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Wondering if I can do it- HSing - Reading Curriculum


vivaciousbee
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I need help and advice! I have wanted to HS for a long time, before I even had kids. My DD is 4.5 and is scheduled to start K in the Fall. She is very smart and has been attending preschool. My plan was to start Sonlight curriculum K in the fall. She has an amazing attention span for her age and all of her preschool teachers have been amazed at her.

 

I really wanted to teach her to read prior to starting K. She knows all her letters and the sounds they make and she can read phonetic words if she tries.. So since she is smart enough and has started to indicate that she wants to learn to read I have picked up the book the Teach your child to read in 100 Easy Lessons. The first few lessons went fine, but now she complains and drags her feet and is very uncooperative. We are only on lesson 8. These lessons are so short and easy and if I can't get her to do these simple lessons how can I possibly HS her?

 

My daughter is stubborn and if she doesn't want to do something and it isn't her idea then it becomes a fight... I don't want to fight her on doing school every day. So maybe I just need to give up my HS dream.

Then I think maybe I am pushing her too early and she is just too young...but then I think she is just being lazy .. and how long do you use that excuse that she is too young.

And I think maybe I just need to do a different reading program instead of this book.

 

But then I go back to how easy these lessons are and how I can't get her to focus for 5 mins on it..

 

So what do I do.. Do I continue to encourage her to do this lesson book and try and get through it? Do I try a different type of reading curriculum? Do I wait until she is older to do reading?

 

Sorry about the rambling message.. I am frustrated at the moment and really want the HSing to work but having doubts that I can get my daughter to comply!

 

Thank you!!

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Just because one particular resource doesn't work for your child doesn't mean that no resource will. My kids haven't taken well at all to 100 Easy Lessons, they've fought and dragged their feet. We have definitely found other things that worked when this didn't.

Edited by lamamaloca
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She's really young. It could be she's just not quite ready for that much structured time doing curriculum type stuff yet. Five minutes of focus on something like that sounds actually just fine for that age to me. In a few months, it could be completely different. Or you could try a different curriculum. I would also just try playing games with her. And even if she expressed an interest in reading, I wouldn't push it yet.

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I would wait. It sounds like this isn't working for her right now, and there is no need to push it at such a young age. She sounds like the kind of kid who will learn to read on her own without a lot of phonics instruction. At the very least, I would put the lesson book away for another six months and then give it another go.

 

Jessica

mom of 5yo and 3yo, preparing to homeschool

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Don't let these stumbles erode your confidence in homeschooling. Perhaps instead of using the material you're currently using, you could purchase some magnetic letters and get a cookie sheet and just sit with her as you put simple three-letter, short vowel words together. (This Montessori site has some free printables that could be helpful. This pdf has the pink series--three-letter, short vowel words. You can use these pictures with the words you form and later let her match the words with the pictures.) Sound out each letter individually, push them together to form the word and blend. This is a developmental hurdle and she will jump it when she's ready. Until then, take a gentle, fun approach. We did not do SL K, but knowing SL I'm sure there are plenty of great books that you'll be reading to her. This will help in her reading development as well.

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:grouphug:

 

Games are a much better fit for that age.

 

Here is an online program with a bunch of games:

 

http://www.catphonics.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/contents.htm

 

And, my phonics concentration game is fun:

 

http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Phonics/concentrationgam.html

 

Finally, a bit every day is all you need. Here is what I am doing with my son. I do it from a white board, it makes it a lot more fun. It shows how much you can get through in just 5 to 10 minutes a day:

 

http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=208407

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i would abbreviate the lessons and try some other resources. i just started this book with ds and i am rushing to get through the first chunk of the book because i know my daughter didn't become engaged with the book until she was reading the actual stories. and having another resource that you can switch it out with is nice so you can give your child options. i had a basket of readers for dd. ds likes dick and jane so we may do more with those.

 

i won't push if i think it is too hard for them or the format or length of the lesson is not matched well for their maturity, but "i would rather be playing" doesn't hold much weight with me. i don't let them out of picking up their toys or sitting down to dinner or taking a bath with that excuse, learning to read falls into the same category for me. use whatever motivator you would use if she refused to do these tasks. ideally they would love to learn to read, but even if they don't i can give them the 100% gaurantee that they will like being able to read once they learn how.

