Thinking ahead to next school year so I can make my purchases before the baby is born I'm planning on using Five In A Row for the spine of my curriculum and we'll take off on little "rabbit Trails" as the books inspire my children. I'll be using Math-U-See for math again this year. My only hang up is phonics...we've been quite hit and miss with this this year...nothing we've tried has worked in its entirety however my children do know the letter sounds, can read simple readers (slowly and by sounding out most words), they know vowels anc consonants...What should I do for first grade phonics instruction? I think I'm looking for something that will reinforce what they already know and encourage them to practice on the blending sounds like ch,sh, th, wh, ph and the like...any suggestions?
Phonics Pathways works well for some. If you are looking for something requiring a little bit ofwriting, Explode the Code, perhaps?
I used Bob Jones. However, a good spelling curriculum should also be teaching phonics rules to some extent. So, if you can get your hands on a good spelling curriculum, you'll have a good phonics start.
We 've been happy with Abeka readers and another from Sonlight, "I can read it". For fun we go online to starfall.com
OUr church school uses abeka and I had been given some materials that they had left over and my boys just didn't like it. I heard some of you use LLATL would I need the whole kit or just the teacher and student books? I mean the readers aren't really necessary as they know their letter sounds I'm really just needing something to encourage them to practice reading more and to help with the blending sounds.
So far we haven't done any formal phonics teaching except for one thing....my dd is super into the Backyardigans so I found this boxed set at the bookstore where is it 12 books and each book focuses on a particular phonetic sound(s) but to her its just a bunch of stories about her favorite characters. They have tons of other characters too. If they already know the basic sounds this could help reinforce that without being overly 'schoolish'....because who really thinks they are learning much from reading a Spongebob (or whatever) ??
We LOVE explode the code. I give DS a choice every day. Two pages of explode the code and read me a reader, or four pages of explode the code. He reads to me in either, so I figure he's getting reading in, AND he's working through the phonics rules. DS is six, we are almost finished with book 3. We started slowly with book one towards the end of kindy. He's always been stronger in math than language, but this program is helping him actually learn to read! I figure the series will take us through second grade and he'll have a solid foundation in phonics rules. We like them! Edie
