Just curious about reading....

[Earth Yarn]

How old did you start your LOs with learning their letters in prep for reading?

 

I have started my DS recently at 2.5 years old. We are on letter H today and he seems to be eating it up and really absorbing it all. We also use HOP along with out alphabet lapbooking.

 

My cousin taught her twin boys to read by age 3 so I know it is possible although most likely not the norm :)

 

So when do you all start, what dis you do/use and how did it go?

[yslek]

I started teaching B his letters around age 3 or so, I think. The others, a bit later. ;) D learned her letters last year (age 5) and is still working on learning to read. (This is her K year, and she'll turn 6 this week.) L (turns 4 at end of year) knows the sounds some of the letters make, but not because of any direct instruction. I probably won't start officially working with him until his K year. I think that's just part of the dynamic of oldest child v. younger one with many siblings. :D

[LadyAberlin]

Well ds 5 I knew his before 2 and ds 3 knew his by 2.5. Ds 5 though is reading, but is is slow going. I think there are some developmental things that have to happen and that is what has slowed him up. ds3 is still not speaking clearly yet and I feel that that will cause some problems if I were to try to teach reading at the moment. So I'm waiting for that to get better first.

[Shelly in the Country]

I didn't teach any of my children their letters. They all picked up their letters/sounds on their own. I'm guessing Sesame Street was responsible. My youngest doesn't know his letters yet.

 

My dd9 learned her letters at 18 months. She walked up to me one day with a magnetic "P" and said "Ook mama, pay-uh". You could've knocked me over with a feather. I began to quiz her with the other magnets and she knew most of them. She picked up their sounds around 3yo. I'm not sure when ds6 picked up his letters ( I was too busy with his little sister to pay attention.), but he was teaching himself to read and write words on his own before his 4th birthday, so I began phonics lessons. Dd3 has known her letter sounds for about 6 months now and I am just getting around to doing some phonics type stuff with her (I've been too busy with her little brother.). My littlest son looks at books, but does not show any signs of knowing his letters yet. I'm just happy he doesn't tear out the pages any more. That boy destroyed every pop-up book in our house.

[MIch elle]

took about 1.5 yrs to get to the 100th lesson - used Bob Books & others during breaks of using 100 EZ - used PP in grade 2 & 3

[Chris in VA]

Oldest learned his letters in K--but didn't read til 1st.

Second learned his in Prek

Third learned hers at 3 and read her first words right before she turned 4.

[Crimson Wife]

My oldest learned her letters & their sounds at around 18 mos, and was reading at 3 3/4. My 2nd learned his letters and their sounds at around 2 1/2. He turns 4 next month and isn't yet reading.

[ElizabethB]

Talking letter factory for both my children at around age two, they learned their letters and sounds in a month with a daily viewing.

 

My daughter learned to blend at 3 1/2. I started her because she was starting to guess at words from being read to and she was interested in learning. I used a variety of good phonics books 5 to 10 minutes on days she was interested. For K when she was 5, I started working daily with Webster's Speller working in all uppercase letters from a white board. (I would have started it earlier if I had found it, its 2 letter syllables are the perfect length for a young child to start learning to blend with.) We did 5 to 10 minutes a day from the Speller. By the end of K, she could read out of the KJV, it's very powerful!

 

My son didn't start to guess, he likes you to just talk about books or make up things, so he wasn't seeing and hearing the same words over and over. I started working with him when he was interested at age 4, after working with him off and on with spelling most days and blending occasionally, he finally learned to blend and read words a week or so ago at age 4 1/2. I've been working on words like in and on and at and it and up, next we'll learn be and me and hi and my and by and then I'll start the syllables from Webster's Speller and then work him through the speller on the white board as he wants to. When he is officially K age, I'll work with him daily for 5 to 10 minutes a day whether he's interested or not, until official K age he gets to choose to work or not during school time.

 

I use all uppercase for the first year, it prevents B/D confusion and is easier for me to write neatly.

 

Sidney Ledson teaches children as young as 2 to read, using phonics, a lot of games and uppercase:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Teach-Your-Child-Read-Minutes/dp/1412015545/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1254773928&sr=8-1

[ElizabethB]

ds3 is still not speaking clearly yet and I feel that that will cause some problems if I were to try to teach reading at the moment. So I'm waiting for that to get better first.

 

I found with my son that talking letter factory actually improved his speech!

 

(My daughter was speaking clearly at age 2, so we didn't notice any change.)