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ITA with the p.p. who said not to judge based on one particular resource. Many dc don't like 100 EZ Lessons, by the way. :)

 

I'd put it away, and I wouldn't replace it with anything else. She's very young, even though she seems to show an interest in reading. You'd be better off reading good books to her, the way mothers have been reading books to their children for generations. :)

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I would wait. It sounds like this isn't working for her right now, and there is no need to push it at such a young age. She sounds like the kind of kid who will learn to read on her own without a lot of phonics instruction. At the very least, I would put the lesson book away for another six months and then give it another go.

 

Jessica

mom of 5yo and 3yo, preparing to homeschool

 

:iagree: My daughter said she wanted to read when she was an older 4 year old, so I bought Reading Made Easy. We got through a few lessons and my daughter started getting so upset whenever it was time to do reading. I decided it wasn't worth the battle. Put the book up, took it down about 6-9 months later, and she was ready to read. Sometimes they want to do something that they just aren't quite ready for!

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She is young and the lessons need to be very short and fun. She may need a different approach or just some time. You could either take a break or you could try "The Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading" by SWB many moms in our church have reported was a wonderful resource for youngsters that were quite young and yet ready to work on phonics.

 

Faith

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Thank you all for the encouragement and advice. A lot of this is fear that HSing isn't going to work. My mantra when I started the book was.. "If I can teach her to read, then I can manage to HS her." But we are already not doing well.. I don't want to spend lots of money on figuring out what curriculum works and what doesn't. I just want it to work! :)

 

I will have to learn patience even more. Perhaps putting it aside and doing more fun things would be best for now. I appreciate all the help and links. We will try a different approach and see how it goes.

 

I also fear about what I am letting her get away with... is she being lazy and disobedient or is she really not ready... I have a hard time telling the difference. I know she can do it if she would just try.

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She sounds like my oldest at 4. When I tried to teach him to read, he resisted big time. I backed off completely and just read him good books and let him play starfall.com. At 4.5 he picked up a book and read it to me, and it was a 60 page Dr. Seuss book! He just took off when I stopped trying to teach him. He needed to be unschooled at that age.

 

The next year he went to K (reading at grade level 2.5 at the beginning of the year), and he did fine being taught formally. I am homeschooling him now in first grade, and things are so much better! It's amazing what a difference a year or two can make!

 

So don't let the behavior of a 4 year old tear down your confidence. She just isn't ready for formal school yet. Let her play starfall.com and other reading games, read to her a LOT, and relax. :)

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Try other methods as other posters have suggested...I wouldn't let this make or break your decision to homeschool.

 

My own experience so far was with an early reader...I read to her from birth and she picked it up with very gentle guidance when she was 3.5. She was reading Magic Tree House books, science and nature books that she was really interested in at the time, American Girl, etc when she was 4 and I was reading to her books that she wouldn't be able to understand much on her own. We still work that way for the most part...I'll have her read books at her level or just above and I will read ones that are above or ones with lots to digest. All kids are different and learn in different ways.

 

If she wouldn't have picked it up by K with just reading and informal phonics-by-mom then I would start short lessons...something fun. Don't feel pressured by what you think she could achieve if she just started sooner/tried harder/etc. I did this in the math arena and it took us some time before that wasn't such a frustrating subject for us both! She's on track with kids her age but I had expected more. She wasn't ready for the abstract-logical thinking that I figured came naturally :tongue_smilie: Most children invariably catch up in a short time...my early reader is still quite ahead as compared to the 'average' child whomever that is, but I know she has not advanced much in the past year. I do hope however that since it was fun for her when she was younger that she'll retain good memories of reading on her own and together that will foster a lifelong love of books. I plan to go the same route with the next...again feeling that we'll do nothing formal or forced before K and even then it will be gentle and fun- more child-led. Not optional, however, will be story time by mom :)

 

I'm sure you'll have lots of great advice from other moms here...cut yourself some slack and foster the love of learning and the love of books without focusing so much on skills acquired at this young, tender and fleeting age!

