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Anyone go from Dancing Bears to High Noon?


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Even though we are ALL SET for this coming year (we're supposed to start MONDAY!), I have spent the entire day looking at High Noon samples...   :glare:

 

I *like* Dancing Bears -- specifically, I like that it brought DD beyond CVC words.  We are only a few lessons into DB B (I won't lie; it's been slow going).  That said, I was a little surprised to find that after taking 3 weeks off from reading practice (for vacation and, well... summer laziness) DD struggled to decode what I considered "mastered" words (words like "with" and "get" and "came").

 

So....  :001_unsure:  :crying:

 

Anyone have a positive experience switching from DB to HN (looking at the placement passages, she'd probably go in at the beginning of Level 1).  I'm feeling a bit let down -- as though we'd be starting all over at the beginning.  Again.

 

Anyone stick it out with Dancing Bears for the long haul and want to tell me it's worth it & it gets better?

Anyone want to tell me to jump ship while I can?   ;)

 

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I am going to hang in there until the end of Book C.  Bancing Bears is the only thing that has worked for DD and she does enjoy it.  There are times when I have to slow down and we might only do one or two pages at a time.   As far as the "mastered" words, I put the entire Dolch sight word list onto flash cards and we go over them once a week.  DD knows every word on the Dolch list so she knows not to sound them out.  We are about 3/4 of the way through Book B.  Hang in there

 

Susie

DD(9)

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So IIRC, you have not done evals to get specific results, right? I ask just because Dancing Bears is a morphemic approach that works for some dyslexics, but not all depending on their issues. Have you also done OG instruction or no? Most neuropsychs will recommend that you do both or at least that you try OG before going with a morphemic approach.

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So IIRC, you have not done evals to get specific results, right? I ask just because Dancing Bears is a morphemic approach that works for some dyslexics, but not all depending on their issues. Have you also done OG instruction or no? Most neuropsychs will recommend that you do both or at least that you try OG before going with a morphemic approach.

 

No, we haven't done any evals, though I am not opposed to them.  I just don't quite know where to start (and I don't think it's covered by our insurance.) 

 

No formal O-G instruction.  I did take DD through AAR1, but she made no progress at all during that level, so we moved to DB after that.  We have done all of DB A -- and DD progressed quite a bit.  We also did it alongside Recipe for Reading (which might be a O-G based program?).

 

I guess our 3-week break just caused a bunch of backsliding (more than I would've thought).  Makes me wonder now if DD has any memory issues, as it relates to reading.  (She does have some dyslexia indicators, as well as strong ADHD tendencies...)

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i cannot speak to DB. HN was the program that got my ds reading. We did not take breaks for the almost whole year that it took him to get to the point that he could read real books such as Kane Chronicles, which since he was older than your child was his interest level at that point--after which there have never been any significant breaks because he has some book or novel or other going nearly all the time.

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Thanks again for the feedback.

 

We have used I See Sam -- the books at the BRI 3 level were a godsend! (That hairy stage before my child could read long vowels but needed something *more* than "The fat cat sat." :D)  However, after that level they phase out the cute animal characters and oldest DD refused to have anything to do with them.  :huh:

 

I did end up purchasing the High Noon Reading Intervention set (level 1); we'll give it a go and see if it fits us better than DB.  If not, we'll just go back to DB.  

 

The only problem now is whether or not I should have ordered their spelling program.... (which looks like it'd reinforce the reading nicely...)

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