[Dinsfamily]

My oldest learned her letters & their sounds at around 18 mos, and was reading at 3 3/4. My 2nd learned his letters and their sounds at around 2 1/2. He turns 4 next month and isn't yet reading.

 

We're similar to this. My oldest learned his alphabet around 2 and letter sounds by 3. He started reading CVC words a little after 4. He's 5.5 and is doing reading well for his age, but not close to fluent yet.

 

My 3yo knew his alphabet by 18 months and all of his letter sounds by 26 months. I didn't explicitly teach him anything...he picked it up from his brother. He started reading CVC words right when he turned 3. He now knows about 35 phonograms and is already starting to apply them to reading words. I'm just letting him figure it out on his own.

 

I have no expectations for my third. I'll just let him go at his own pace until he's 5. Then we'll start SWR wherever he is.

[iteachmine]

Talking Letter Factory worked here too! It was a huge help. dd knew all her letters and sounds before age 3. She is now 5.4

[rockermom]

Ds learned his letter names/sounds at 18 mos (upper) (Letter Factory), lower case at about 22 mos (Starfall.com) and has recently started sounding out CVC words (*shrug* I wasn't expecting this). I don't know when I'll start "formal" instruction. I'm a bit confused about this myself. I've been holding off as his speech improves.

[Ellyndria]

Well, it wasn't intentional. I used to count to DS as a baby to calm him because he seemed fascinated by it. I also used to write capital letters, numbers, and shapes on his magnadoodle for him because I'm a terrible artist and that's all I could think of to draw on there. He also had a wooden alphabet puzzle, and of course alphabet board books.

 

So he could recognize and identify his first letter and number at 18 months (E and 3... those were his favorites). He recognized/counted all his numbers up to 20 by 19 months, and all uppercase letters by 22 months. A couple months after he turned 2 he recognized all his lowercase letters, from playing with some toy of his...I had only gone over them maybe twice on the magnadoodle.

 

He also played a game with us over and over (that HE made up) for a good part of the year that he was 2. He would play it with us in the car, while eating, etc. He would ask us, "What does ____ start with?" He would ask about a whole bunch of words... car, elephant, toy, etc. So we'd answer with what letter it started with. By doing this, he had somehow assimilated most of the sounds by the time he was 3 years old. He did have a couple of toys that said letter sounds too.

 

So we played around with learning to read at 3, but he wasn't really ready for it until he was almost 4.

[LadyAberlin]

I found with my son that talking letter factory actually improved his speech!

 

(My daughter was speaking clearly at age 2, so we didn't notice any change.)

 

 

Really? With my oldest he watched that all the time and that is how he learned his letters. My youngest has watched it as much because he usually watches what big brother wants to watch. I'll have to make a point of putting it in more.

[ElizabethB]

Really? With my oldest he watched that all the time and that is how he learned his letters. My youngest has watched it as much because he usually watches what big brother wants to watch. I'll have to make a point of putting it in more.

 

Yes, and if you wade through the 500+ reviews on Amazon, you'll see that a few other people have said the same thing, I wondered after noticing it with my son if anyone else had the same thing happen.

[knit247]

I haven't read the other responses, but both DDs knew their letters and the sounds they make at 3-1/4 (DD#1) and 2-3/4 (DD#2). I tried using LOTW with DD#1 and it worked to some extent, but it was the Leap Frog fridge magnets that taught both girls in no time! We also were given the Leap Frog Letter Factory DVD and both enjoyed that as well!

[LittleIzumi]

We didn't "teach" either of them letters. With dd1, we just read and read and sang the alphabet song and read ABC books, etc. Sometimes we pointed out specific letters in books or on posters. She knew her letters by 2 and was reading (slowly) at 3. Dd2, with the same atmosphere, did not pick up a single letter until she saw the Signing Time ABC Practice DVD, and then she learned all of her letters, upper and lower, in two weeks right before she turned two. Less than two months later, she is addicted to Starfall. I have Letter Factory on hold at the library but we haven't seen it yet.

[Caribbean Queen]

I have some refrigerator magnets and an alphabet puzzle somebody gave me and I let my children play on Starfall. I don't try to teach my 2 and 4 year olds letters. They know some of them. I plan to try to teach them letters at age 5 or so.

 

I like to wait until my children are mature enough to "do Preschool/Kindergarten" for only a few months and zoom onto first grade level, rather than start Pre-K/K early and stay in it for years.