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She is young and the lessons need to be very short and fun. She may need a different approach or just some time. You could either take a break or you could try "The Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading" by SWB many moms in our church have reported was a wonderful resource for youngsters that were quite young and yet ready to work on phonics.

 

Faith

:iagree:I use OPG and LOVE it. It is easy to implement, logical in progression, and the lessons only take between 5 and 10 minutes. I plan to start my 3rd son with it sometime this summer right before he turns 4; he is ready now, but I think 3.5 is just too young. :001_smile: Can't say enough good things about it, especially compared to 100EZ (which I tried) and even Phonics Pathways (which SWB recommended in the early versions of TWTM). HTH!

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I also fear about what I am letting her get away with... is she being lazy and disobedient or is she really not ready... I have a hard time telling the difference. I know she can do it if she would just try.

 

Please don't say that about your four-year-old. I know it's hard to see when they're your first, but 4.5 is so, so, so, so, so, so, so young. You don't know that she could do it if she would just try. You just think she could do it. You don't know that. It's easy as the parent of a young child to be convinced that they're highly intelligent and therefore everything should come easily to them, so if something doesn't, they're being lazy. It's easy to believe a child is capable of more than they actually are when it's your child and you're convinced of their intelligence. Been there, done that.

 

My 6.5yo is verbally advanced and very intelligent. She's always been verbally advanced. Everyone's always commented on how smart she is, blah, blah, blah. But you know what? She's still learning to read, and we've been working on it for almost 2 years now. She can read easy chapter books (first grade level) but that's it. This is despite being verbally advanced (and this isn't just my opinion - her therapist recommended testing for giftedness). Reading just has not come easily to her.

 

If you want to home school, you will have to accept the fact that you are going to have curriculum choices that don't work. It happens to everyone sooner or later. You will have to ditch things that don't work sometimes and spend more money on something else. That's the way it goes. It doesn't mean your child is lazy or stubborn; it means that program didn't work for them. That's all. And sometimes, no program will work because they aren't developmentally ready yet. Nothing you can do about that but wait.

 

If I were you I'd try something else for now. If that doesn't work, put it all aside for a few months and then try again, but whatever you do, don't decide a 4yo child is lazy, stubborn, or disobedient just because they aren't ready to read yet. :grouphug:

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Please don't say that about your four-year-old. I know it's hard to see when they're your first, but 4.5 is so, so, so, so, so, so, so young. You don't know that she could do it if she would just try. You just think she could do it. You don't know that. It's easy as the parent of a young child to be convinced that they're highly intelligent and therefore everything should come easily to them, so if something doesn't, they're being lazy. It's easy to believe a child is capable of more than they actually are when it's your child and you're convinced of their intelligence. Been there, done that.

 

My 6.5yo is verbally advanced and very intelligent. She's always been verbally advanced. Everyone's always commented on how smart she is, blah, blah, blah. But you know what? She's still learning to read, and we've been working on it for almost 2 years now. She can read easy chapter books (first grade level) but that's it. This is despite being verbally advanced (and this isn't just my opinion - her therapist recommended testing for giftedness). Reading just has not come easily to her.

 

If you want to home school, you will have to accept the fact that you are going to have curriculum choices that don't work. It happens to everyone sooner or later. You will have to ditch things that don't work sometimes and spend more money on something else. That's the way it goes. It doesn't mean your child is lazy or stubborn; it means that program didn't work for them. That's all. And sometimes, no program will work because they aren't developmentally ready yet. Nothing you can do about that but wait.

 

If I were you I'd try something else for now. If that doesn't work, put it all aside for a few months and then try again, but whatever you do, don't decide a 4yo child is lazy, stubborn, or disobedient just because they aren't ready to read yet. :grouphug:

 

:iagree: And I hope you read that with the gentle spirit in which I'm sure it was meant. :grouphug: I agree with the others who say she's probably just not ready. I have five and we've always homeschooled. Some kids were ready to learn to read at 4/5, one was 8 before she really hit her stride. My current 4yo won't start reading lessons with me until she's five. Until then she has had fun playing Explode the Code Online and can sound out very simple CVC words. I see no reason to push more extensive reading on her at this point. :)

 

In my experience teaching my oldest three to read, I swear there is some kind of mental switch that has to flip before things make sense for the child. All the phonics rules and reading practice doesn't pay off until the child is mature and ready.

