I just began HS and DD is in K5. I am looking for any suggestions on the best method to teach phonics/reading. I am sure it depends on your child but I have looked and looked and am starting to get overwhelmed. We have started Explode the Code but I feel like maybe there are some other good resources available that some veteran homeschoolers can offer advice on. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated!
We love starfall. It's free, the kids have fun and it works great. My ds5 learned all his letter sounds from playing on there. We still do a formal phonics/reading curriculum (Rod and Staff) but starfall is a great suppliment.... and it's free!!!
I believe teaching phonics first was a bit pointless for some children, particularly those who are ready to learn to read. Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons is what we used. Children taught with this book will learn phonics, but in a way that they understand the purpose of phonics rather than just memorizing sounds.
I don't know - 100 easy lessons looks overly complicated to me. Given the choice, I pick a simple method every time. When I taught my DS to read we used Starfall, sight word flash cards starting with easy wrods like a, an, the, is, you get the picture. Then I added in a Dick and Jane book. He was reading in 9 days. We continued that schedule and added in copy work on the white board and My Father's World K. He finished that in like 4 months and we moved on to Pathway Readers first grade and he finished that one before the year ended as well. For phonics we used the Modern Curriculum Press "Plaid" Phonics book for first grade and that was actually a really good phonics book. Pathways is phonics based too. After that year we did Pathway Readers up until fourth grade, he skipped 5th and now we're reading liteature in 6th. Both my kids are excellent readers but hate to read. Go figure. His last test in 3rd grade put him at like an 8th grade reading level. Pathway readers was excellent for vocabulary and reading and comprehension and he really enjoyed the stories. I don' know why it isn't more popular...maybe I am the only one who adores that program?
We use Starfall and a Scholastic Phonics curriculum that a friend loaned me. They have a reader each week, listen to the story on tape, and play a game related to the sounds learned that week. So far it's been pretty good for us. We also throw in other early readers and some Dick and Jane and he likes reading those.
I didn't use any curriculum/program with my daughter. We just read everything we could get our hands on. Every so often she would ask for a workbook from Target. I treated it like a coloring book - she would get it out and do it on her own whenever she wanted. We had a fun day of labeling everything in the house (ie. door, window, sofa, table, etc.)
Starfall is good, but I personally like literactive.com a bit better. You have to register for it, but it is free, too. I tried 100 EZ lessons but my girls hated it. Glad I got it at the thrift store for $2! :lol: I was using Horizon's program, but it was moving way to fast (that is when I found the EZ book) So then I started to just make my own flashcards. Sort of like they do on Starfall. My girls would rotate, starfall, literactive, my flashcards and some of the Horizon's books. We switched this year (1st grade) to Abeka for reading/writing/language/spelling and it has just exploded for them! For a while I was wondering if I was getting anywhere with them. I think mixing up different ways to see and learn things can be good.
Thanks Mamakittycat! My daughter seems to do better mixing things up a bit too. I am going to check out literactive.com too! I have been looking at Abeka too.
I never used any kind of program and for us that worked great. I just read to my daughter A LOT. Probably an hour a day or more most days (that was before I had my second kid and now its a lot less!) And we have letters everywhere....foam letters for the bath tub, magnetic letters for the fridge, letters on our blocks etc...there's never any kind of formal instruction, just playing with the letters, building words while we're in the bathtub. I'll teach phonetic sounds when its fits in with what we're playing...we're very into rhyming at the moment. I also alternate the books I read...sometimes I'll pick a longer book more for listening but other times I'll pick a very simple book with just one or two words on a page. My dd is only 4 but she's been reading since she was 3 and actually reads indepently now. I think keeping it fun was key for us.
We've used a variety of things with ds. We have 100 Easy Lessons & Explode the Code. We also use Starfall & flashcards. He loved the Leap Frog DVDs (Talking Letter Factory, Talking Letter Factory 2 The Code Woed Caper, and the StoryBook one), but has outgrown those. We also watch stuff like Between the Lions & WordWorld. He chooses what he wants to use each day & how much of it he wants to do. That's why I have so much variety for him, so he can choose & doesn't get bored with doing the same thing everyday. We also read together a lot. Each book that we read he'll read part of. Sometimes, he chooses just a word (or a few words) he wants to read. Sometimes, we alternate paragraphs or pages. By allowing him the choice, he doesn't feel pushed into it, and he enjoys it more. A few weeks ago, ds & dd were upstairs reading & he read 2 whole books to her. So, what we're doing must work for him. Some of our flashcards are whole words, some are partial words that he has to combine to make a whole word. That way, they cover phonics & sight words.
I have one 5yo girl I do day care for. She seems to have not been read to or worked with until now with me. She didn't know her letters or numbers at all. Well, she could rattle some of them off, but had no clue what it meant. I ended up starting her with "Go For the Code", which is the 3-book series before "Explode the Code". She needs that extra practice! She recently took a huge jump in her understanding and recognition, which is exciting! We worked with flashcards I made and other little games and things. She just finished the first book, and I think will go through the next 2 much faster, now that she understand the concepts better! Her parents can't afford the A Beka program, otherwise we might be going with that, but I think this is a great series!
I just wanted to add that 100EZLessons always is strongly divided into love-it or hate-it categories when you read reviews. One of my close friends was in the hate-it category and her child was using a good phonics program (nearly $100) for several months. She learned all the sounds and her mother taught it as suggested, but the child could not decode the most simple words. She would make each sound of each letter, but could not put them together to form the word--after well over six months on phonics. After explaining to me what was going on, my friend finally bought my copy of 100EZLessons for $8 and her daughter began reading in three weeks; she changed her mind about it. Another church friend asked me about some of the difficulties her child is having in learning to read and I recommended this book, the same book the special education teacher at school recommended--to her surprise--and within just two weeks the teacher said she had already seen improvement in the child's reading. I mention these cases for those who might be having the same challenges. I admit 100EZLessons is not the best method for every child nor the favorite approach for every teaching parent, but some children need a purpose to learn the phonics or are motivated by actually reading. This is how my daughter learns although I did not realize that aspect of her learning style until later on. To me, it just seemed to a natural approach to learning to read. By the way, my daughter does know phonetics very well and how they apply in spelling rules, for instance, she not only recognizes the letters by sound, but can explain the difference between consonant digraphs and blends. My daughter played at starfall.com, but by the time I was aware of it, she was beyond it for the most part. I might have used it more, but there just was no need. Besides, I was trying to keep her focus on actual books rather than technology at the time.
I used Phonics Pathways with my daughters. The book was very inexpensive and super easy to use. My daughter learned to read in just a couple weeks using it. We also love starfall. Amy
That's why I'm glad there's so much available these days! 100 Easy Lessons didn't click with us, and other things did. I was a little bummed, since it was cheap, but you have to go with what works. The "Explode the Code" primer series has been really good for dcg!
Wow.. wanted to threadjack and thank MamaKitty for the literactive link... that is really a good site! Just signed up so we can use that one too!
