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Phonics Road vs. WWE, FLL and All About Spelling


warriormom
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Ok, I finally looked at Phonics Road to Writing and Reading. It is very appealing since it seems to give a strong foundation in the language arts. I am concerned it may be too rigid for a K-1st grader, or for me :)

 

For PR:

 

1. What should be my expectations going into Level 1?

2. Does the curriculum include readers, read-aloud material or suggested readings? Should I add additional reading material?

3. How long should I expect to work on this with my son each day? Is it complicated?

4. Once Level 4 is completed, what should be the expected outcome?

 

For All About Spelling Fans:

 

1. Do you think that AAS will give my child an adequate foundation?

2. Do I need to add FLL or WWE to this program to "round out the program"?

3. Can you suggest a good reading list for a K-1st grader?

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I can't speak to PR becuase I haven't used it, other to say it is a very strong program, you can't go wrong here philosophically. You might find one isn't a good style fit.

 

AAS will give an excellent foundation in spelling and phonics, but it doesn't include grammar and writing, so yes WWE and FLL would be good options. FLL tends to work best with auditory learners, so you might consider Growing With Grammar if you know your child is visual. Later I move to Junior Analytical Grammar and Classical Writing.

 

What reading level is the child at?

 

Heather

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For PR:

 

1. What should be my expectations going into Level 1?

 

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking. PR1 starts at the beginning with teaching phonogram sounds and proper handwriting. My third dd is in week 24 (out of 34) and is now reading very well. When we started she was able to sound out very simple CVC. I am quite impressed with her progress.

 

2. Does the curriculum include readers, read-aloud material or suggested readings? Should I add additional reading material?

 

All of the levels include reading material. I do, however, add additional books for literature, history, and science. Level 2 uses one book (Little House in the Big Woods) for the whole year because you learn various skills from real life literature.

 

3. How long should I expect to work on this with my son each day? Is it complicated?

 

I find it very simple to use. I love that PR covers all of our LA needs in one session between me and my child. I watch the DVDs on the week ends or in the evenings. That's the extent of the prep I do before lessons. With my 6yo (Level 1), we work for about 30 min. each day. With my 8yo (Level 2) it's probably more like 45 min.

 

4. Once Level 4 is completed, what should be the expected outcome?

 

A student with a very solid foundation in phonics and grammar.

 

For All About Spelling Fans:

 

1. Do you think that AAS will give my child an adequate foundation?

 

I've used AAS levels 1 - 5. It is a very good program, but I've switched all my kids to Phonics Road. It's just easier for me to have all our LA needs covered with one program and PR does that. :)

 

2. Do I need to add FLL or WWE to this program to "round out the program"?

 

Yes, you will need to add grammar and writing. FLL and WWE are what we used (among other things) before switching to PR. They are good options.

 

3. Can you suggest a good reading list for a K-1st grader?

 

You might look at Sonlight's lists (reader packages). That's what I do. :)

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My child is a visual learner and then secondary a kinesthetic learner. He learns well with songs (as I think most of us do :001_smile:) So which do you think would be a good pick?

 

 

 

:bigear:

WWE is visual, kinesthetic (writing) and auditory in the first two levels. It should work for most learning styles, maybe with a few modifications for kids with extremes.

 

FLL is primarily auditory. It worked fine for Pumpkin, my 2nd dd even through she is kinsthetic visual and it didn't work at all for, Honey Dew my 3rd dd who is the same, but obviously not very auditory at all. For ds, who is like my 3rd dd I am going to use Growing With Grammar. He likes workbooks anyway.

 

AAS and PR are both multi-sensory. To make a decision here I would go more with whether the child likes mastery with review, or more spiral learning with review.

 

All of us here are very concrete step by step learners. AAS covers one topic at a time to mastery then continues to review it as you move ahead. You start out with all the consonants, short vowels (though with phonogram cards you cover all the vowel sounds for a, e, i, o and u) and you cover CH, NG, TH, NK, CK...and I think that is it. You start with a limited amount and each levels adds to it one at a time.