 

So, relax! Spend this time learning more about various homeschooling options. Play with your dd. Have fun. :)

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She's really young. It could be she's just not quite ready for that much structured time doing curriculum type stuff yet. Five minutes of focus on something like that sounds actually just fine for that age to me. In a few months, it could be completely different. Or you could try a different curriculum. I would also just try playing games with her. And even if she expressed an interest in reading, I wouldn't push it yet.

 

:iagree: If you do want to be a more structured homeschooler, I think it's a good practice at that age to just start with 5 or 10 minutes a day of something (games, singing, copywork, whatever). But have no expectation of getting anywhere with it. I had 2 kids that had no interest in learning to read as preschoolers. But then jumped up to 4th or 5th grade level + in reading in a matter of months at age 5-6. I was very laid back at preschool ages. And my oldest is highly to profoundly gifted (still figuring out #2). You just need to wait it out. 4.5 is still really young - quite a few things need to come together for reading and not all just intelligence. Eye tracking, patience, interest, etc.

 

Music lessons were great for my daughter starting at age 4 (my son at 5). It gave us a structure for homeschooling and had us accountable to an outside teacher. Great for building learning habits (we don't get everything on the first try).

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Please don't say that about your four-year-old. ...If I were you I'd try something else for now. If that doesn't work, put it all aside for a few months and then try again, but whatever you do, don't decide a 4yo child is lazy, stubborn, or disobedient just because they aren't ready to read yet. :grouphug:

 

The advice is appreciated from everyone. My DD is a wonderful child and very well behaved. I stick by the stubborness.. it has nothing to do with the reading lessons though. Many other things have drawn me to that conclusion... :lol: Anyhow I was a very lazy child and didn't want to do anything in school. I am fearful that I will be pulling teeth for her to do school and this experience is playing on my fears.

 

I might have to check out some computer based lessons. She loves playing games on the computer. You are all very right that she is young and I need to be patient!

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The advice is appreciated from everyone. My DD is a wonderful child and very well behaved. I stick by the stubborness.. it has nothing to do with the reading lessons though. Many other things have drawn me to that conclusion... :lol: Anyhow I was a very lazy child and didn't want to do anything in school. I am fearful that I will be pulling teeth for her to do school and this experience is playing on my fears.

 

4 year olds are stubborn. Trust me, I have one right now. :D

 

As a child, was the work maybe too easy for you? Were you coasting through school? That can make a child lazy. My son was coasting through school and was becoming lazy about school work. Now that he's homeschooling, he's having to learn to work harder. It's been a little bit of a power struggle as we've gotten started, but we've gotten a LOT done and made a LOT of progress, and he's quickly learned that he can't manipulate me into doing something else or skipping something that he just doesn't feel like doing (ie, he has to work his little brain a tiny bit to do it). ;) School made him that way though. If I'd homeschooled from the beginning, I don't think he'd have been quite so lazy about schoolwork. He actually LOVES doing school, and during the summer he even did a Summer Bridge Activities workbook everyday for fun without me asking him to.

 

The main thing to think about when you are trying to determine lazy vs. not ready... Is what you're asking her to do developmentally appropriate? For example, if I asked my son to write a full page narration and he melted in tears, well, that's not him being lazy. He seriously can't do that, and it's not developmentally appropriate for him to do it! But if I ask him to write one sentence and he says he doesn't want to, tough. He's writing the one little sentence that only has 4 words in it. :tongue_smilie:Just this morning, he said his hand hurt after doing 5 math problems. I know that sometimes his hand *does* hurt when writing, and we're working on strengthening his hand, but I knew that since we had just started and he'd only done 5 problems, his hand should be fine. So I told him to push through it. He did, and he ended up doing 2 pages of math just fine without any more complaint. He didn't have to write again until afternoon, and he did 2 sentences of copywork (separate times) and wrote about 12 spelling words, plus he drew a pig and colored it with color pencils (coloring kind of dark, so it was using his hand more, though I told him to color lightly). He did all that without complaint, and some of that actually was pushing him a little bit.

