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DS8 is MATH. Recently he decided he didn't have to really work on reading b/c he "wasn't good"... after discussion he changed it to "not as good as I am in math".

I basically appropriately without further dicussion said BS.

So, he doesn't really "like" to read, but he does. We focus on good fit books, interesting topics and he enjoys it but for only SHORT periods of time.

We work on simply 20 min. a day with some discussion of the text for a few minutes. Some days go better than others...

I am wondering if anyone has some other suggestions for making this more enjoyable, how to motivate and even tap into some enthusiasm.

I'd like his scores verbally to reflect his ability but he seems to have given up in the name of MATH.

?!?!??!

Try some mathy books.. Sir Cumference books and Life of Fred might be a start.

If he enjoys reading, but only for short periods of time, he might have tracking or convergence problems, scotopic sensitivity, or some other visual processing issue that makes it difficult, tiring, or physically uncomfortable to read for long periods of time. A standard vision screening won't necessarily pick up on these things. It's worth checking out.

NO. none of that, I am sure.

I think it's more appropriately diagnosed as LAZY.

Try fiction books like Percy Jackson series or Harry Potter. My DDs will read fiction books anytime compared with nonfiction books. My DD7 finished those before her 7th Birthday and she would read 3-4 hours a day. All I had to do was buy the books. I had to ask them not to read during meals and while using the bathroom. I have to bribe them if I want them to read nonfiction books.

If your school has AR (accelerated reading) program, they can earn points by answering the questions (sort of like comprehension test). They have AR points for almost all fiction books. We reward them for their AR points.

The only downside is that they have not found any books they enjoy as much after HP.

Sir cumference series is good for Mathy kids (probably your DS already read those). Life of Fred series will be good but those are for Math purposes and not reading.

Murderous Math, Cat in Numberland, The Number Devil there are bunches-
http://hoagiesgifted.org/mathematics.htm

@Peter- my son read Percy Jackson, followed by the two Kane Chronicles books. He then jumped to 39 Clues (many also by Rick Riordan). He's now happily into The Alchemyst. It was recommended by the Barnes and Noble guy as 39 Clues meets Harry Potter. So far, he's dead on! There are many of those as well in the series.

My DDs read kane chronicles and Lost Heroes. They complained that Rick Roprdan should have finsihed one series before starting another one. They did not like 39 clues (not yet anyway) and they kept on re-reading HP over and over...

Hopefully, we can wean them from HP (after the movie) and introduce other books like ranger apparentice and alchemyst, ...

My son has loved the Magic Treehouse series. I think reading studies have shown that just having the kids reading is good- even if it seems "dumb," like a biography of Justin Bieber or whatever.

Laura,

It's great that you have already had him tested to rule those things out. So many times, these sorts of things go undiagnosed for years because often there are no obvious signs or symptoms other than disliking reading, and parents and doctors don't think to check.

Kudos for checking it out early.

Maybe if he is really seriously mathy some history of math or science. Like Joy Hakim's The Story of Science: Aristotle Leads the Way.

And for reluctant readers if you read a page and then he reads a page might work. Or each of you reading a section on your own and holding a discussion afterward (with you showing a lot of enthusiasm). Reading is a lot of fun if you can share your feelings about what you have read with someone else.

well, thank you all for the ideas & thoughts!

I have not had him tested, because when I bribe him, he reads just fine! And during our 20 min. he reads like a river, sounds out hard words, ask what more challenging themes mean... just a normal little reader.

I am looking for creative ways to spark his ENTHUSIASM... if it can be done. I believe he could be doing much better given the desire to practice, there's just little motivation.

He began reading Charlie Bones and was very enthusiastic, but the book was just out of his reach. He was very committed to read these harder books for himself but it became clear they weren't a good fit.

After that, we moved down to the Dragon in the Sock Drawer. He loves the adventure, science fiction type books/stories - but is LAZY in reading them.

He'd rather be playing with his friends, engaged in sport, doing math or origami... drawing... pretty much anything other than actually reading the story. Although, will do so on long car trips (which are infrequent as we live in a small town).

I tried getting illustrated books at his lexile level to see if maybe a break from chapter books would do the trick... a little but not to what I had hoped.

I guess I'd like to see him just work to his potential but his lack of desire prevents this, I think.

For math, he'll lay in bed before he goes to sleep and jump up and request to be taught this, that & the other thing and then practices it until mastery (which isn't long).

How do I get anywhere close to this for reading?

You may not ever get the reading to match the math, if the passion is not there. Or he may just be learning in spurts, and some day he'll switch his interests. I don't think there's any one magic trick to make your kid into someone who enjoys reading. And sometimes it just takes time. Our DS7 will read in the car for long trips (and it turned out to be lucky that we switched to a school that's a 45 minute ride each way, so he'll read). Otherwise, there are many other things he'd rather be doing. He will also spend a lot of time reading wiki entries about his favorite pasttime, Minecraft. So he is getting reading in, just not high quality literature! We encourage him by reading a lot ourselves, getting lots of different books from the library we think he'll like. He's enjoyed the Life of Fred series very much (which is math). The Penrose the Mathematical Cat series is fun too.

thanks... we were just looking on amazon - he wanted origami. tunnel vision.

thanks for all the thoughts. I ordered some sir cumference books... and 2 origami's with the deal that more reading comes with more origami!!!

We shall see... we shall see.

