Insititute of Reading Develoopment Summer Course - Feedback Please

I don't know anything about this organization.

If you are concerned about your child's reading skills, I would discuss this with his/her teacher and come up with a list of things to work on this spring and possibly a list of things to work on over the summer.

If your child is significantly behind, then I would discuss the possibility of summer school or summer enrichment or some other program in your area.

The summer reading programs I've heard about market themselves as programs to help your child progress faster than his/her peers. I'm not convinced that's in my child's best interest. It's not that I don't want my child to be a good reader. I do highly value education. I'm just not sure it's in his best interest to be ahead of his peers. I think he should be learning WITH his peers.

My daughter attended one when she was turning 4 (the entering K) because she was ready for it but wasn't ready to sit still. They actually should have not let me enroll her as she was not old enough (and yes I told them her age). They gave me a credit for another session and because it was about to expire, we enrolled her this summer...entering 1st grade. At the first session, they pulled us aside and moved her to the entering 2nd grade class because she was reading at a 2nd grade level already. She struggled a bit with the writing component as she was only entering 1st grade.

It's a nice program though. They give you a reading list based on your child's level but we did not purchase them. We did use it to guide some age/level appropriate selections at the library.

I am not familiar with that program. My questions would be.... How many students are in the class? For that price, it should only be 1-3 students per class.

I am all for enrichment programs and we did some through our school system in the summers when daughter was younger. The school programs was just 4 weeks of 8am-noon in a class where your child might need enrichment for reading, math, writing, comprehension and also had fun classes incorporated such as cooking, drama, art, computer.

We also had private tutoring which involved reading, comprehension and writing. At the time, we paid $35 an hour for private one on one tutoring. The going rate in my area now is $50 an hour.

If you pay that much, you should have a lot of one on one interaction with the instructor, plus I would want to review the curriculum and know what to expect as far as improvement.

$30 an hour sounds pretty pricy... if you are concerned about your child's reading, I would think you could find a private tutor for less than that.... although, prices in California may be at that point.

I wouldn't mind tutoring for that price!

Check out the complaints against them at the Better Business Bureau before you sign up with them.

http://www.bbb.org/greater-san-francisco/business-reviews...

My best friend hired a public school reading specialist to work with her son over the summer. He improved 3 grade levels in fluency and 2 in comprehension.