 

So basically, you'll get to know your child and what they're capable of, but also what is developmentally appropriate. She does sound like she's getting close to taking off with reading, but as a PP mentioned, there comes a time when it just "clicks". That's what happened with my son that day he picked up the Dr. Seuss book and read to me. Prior to that, he couldn't blend (putting the sounds together to figure out the word). That was the missing piece for him. Once his brain said "Aha! That's how I do it!", he was immediately reading at probably a first grade level.

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This is my first hear of homeschooling- my daughter is an older Kindergartner, since she has a November birthday.

 

Here is how learning to read went for us:

 

At 4.5, we tried Reading Eggs on the computer. She loved it and made a lot of progress with it for a while. She eventually stalled out with this approach, but it was good at the time.

 

At 2 months shy of five, she started reading Bob books.

 

I did not require her to do either of these things. She did them when she wanted to.

 

Two months after she turned five, she developed a more serious interest in learning to read. I told her I would work with her, but I would expect her to work on it with me every day. We used the Ordinary Parent's Guide, which was boring but effective. She didn't like it, but she was willing to do it. We kept reading Bob books, and found other books at the library.

 

At two months shy of 6, she started Kindergarten. At this point, she could read books like Go Dog Go. We gave up the OPG in favor of reading books. She can now, five months later, read things like Nate the Great and Amelia Bedelia without difficulty, and will gladly read books with much more difficult language, as long as there aren't too many words on the page.

 

I am sure I would have had no luck trying to teach her to read when she was younger. In observing her progress over the last year and a half or so, it's clear to me that she's matured in many ways during this time, and is much better equipped developmentally for academic work now than she was 18+ months ago.

Edited by skueppers
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My son started the TYCR100EZ lessons program at 4. I got the same response from my son. I waited a few weeks and decided to implement a rewards chart. My theory is that learning to read early is a lot of hard work. In the real world, you get paid for hard work. For every 20 lessons, he earns a movie night, day at the local jumpee place or a $5 toy. This gives him some ownership in learning. We used TYCR100EZ lessons. He is begging to do lessons, and I do not have to convince him to do "his lessons." Also I invited a guest professor to teach....Professor puppy, his beloved stuffed animal. It is silly but it works. Somehow his puppy is less intimidating than mommy. He loves getting licks of praise and a high paw. He also does not mind professor puppy correcting him. We are on lesson 75 and he is telling everyone he LOVES "his lessons". He loves that he can see that his hard work paid off. You may have the right material but the wrong approach. Just sharing from my experience. I feel for you. KEEP HOPE ALIVE :)

Edited by cabreban
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My son started the TYCR100EZ lessons program at 4. I got the same response from my son. I waited a few weeks and decided to implement a rewards chart. My theory is that learning to read early is a lot of hard work. In the real world, you get paid for hard work. For every 20 lessons, he earns a movie night, day at the local jumpee place or a $5 toy. This gives him some ownership in learning. We used TYCR100EZ lessons. He is begging to do lessons, and I do not have to convince him to do "his lessons." Also I invited a guest professor to teach....Professor puppy, his beloved stuffed animal. It is silly but it works. We are on lesson 75 and he is telling everyone he LOVES "his lessons". He loves that he can see that his hard work paid off. You may have the right material but the wrong approach. Just sharing from my experience. I feel for you.

 

I love the professor puppy idea. She might get into that.. maybe! We do have a rewards chart and she does earn smiley's and is very effective for everything. It hasn't worked so well with the reading lesson though.. Even the lollipop that I offered her today didn't quite cut it. So much good advice here. I forgot about Starfall.com and will see how she likes it.

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I forgot all about rewards! I made a reading chart for my dd, and every time we got to certain points we got to do something fun. Having the chart really helped because it was a nice visual for her. Plus she got to choose a sticker for each square, which for some reason is a really big deal to her. She loves stickers. Maybe your little girl would, too. :)

 

I should also say that, for what it's worth, my dd flipped out when she saw the look of 100EZ. She hated it. We've had to use other things. You may already know this, but I think funnix is still free until the end of this month. It's based on 100EZ, but it's all on the computer. Maybe your dd would like that.

 

I'm sorry if I came across the wrong way before. I definitely did mean it gently, but I always come across the wrong way online and I'm usually nursing a baby and trying to type one-handed, so you know...lol.