My ds9 also doesn't like to read all that much - which is weird, because my three others do. His brother and one sister just read constantly. Ds9 is more active and "hands on" and he loves math and is very good at it.
We've tried for years to get him to read and it IS better, but he may never love it as much as the others. Even math, for him,is best done while moving
One thing that has really helped is good magazines. I let him read at breakfast and lunch (if he's home) and I bring them in waiting rooms and the like. Look at Carus publishing - ds loves Muse, Odyssey, Calliope... they're challenging, interesting and short.
He also enjoys books-on-CD. I get them from the library regularly and we listen whenever we go somewhere. He does like when others read - he came home from school on the last day and immediately asked me to go to the library to get the book they'd been reading aloud but hadn't finished. Sometimes with kids like this I think you need to "spark" their interest a bit (whereas the others will read a label, a loose piece of paper, a boring article, anything!).
Oh, and as others have said, he really did like the LOF. Now, I'll admit, he's a bit lazy too, and he wasn't working out the problems, but he did read it for hours the first day the new one came (not new in the series, just new for us).
Another thing I do is get tons of books at the library and leave them everywhere. I mean, I'll get 20 or 30 that I think he might like, and if he enjoys two or three, I'm happy (on his own, he struggles to pick out one or two).
I also recommend comics if he enjoys them. Ds9 loves Calvin and Hobbes, Zits, all kinds of things. My older kids have old books and he can read them for hours. I truly think Calvin and Hobbes has taught him vocabulary and he's developed a wicked sense of humor.
Keep trying. I don't think that there's a magic bullet, but by my constant "throwing" things, a few have stuck and he's now occasionally reading even when it's not the forced half an hour before bedtime!

I too have about 30 books checked out at once. I always have fines as a result of it!!

I am going to invest in LOF books, can you recommend a good one to start?

He has those Times magazines for kids and on occassion will want a Highlights, but he likes the facts of Times more, I think. I think leaving them in the car with some other books will be my next step.

I think Calivn & Hobbs is a GREAT idea... it's our sense of humor too and he'll really appreciate the illustrations and cheeky-ness of what they offer.

So funny, after all these posts today, we briefly talked about moving away from the "20 min." and reading to enjoy and just spending more time doing it.

He read Judy Moody for 30 min. and just now wanted extra reading time before bed!?!?

This is lower than the range his teacher recommended but at this point, WHO CARES, seems like a great start!

Will go to library tomorrow for C&H... thanks again!

He loved Calivn & Hobbes! When I let him wander around our dinky bookstore today, he was searching for origami books and how to make bracelet books.... the world's best jokes books... I'm willing to let this jump start the enthusiasm.

THANK YOU EVERYONE!

We have the same problem! DS8 is all math, and says he's "not a fiction kind of guy." He likes to read math textbooks, and textbooks of any kind (just renewed a college physics book at the library, which he has to have because it's two editions newer than the identical one that we have at home), dictionaries, books on paper airplanes and origami and magic tricks and science experiments. He also (don't tell him comics are fiction) loves Calvin & Hobbes, Garfield, Heathcliff, MAD Magazine books like Spy vs Spy, and those sorts of things. That's what he's doing this summer, so far.

Luckily, the school has an excellent summer reading program in the interests of cutting down on summer regression, so he feels fairly motivated to try for the prizes. Getting him to write it all down for the program is another thing, however.

You might intise him to read more with his interests. Some suggestions are books on magic tricks, Legos, Yo Yo tricks, castels or Math.

Mental magic : surefire tricks to amaze your friends / by Martin Gardner ; illustrated by Jeff Sinclair. Gardner, Martin, 1914-

Secrets of mental math : the mathemagician's guide to lightning calculation and amazing math tricks / Arthur Benjamin and Michael Shermer.

The fractions book is the first in the series that is available now. I understand the story line starts there, so until the earlier elem books come out in a month, fractions would be the best starting point for LOF. We do like Ray at Horrible Books - free shipping and awesome service.

We have had so much success in the past few days! I moved away from the time and just said, "well, we're going to read..."

He read Judy Moody and has been flipping through Calvin & Hobbes and other magazines.

I checked out a card tricks book - after 35 min. or so of reading, he turned to this and mastered his first card trick.

Makes me wonder why I didn't think of this earlier?!?

Waiting for the Sir Cumference books, LOF will be next and mental magic & secrerts of mental math.

Thanks so much for all the great recommendations!

It is the funniest thing to me that some of you posted that your kids WONT move on from Harry Potter! My DD9 began HP in second grade (I made her wait) and the I made her wait to finish the last 3 books as they were a bit mature. But she finished at the beginning of 3rd and now, at the end of third she is having trouble getting into more books. She has read several 200 - 300 page books, even some young adult fiction, but she just can't seem to pick up another fantasy series. She asked me to pick a book for her the other night and she pointed to a big thick fantasy one - book one of the series..(I forget which one) and said, "just don't pick that one until after I've seen all the HP movies!" I haven't let her see all the movies. I have heard they are quite dark...but ya know what! She is going to see them all and then she is going to get to go see 8 in a few days at the theater...she has seen NONE at the theater! So, I'm giving in and maybe she will move on from here!
As for getting you children to LIKE to read! My advice is to let them read whatever they want.
I read to my 5 year old. I read to her what I want to read to her. And she reads to me what I want her to read to me...but all her independent reading is chosen by HER. She has been reading the Junie B. Jones books for almost a year. over and over and over. And I decided that I was going to let her. Because she loves them. Loving to read what you are reading is so much more important that "what you are reading" at young ages!