Yeah.
Fifth. Yeah, yeah.
Well, what are the 123 and 4? Well, of course carrots come #1.
Of course. Singing is high, really high up
(43:54):
there. I really love to sing.
A whole lot, yeah. Yeah, I also love that I I love
grooming my ears. Yep, that's a pretty popular
one. And of course, hanging out with
my family. Now, I'm going to be clear,
these are not in any particular order, but I am pretty sure that
reading is in the top five. So maybe, Yeah, top five for
(44:15):
sure, Yes. You know what?
And I spent a lot of time with the library.
Yeah, you. Do.
Yeah, that's where I get a lot of my books.
Yeah. And I know the you know, the
library I could tell is very popular.
I'm not the only one. Yeah, you could really tell.
Do you know how you could tell? Yeah.
It's got a lot of letters. Yeah.
You. Mean you mean like like mailing
(44:38):
letter like mail letters that you mail or?
Yeah, that's right. Lots of letters.
Yeah. It's also very tall.
Did you know that? Yeah.
Yeah, it. Is library.
Yeah, it's got all those stories, Yeah.
Now I have to be careful though,when I go to the library because
sometimes I get a little bit excited and I check out too many
(45:01):
books, you know? But I have to tell myself, don't
overdo it. Don't overdo it.
Yeah. Because they might get overdue
books. What?
Yeah, that's right. Why?
It's almost like you rehearsed with me.
Now wait a minute. Do you have any favorite books?
(45:23):
Yes. What are they?
I, I don't know, like Goodnight Moon is probably one of my
favorite. That's a good one.
I also like blueberries for Sal.And I also like blueberries and
Sal, so I guess I would like blueberries for Sal.
Yeah, that's a good one for me. Of course, I love the runaway
(45:43):
Bunny. Naturally.
Peter Rabbit. No relation.
Oh, definitely Bunnicula. Yes, that's a good one.
Also the Bunny in the hat, Jamesand the giant carrot.
The very hungry Bunny pillar, The Giving Tree, the.
(46:03):
Giving tree. I like that one too.
Yeah, me too. That's right.
They originally were going to call it the Giving Bunny, but
then everybody got confused withSanta Claus.
What? No, it's the Giving Tree.
Everybody knows that it's such an uplifting story.
That's why people love it. Well, I'm glad that you like to
read and thank you so much for coming to share us.
(46:26):
Share that with us. Yeah, I hope you guys have a
great time and go beat the summer heat with a great book,
Mr. Popper's Bunnies. That's a good one.
Bye, bye bye Mr. Bunny. You had so many.
He had so many puns in there I could not keep.
Up He did have a lot of puns today.
(46:49):
This was a punny episode for Mr.Bunny, but you know, sometimes
Mr. Bunny just needs a laugh. Yes.
It's fun to have a laugh. It is fun.
Well, if you would enjoy some more laughter in your life,
perhaps you could join us at childoftheredwoods.com.
Not because we're particularly hilarious all the time, but we
have such fun with our communitymembers.
(47:11):
And community is a big part of what we do at Child of the
Redwoods. So if you want to know more
about our work, head over to childoftheredwoods.com and you
can learn all about our plans, all of which include community
and some. And sometimes Mr. Bunny doesn't
make behind the scenes appearances.
For those who are big fans, you.Know sometimes he does.
I don't know who's a big fan of Mr. Bunny, but I'm certain
(47:31):
somewhere out there there's a Mr. Bunny fan.
I know there is. We want to thank everybody who's
joined us live as well and for this really fun episode.
We have another one coming up onreading next week.
This is going to be on selectinggood literature, which I think
(47:52):
is going to be a nice follow on to this.
Maybe Mr. Bunny's list can help us.
Yes, we've got a lot of tips foryou from the Montessori
perspective. We.
Do that's right, And also a rapid perspective, apparently.
Apparently. All right, everybody, you guys
have a great day. We will see you in one week.
All right. Love you friends.
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