Reading Battles, Sharpie 'painting' & fun with friends :-)

We spent a fab day today with old friends from our toddler group days.  There was table football, tote bag painting, giant skittles, feeding chickens, catch, It, sword fights and indoor discos! Lovely to catch up and spend the day with 8 kids happily playing together :-)

Yesterday evening we got around to doing our glass 'painting' using our new Sharpie pens. It worked a treat! so I wanted to show the results :-)  We used some old Nutella's jars we had washed our and saved, and used them to make these cute little candle holders -

I'm really pleased with how they came out and how simple they were to do.

The other thing we've been doing is getting DS back in to reading.  He has become increasingly frustrated that he cannot yet 'free read' but at the same time is HUUUUUUGELY resistant to actually Doing Any Reading!  He will happily be read to, for hours but Oh My God, Do Not Ask Him To Read!!!  

When we first started out on our HE journey we had Reading Diaries and I made sure I read with DS daily (DD less so, although she kept her own diary updated as she is such an avid reader!).  The last few months I've backed off a bit as DS was becoming extremely agitated by it, so we took a break from that routine and did different types of learning for a while, and indirect reading.

Anyway, one of the causes of stress for DS is reading fiction - he gets extremely aggitate by 'plots' that are not real, viable or plausible and even more annoyed by pictures that are not 'factually accurate' (eg cartoon figures with over the top eyebrows, or figures with 4 fingers and no thumb).  His mind is racing so fast, taking in all the information at a relentless pace and it just exhausts him to filter through the 'unnecessary'. He then becomes too fatigued and distracted to actually read and comprehend.

One way I've reignited his interest is with some of the Usbourne Early Readers - they have some great versions of the Greek Myths, Legends and classics such as Sinbad the Sailor.  He likes these kind of stories, and they are written in a very accessible way with really great illustrations. 

And this week, I bought this lovely set of books from my other favourite, The Book People -

Fantastic bargain at £9.99 for the set of 10, and they are just the right level for him - 

 so we're back to set reading of 2 pages a day, which is a MAJOR achievement, especially as it is the school holidays!  

Little Miss DD is no such problem. When asked what she would like to do tomorrow, her first answer was 'Go to a library' ha ha ha :-)  Bless her x 

How do you motivate your little readers?  Or don't you have to?