 

Now I haven't used PR but it is based on Spalding and you usually cover all the phonograms and spelling rules from day 1, and the word lists have a combination of sounds and rules. In SWR (another Spalding off shoot) your third list is:

 

tan

can

so

no

pet

a

an

the

good

last

bag

beg

big

bog

bug

fish

odd

hill

hit

step

 

You have short vowels, long vowels, two letter vowels, doubling a letter, blends, open syllables, closes syllables, and vowel team syllables.

 

Overwhelming for my kids. I couldn't start them on SWR till they were 3rd or 4th grade and reading well.

 

The first list in AAS is all short a vowels words, then each of the other short vowels gets a list. One of the most complex lists is step 11 S, X and QU and this is the list:

 

as

has

is

his

box

six

mix

fox

quit

fix

 

 

Having the lists in nice neat packages does make them kinda easy to get right, but there is a lot of review scheduled and for review you shuffle the cards that come with the program and practice them in isolation.

 

If you have a child who can take information in randomly and put it in its proper place, then you should be fine with PR. The more concrete and sequential the child the harder PR will be for them and the easier AAS would then be. PR still make work for an older child who already has a foundation of phonics even through they are sequential thinkers because the sequential is already there, and it still also make work if you take it slowly because while they may struggle they probably will eventually start pulling the pieces together.

 

Make sense?

 

Heather

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My child is a visual learner and then secondary a kinesthetic learner. He learns well with songs (as I think most of us do :001_smile:) So which do you think would be a good pick?

 

:bigear:

 

PR teaches with songs. I wouldn't say it is hands-on, unless you count writing. You use a clipboard and a marker, then paper and pencil.

 

AAS uses tiles. When we used AAS we did our lessons on a whiteboard.

 

PR does teach the phonograms in the beginning, but not all of them are on the same day. You learn them over the first four weeks. :) AAS moves more slowly.

 

Like I said before, they are both solid programs. I prefer PR because I kill so many birds with one stone. :)

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PR teaches with songs. I use the AAS tiles to let my kiddo's build their spelling words to make it more of a hands-on activity. You can also use the student tool cards in PR 1, but the tiles are more colorful and I had them already.

 

I chose not to go the AAS, FLL, WWE route because that would mean I was juggling 3 different books for 3 different students. That's 9 every day!! Plus, I would have to add handwriting.

 

Yeah...PR does everything I want it to do in a much more streamlined fashion. Thank goodness!

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PR teaches with songs.

 

 

 

I didn't realize that. I have a huge philosophical problem with that. Singing is stored in a different part of the brain, and the only way to retrieve it is to sing it. I have been in many situations where I have chosen not to get the answer right instead of being caught singing a song to remember it.

 

Instead I work on direct memorization.

 

And yes, writing is considered hands on. Original O/G that the studies were first done that proved its effectiveness the only hands on it included was writing. The tiles, taps and movements added to current o/g programs (thinking Barton and Wilson here not AAS) just make them even stronger.

 

Heather

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PR does have a brief period where all of the phonograms are not introduced.

 

I love the fact that we have both the songs and the building code to jog our memory of the rules. Some of the rules we choose to simply remember the building code. I think that the building codes are much more effective for a visual/hands on learner than flashcards, because you work through the rule and examples of on a worksheet.

 

Marking the words with their rules has really helped too.

 

AAS 1 and 2 have some work with segmenting (you work out how many sounds, but not with phonograms yet, the steps are broken down more) and hands-on work with open and closed syllables that are very beneficial.

 

AAS was gruelling to us because of the mastery approach and the slow progress, but like Heather said, there are people who will benefit more from that. Phonics Road is working better for us due to the spiraling format. It also takes much less time for us to complete our LA work for the day.

 

Heather mentioned that she was able to start out with the AAS approach and then switch her kids to the PR approach later. I think that this can work very well. That is what we did, so we benefited from the extra work on segmenting and syllabication in AAS before switching to PR.

 

Now to address writing and grammar:

 

I love WWE. I love the fact that we are exposed to a variety of literature, and I really like the way it begins slowly with copywork.

