Tuesday, March 15, 2011

What do you use to teach a child to read?

What do you use to teach reading to a 3 yr old? Ella can read a little – she has taught herself some sight words… and then other words that aren’t official “sight words,” but they are her favorite things. I don’t want her to just memorize words, though, and she is begging to be taught to read. I need a good phonics program. 

For Deuce, we tried 100 Easy Lessons at the age of 5. Cody was 2 at the time, and (just by being in the room while Deuce was working) caught on quickly – I had to send him out of the room during language arts, because he was reading and Deuce couldn’t, and it drove Deuce nuts. I then switched to Sonlight’s language arts (we were already using their Core K), and that didn’t work either. Eventually I stepped back and left Deuce alone, and he just taught himself – typical Deuce… too hardheaded to allow any help, LOL. (The week after he started reading, at age 6, he had to be tested for his IEP through the local school, and he was reading at a 4th grade level… late readers catch on VERY quickly, it seems).

Because of the ways that the boys learned, I am really not sure what to do for Ella. I have been looking at Sing, Spell, Read, and Write – anybody have any experience with that program? There’s also the Explode the Code series – I have heard lots of good things about that. I can tell that she will be easy to teach, with the right program – I just don’t want to waste money going from program to program. Opinions? Thoughts? Advice? Come on – give me your 2 cents, LOL. :-) 


2 comments:

  1. If she's going to be easy to teach, I would see if your library has Teaching a Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons and try it out with her. I used this with my youngest. I didn't do everything, I just told him what the new sound was and had him read through the section he needed to for the day. He made it through 50 lessons, switched to Dick and Jane readers (the Light Blue volume that Wal-mart sold at the time) and then was reading at about a 2nd Grade Level. He had just turned 5 when we completed this process.

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  2. My Father's World... oh my, Sam was reading before I knew it and I don't even know how it happened :)

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