She does have a vision issue that is often associated with convergence insufficiency and other processing disorders. (She is awful at puzzles and I-Spy books.) I have often wondered if she is showing signs of this in her reading. One thing she does is mix the words "here" and "there" and "what" and "that" all the time. And, she cannot read italics very well. But, she is reading so far above her grade level that I think it might be remediating itself anyway.
ellenmope, the things you've listed above go a bit beyond what ultra mentioned, and are things we saw happening with both of our dds who had vision challenges (including convergence insufficiency). Our older dd had really severe vision challenges, and was reading behind grade level until we discovered the vision issue and went through vision therapy, but our younger dd had a milder vision challenge and she did well on comprehension with higher-level books because there was more text to put together to understand what was going on even if she missed a few words. However, reading was still difficult for her (even though she was reading ahead of grade level), not difficult to comprehend but difficult because she had to work harder than most of us do to read the words on the page, which did hold her back from moving ahead as quickly as she might have in reading.
I can't remember if your dd has been evaluated by a developmental optometrist or been through vision therapy, but if she hasn't, it's something you might want to consider (ellenmope, not ultra :)).
Best wishes,
polarbear
She started reading in her head at the beginning of the year and is mostly reading grade three or N-O-P some Q book (finished up Merlin Missions, the Littles, Cleary, Boxcar Children and other random chapter books.) She reads really fast in her head--like a speed reader with her little finger almost going entirerly down the page without going across. It is amazing. She reads nearly a book a night. Her comprehension is okay, best I can tell.
I think it is important to emphasize that every word counts. I tell DD this but I also have not given her any reading instruction since she was about 3. I have just been giving her the right level of book and letting her enjoy it--and things have worked themselves out. She probably wont have a challenging reading test (with really detailed comprehension questions) for a few years I imagine and that is fine, IMO. Hopefully her school will make her read aloud and she will learn to take pride in reading precisely.
Another thing she does is sound out a new word wrong and hold on to that pronunciation forever. This mostly happens with names.