 

The literature/writing portion of Phonics Road is good in that we cover many skills: reading, reading out loud, writing, literature are all covered and the writing takes a variety of formats with a lot of dictation.

 

Grammar: The Phonics Road breaks it down more. For example, when we learned pronouns in FLL we learned all of them. This is really not very beneficial because we rattle them all of in a line and don't notice the individual words: I me my mine you your yours he she it his hers its we us our ours they them their theirs. We could go over the song and then go back to the sentence and ask what pronoun would we use and DD still couldn't get it. With PR you first learn the subject and predicate of sentences, and the subject is a subject noun. Then you learn object noun. Then you learn adjectives. Then pronouns. Ah... now they make sense. We broke them down. We learned I, he, she, it, you, they, we as subject pronouns. These are words that replace a subject noun. Then there are object pronouns that replace an object noun, and we have a separate list for them. Then there are possessive pronouns with a separate list... we also write 2 sentences per day and diagram them. It isn't any harder than the FLL approach, because 2 sentences is not a lot of writing... but we learn so much more by diagramming them, rather than the oral approach of FLL. So I have to say that so far we are much happier with PR grammar.

 

HTH!

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I didn't realize that. I have a huge philosophical problem with that. Singing is stored in a different part of the brain, and the only way to retrieve it is to sing it. I have been in many situations where I have chosen not to get the answer right instead of being caught singing a song to remember it.

 

 

Heather,

I did SWR for a while and I know that she does not recommend using songs, or pictures for that matter, either.

 

I stuck with that for a long time, until ds #2 could not seem to remember the sounds of v, w, u, or sh. I finally, after almost a year of working on those, pulled out some flash cards that I had around here with pictures on them. In a couple of days, he could remember the sounds each made. I only used them for a week or two, then went back to the cards with no pictures. For a while, I could tell that he would stop to think of the picture that had been on the other card and then would think of the sound. But, after a bit, he just spouted off the sound. If I had never gotten those out just for those few phonograms, I don't think the poor kid would have ever remembered those few sounds.

 

Now, with PR, we use the songs. I, too, would not have considered these a few years ago. I even thought of doing the program by just saying the rules instead of singing them. But, the rules have really stuck using the songs. We don't sing them for every word and they can usually tell me what to do without singing the song. I think the difference is, if you just memorize a song (states and capitals, books of the Bible, etc), you have to sing it to recall the info. But, with PR, you learn the rule by singing a song, but then you apply it over and over and over until it becomes habit.

 

With AAS, my kids learned most of the rules, but the syllable rules they struggled with remembering after a few years of going over them. Now, they can recall the PR songs for those same rules and we have only been using PR for a short time. Putting them into practice should eventually become a habit and the songs will not always be needed. My sons have already lost the "need" for a few of the songs and just apply the rules.

 

I still look longingly at AAS. I liked it a lot. I could never find other LA programs to put with it that satisfied me though. I never tried WWE or FLL. What I can say is this, we are accelerating PR here and I am still getting all LA done in less time than it was taking to do AAS.

 

ETA: One more thing, you do not learn all of the phonograms up front in PR. They learn about 2/3 of them....don't want to go count them right now. Then they move into the spelling lists. Week 14 or 15 is spent learning the remaining ones.

Edited by mothergooseofthree
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I didn't realize that. I have a huge philosophical problem with that. Singing is stored in a different part of the brain, and the only way to retrieve it is to sing it. I have been in many situations where I have chosen not to get the answer right instead of being caught singing a song to remember it.

 

It hasn't been an issue for my kids at all. They practice the rules in addition to learning the songs and know exactly how to apply what they learned. When we spell a word that has an applicable rule tune, we talk about why it's spelled such-and-such a way. We sing the song, but my kids also talk about it using words. I find the approach to be very effective. :)

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It hasn't been an issue for my kids at all. They practice the rules in addition to learning the songs and know exactly how to apply what they learned. When we spell a word that has an applicable rule tune, we talk about why it's spelled such-and-such a way. We sing the song, but my kids also talk about it using words. I find the approach to be very effective. :)
We actually skip the songs about half the time, because remembering the building code is easier. I think that is probably the difference between an auditory and a visual learner. It is nice that PR addresses both.
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My child is a visual learner and then secondary a kinesthetic learner. He learns well with songs (as I think most of us do :001_smile:) So which do you think would be a good pick?

