<p>Second, many kids in our magnet school are Asian from poor immigrant families. Obviously, kids can be academically advanced even when English is their second language.</p>
<p>We were taught to read using the Dick and Jane books. When I look back on it, I think that I probably could read already. When the teacher presented the first lesson with the Big Book up front, it was as if someone handed me a key and voila, there it was. At least, that is my recollection.</p>
<p>I “taught” S to read in preschool. (He missed the state cutoff by 6 weeks, and so had to spend an extra year in pre-K.) I had observed that he was probably ready to read, just as I had been, and asked him if he wanted to learn. He said “You’re not supposed to learn to read until you’re 6,” so I dropped the subject. A few weeks later, he decided that he wanted to learn to read so that he could play Treasure Mountain by himself on the computer. I got the first set of the Bob books and a how-to book called I Can Read, that explained different decoding strategies to the kid and said it was fine to use any or all of them. We went through the little set of 12 or so Bob pamphlets, and he started to read simple books with me and alone. I gradually gave him more and more complex books, and he picked out his own.</p>
<p>I did still read to him a lot. At some point in K I got the first book in the Chronicles of Prydain for him. He said that he wasn’t supposed to be able to read chapter books yet. (Where he got this stuff, I don’t know. Probably from the obnoxious older brother of his best friend.) I suggested that I would read the first chapter to him, then he could read the second chapter to me, and so forth. When he got to the end of his first chapter, he kindly informed me that he would really rather continue reading it himself. 
That was it.</p>
<p>BTW, we weren’t taught with phonics.</p>