mlktwins Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Hi all. I'm new here and have 4.5 year old twins (boys) that are currently enrolled in private pre-school. I am planning to homeschool K next year. I've been lurking for a little while and am excited to finally join and get rolling with my plans and schedule for August (when one of my boys wants to officially start home school). Anyway, I am looking for a phonics program. I have the OPGTR and like how the lessons are laid out. Can anyone tell me if the ETC program follows the order of the OPGTR so I can reinforce what they are learning as we go? One of my boys is a natural reader (self-taught himself at age 3) and his brother is just starting to read. They know their letter sounds, etc. but we haven't worked on a formal phonics program. I don't want them to miss something so I'm going to cover all the basics. Also, would you recommend the ETC workbooks or on-line program? They love workbooks, but are not the best writers at the moment. Thanks so much for your help! Mendy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
.... Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 I'm also looking out onto the Kindergarten frontier. I have a friend who swears by Explode the Code. I've also heard great things about Headsprout, Phonics Pathways and we used Hooked on Phonics. I am planning on using K12's Language Arts independently for K. Would like to also hear more ideas. :lurk5: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ktmo Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 I don't know how ETC ties in with OPTGR, but we are using it. There is a fair amount of writing on some of the pages. My DD is the same age as your boys, and we either skip the writing pages or I'll have her dictate to me. She will write some, but usually won't get through the whole page. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diaperjoys Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Be sure to check out McRuffy Phonics! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spy Car Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 I haven't used OPGTR, but I've been quite happy with ETC. We started with the primers in pre-school, and are now about to finish Book 3 now that my son is 5.5 and is in kindergarten. He is reading and spelling quite well. Still "learning" obviously, but I'm very pleased. While he may not "love" ETC I don't think there is a phonics program I've seen that *this* child would enjoy nearly as much as this one. We have never had him do the "writing" portions, and instead done it all aurally which has been fine thus far (as reading has outpaced writing developmentally, and I didn't want to introduce any "frustration" to the process). Bill Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jennefer@SSA Posted January 30, 2010 Share Posted January 30, 2010 I am using ETC for the second time around; now with ds5. We started with the Get Ready, Get Set and Go for the Code books and then moved right into Book 1. I am a huge ETC fan. It's inexpensive (compared to some other programs) and very easy to implement. You can progress slowly or quickly depending on your dc. Now that we are in Book 1 we do 4 pages a day. I use the Primary Phonics Readers (published by the same company who does ETC), Bob Books and the Nora Gaydos Now I'm Reading Readers. I waited to start a formal spelling program until my oldest ds finished all 8 ETC books and most of the half books and he is an excellent speller just on the merit of ETC. :) Welcome to the board! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.