 

 

:bigear:

 

my vote for this would be PR. I have a child in both PR and AAS. PR is great with the rule tunes and markings of the sounds.

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Heather,

I did SWR for a while and I know that she does not recommend using songs, or pictures for that matter, either.

 

 

 

Barton uses some as well, and I think in limited use for a short period of time pictures are fine. Barton has the child make their own pictures and has them only reference it when they can't remember a sound not as part of drilling phonograms.

 

With my ds, who has recall problems, I have to use the Barton tapping for short vowels and I am just hoping that he transitions to knowing without the tapping. When we cover the phonograms he can say the sounds cold, and when he reads he remembers them right most of the time, but when he has to spell everything gets jumbled up.

 

But in regards to the singing I am talking about me in college and as an adult. It never became second nature and I couldn't do it without the song till I started teaching and using so much it did become 2nd nature. I don't want my kids to have to go through that sort of embarrassment, so I avoid it as much as I can. To me it isn't worth the risk if I can avoid it, but I don't have problems with people who choose otherwise. :D

 

Heather

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Heather, your O/G expertise is greatly appreciated! I am glad that we have a variety of approaches to choose from. Obviously we do have a variety of learners. :)

Awww, thanks! It is only because I have used so much stuff. I have my days where I wish I would find THE perfect program and it would be easy and smooth going, like teaching my oldest to read. It has been such a battle with each of the other kids, one that is harder with each child. Probably because I am so busy working with the older children I put of work till later... and it just takes time.

 

Ds really can read at grade level. But he also still has recall problems, phonological awareness problems and if I can ever get him to use TH instead of /t/, /d/ or /f/ in regular speech, I think I will faint. I can get him to say it correctly but I feel I spend all day correcting him and it never translates into using it right the first time. So I have a child who's last ETC worksheet had met as mat, hen as hin, leg as lag, net as nat and ten as tan. No Joke. But he read mushroom on dh's computer last night. :001_huh: I am starting to consider using Barton reading and just eliminate the spelling work from it to keep him reading at or above grade level. Then also work on spelling but do so very slowly with LiPS, Seeing Stars, Earobics and AAS. I really wish his spelling and reading levels weren't so wildly different.

 

Heather

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Awww, thanks! It is only because I have used so much stuff. I have my days where I wish I would find THE perfect program and it would be easy and smooth going, like teaching my oldest to read. It has been such a battle with each of the other kids, one that is harder with each child. Probably because I am so busy working with the older children I put of work till later... and it just takes time.

 

Ds really can read at grade level. But he also still has recall problems, phonological awareness problems and if I can ever get him to use TH instead of /t/, /d/ or /f/ in regular speech, I think I will faint. I can get him to say it correctly but I feel I spend all day correcting him and it never translates into using it right the first time.

Not the same really, since my son is not quite 4... but I do know what you mean here because he can say the sounds correctly if prompted like speech therapy, but never does when he is talking.

And then Emily could read way ahead grade level because she was good at filling in with context cues... but she couldn't sound out or pronounce the words.

 

They keep us guessing!

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Ok, I finally looked at Phonics Road to Writing and Reading. It is very appealing since it seems to give a strong foundation in the language arts. I am concerned it may be too rigid for a K-1st grader, or for me :) We have gotten to a place in PR where we can go through each topic area (Spelling, Grammar, Literature (writing, application of spelling and grammar, or literature) only 3x per week. I would never have been able to do that with other programs and get the rich content we'll cover in 4 Levels (not years) of PR. It is rich, but easy to use, it uses it's time and effort well as a whole and provides a nice amount of instruction and practice.

 

For PR:

 

1. What should be my expectations going into Level 1? They'll learn the initial phonemes, start spelling words by week 5. Kick in dictation sentences around week 14, illustrate some easy readers and begin a grammar study. Level 1 is just a stepping stone into the meat of level 2 and beyond.

2. Does the curriculum include readers, read-aloud material or suggested readings? Should I add additional reading material? The readers come about week 16 (maybe 17, I forget). Your dc will read and illustrate. By level 2, you pick up Little House in the Big Woods. Adding practice readers would be great, but consider the ability of the book Little House and how many books your child will be able to read by the end of level 1 --- out of Bob Books, iykwim :)

3. How long should I expect to work on this with my son each day? Is it complicated? Check out this blog post. You can count on 15-30 min a day for PR1 (that's all language arts!)

4. Once Level 4 is completed, what should be the expected outcome? end of high school level spelling, Latin word study, prepared for high school grammar, a solid foundation in language arts.

 

The All in One affords an opportunity for non-stop application. I find this to be the strength of the program and gives us something more than what we used to have. PR is great!

 

FWIW, there are spelling cards in PR1, so there is opportunity for hands on in a similar way to AAS tiles. You can magnetize them by putting magnetic strip on the back. You can also include finger tapping and pounding (as taught in other O/G methods). The application is easy and fits right into the program. And for younger learners, there are lots of ways to follow PR and put a lot of hands on into the program. Mrs. Beers makes a few suggestions in the beginning of PR1, but does not focus on them.

For All About Spelling Fans:

 

1. Do you think that AAS will give my child an adequate foundation?

2. Do I need to add FLL or WWE to this program to "round out the program"?

3. Can you suggest a good reading list for a K-1st grader?

 

PR teaches with songs. I wouldn't say it is hands-on, unless you count writing. You use a clipboard and a marker, then paper and pencil.

 

AAS uses tiles. When we used AAS we did our lessons on a whiteboard.

 

PR does teach the phonograms in the beginning, but not all of them are on the same day. You learn them over the first four weeks. :) AAS moves more slowly.

 

Like I said before, they are both solid programs. I prefer PR because I kill so many birds with one stone. :)

.
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FWIW, there are spelling cards in PR1, so there is opportunity for hands on in a similar way to AAS tiles. You can magnetize them by putting magnetic strip on the back. You can also include finger tapping and pounding (as taught in other O/G methods). The application is easy and fits right into the program. And for younger learners, there are lots of ways to follow PR and put a lot of hands on into the program. Mrs. Beers makes a few suggestions in the beginning of PR1, but does not focus on them.

 

Agreed. I am actually meshing Sonlight LA K, AAS, Seeing Stars, Barton Reading and Spelling, Spell to Write and Read.

 

I use SL for our sequence (one new letter a week), the phonogram, spelling rule and sound cards from AAS, Seeing Stars adds our visualization work, and from SWR I use the methods for covering phonograms, and the older girls use markups on their vocab words. Barton I use the taps and sweeps for sounding out. This was huge for ds, he is one that always needs to be fiddling with something, so his attention is quickly divided. These kept his focus on the assignment and he was blending within days of starting them. The tap/rhyme for short vowels is also helping. He does pretty good when reading them but has a hard time recalling the right one for spelling. The b/d/not confusion techniques rock! I use those for myself. The overall pace of Barton was too fast for ds. It started out with short a and about 6 consonants, but too quickly moved on to the next set. He need a lot more practice. I know there is additional practice online, but I was using a friends copy and didn't have access, plus I already own the SL LA and can make it work. The Barton spelling methods drove him to tears and he spells better if he doesn't use them.

 

I just take from each what works for us.

 

Heather

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Agreed. I am actually meshing Sonlight LA K, AAS, Seeing Stars, Barton Reading and Spelling, Spell to Write and Read.

 

I use SL for our sequence (one new letter a week), the phonogram, spelling rule and sound cards from AAS, Seeing Stars adds our visualization work, and from SWR I use the methods for covering phonograms, and the older girls use markups on their vocab words. Barton I use the taps and sweeps for sounding out. This was huge for ds, he is one that always needs to be fiddling with something, so his attention is quickly divided. These kept his focus on the assignment and he was blending within days of starting them. The tap/rhyme for short vowels is also helping. He does pretty good when reading them but has a hard time recalling the right one for spelling. The b/d/not confusion techniques rock! I use those for myself. The overall pace of Barton was too fast for ds. It started out with short a and about 6 consonants, but too quickly moved on to the next set. He need a lot more practice. I know there is additional practice online, but I was using a friends copy and didn't have access, plus I already own the SL LA and can make it work. The Barton spelling methods drove him to tears and he spells better if he doesn't use them.

 

I just take from each what works for us.

 

Heather

aahhhh the voice of wisdom at work! It's so nice to have the skill set to work like this. I feel like it took me forever to get to that sweet place where I can adjust whatever works. It's probably why I love the programs I love ~ they both offer me the platform I need, with the possibilities of teaching to a variety of styles and abilities.

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aahhhh the voice of wisdom at work! It's so nice to have the skill set to work like this. I feel like it took me forever to get to that sweet place where I can adjust whatever works. It's probably why I love the programs I love ~ they both offer me the platform I need, with the possibilities of teaching to a variety of styles and abilities.

 

 

Yes, I find that by using SWR, AAS, and now PR...I draw from each of them. While I wish I had started with PR and stuck with it from the beginning and know that my kids would have a strong LA background, I am also glad to have the tools in my teaching tool bag that I often pull out and use. I got those by trying different things. Just shows that God does have a plan for our journey.

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Yes, I find that by using SWR, AAS, and now PR...I draw from each of them. While I wish I had started with PR and stuck with it from the beginning and know that my kids would have a strong LA background, I am also glad to have the tools in my teaching tool bag that I often pull out and use. I got those by trying different things.

:iagree:

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  • 4 months later...
For All About Spelling Fans:

 

1. Do you think that AAS will give my child an adequate foundation?

In phonics, yes. In grammar and writing, no. AAS does have dictation, which is wonderful, especially since I know the dictation is limited to the spelling that has been studied. VERY helpful aspect of AAS.

2. Do I need to add FLL or WWE to this program to "round out the program"? I would add both for First Grade.

3. Can you suggest a good reading list for a K-1st grader?

Memoria Press has a great selection of books for K'ers and 1st graders.

 

 

I haven't used PR. For Kindergarten we used:

 

 

  • Phonics -- OPG (Lessons 101--231 [end])

  • Grammar -- FLL 1 (Lessons 11--122)

  • Copywork -- homemade copywork (using StartWrite--Bible verses, poems)

  • Narration -- WTM-style narrations using literature, science, Bible stories

  • Spelling -- homemade spelling lists (using StartWrite--lists available online)

 

I don't think I would have used WWE 1 or AAS with a K'er. For First Grade this year we are using:

 

 

  • Reading Program -- MP's Story Time/More Story Time Treasures (love it)

  • Grammar -- FLL 2

  • Copywork & Narration -- WWE 1 (we'll move up to WWE 2 soon)

  • Spelling -- AAS 2 & 3 (she breezed through Level 1 in a few weeks, but I'm glad we did it to get oriented to the AAS method)

 

AAS -- I have mixed feelings about it, sort of, some days. ;) The "bells and whistles" aspect annoys me, when I think we could simplify spelling and have fewer "parts." Then I realize that I can tailor it to fit our needs. My first grader does not always need to move tiles, etc., etc., but would rather write on paper. No harm in that. I never get out the cards now. We simply do not need them. The main components that we do use are the teacher manual (essential) and the tiles at times. Also, we have started to use the charts in Level 2. She loves the jail, and can't wait to put a word in there. LOL.

 

I do not begrudge the time we spend on spelling, though. In fact, there are times when I give it more time than usual, not to "get through it," but because I think my daughter is learning good stuff with this program. I see her use and apply what she learns to her free time writing. She even teaches her little sisters the principles she's learned in AAS. That's great for 6.5 years old. Taking the time in the primary years to lay this foundation will pay off in the long run. Good luck with your planning.

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