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\

I'm sorry if I came across the wrong way before. I definitely did mean it gently, but I always come across the wrong way online and I'm usually nursing a baby and trying to type one-handed, so you know...lol.

 

No worries! I didn't take it too harshly. I remember having to type one handed! :) I didn't know about the Funnix website. I might have to download that. It says it is free, but takes 2 GB of space. I wonder if it would be fun for her.

Thanks!

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You know, learning to read is a really big deal and most kids do not read before kindergarten. Some kids do, but there's a certain type of developmental maturation that needs to happen before they're ready to read, and even many very smart, gifted kids don't reach that point until kindergarten or later.

 

My 5.5yo is very bright and incredibly verbal. She knew all her letters by about 15 months and her letter sounds well before two. I totally thought she'd be reading at three, but she wasn't ready. She wasn't ready at four, either. At 4.5 she was painstakingly sounding out words and resisting learning to read. At 5, she was reading the simplest beginner books and resisting learning to read. At 5.5, she's reading at a fourth-grade level and devouring novels for pleasure, to the exclusion of most other activities. She had to wait for that switch to flip in her brain.

 

You've set a goal of teaching your child to read before kindergarten, which is an uncommon achievement, and you've decided that this is a "test" of whether you are capable of homeschooling. That puts you both under a lot of pressure. It wouldn't surprise me if she is picking up stress related to her reading lessons, which is causing her to be resistant.

 

If I wanted to see whether I "could" homeschool a 4-year-old, I would work on trying to establish some rhythms to our day. We listen to classical music during breakfast, Mom chooses some books to read after lunch, Monday is field trip day, Thursday is art project day, Friday we bake. Nothing overtly academic, but just starting to set the expectation that we do certain things at certain times, and that our days are a mix of child-directed and mom-directed activities.

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I need help and advice! I have wanted to HS for a long time, before I even had kids. My DD is 4.5 and is scheduled to start K in the Fall. She is very smart and has been attending preschool. My plan was to start Sonlight curriculum K in the fall. She has an amazing attention span for her age and all of her preschool teachers have been amazed at her.

 

I really wanted to teach her to read prior to starting K. She knows all her letters and the sounds they make and she can read phonetic words if she tries.. So since she is smart enough and has started to indicate that she wants to learn to read I have picked up the book the Teach your child to read in 100 Easy Lessons. The first few lessons went fine, but now she complains and drags her feet and is very uncooperative. We are only on lesson 8. These lessons are so short and easy and if I can't get her to do these simple lessons how can I possibly HS her?

 

My daughter is stubborn and if she doesn't want to do something and it isn't her idea then it becomes a fight... I don't want to fight her on doing school every day. So maybe I just need to give up my HS dream.

Then I think maybe I am pushing her too early and she is just too young...but then I think she is just being lazy .. and how long do you use that excuse that she is too young.

And I think maybe I just need to do a different reading program instead of this book.

 

But then I go back to how easy these lessons are and how I can't get her to focus for 5 mins on it..

 

So what do I do.. Do I continue to encourage her to do this lesson book and try and get through it? Do I try a different type of reading curriculum? Do I wait until she is older to do reading?

 

Sorry about the rambling message.. I am frustrated at the moment and really want the HSing to work but having doubts that I can get my daughter to comply!

 

Thank you!!

I tried using 100 Easy Lessons with my youngest. It came highly recommended but well, to be honest we both hated it. The age your dd is I would simply read to her every minute extra you have. Continue to work with her with sounds. I took my dd through MFW First grade but she probably isn't ready for that yet. It was a very good experience. Well, I am rambling. I think the thing that you need to settle is whether you are called to homeschool your child. Settle that and you will find the material.

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Hi! I have a 3rd grader, 2nd grader, Kindergartener and a 3 yro. I've taught 3 kids to read now...:glare:

 

First, have you read The Well-Trained Mind? How about Cathy Duffy's Top 100 Homeschool Curriculum Picks (especially the section on learning styles and teaching styles)? Those are 2 good places to start. One of my friends recommends a book on Charlotte Mason homeschooling (but I can't remember the title) - you could browse on Amazon.

 

Second, I would start browsing all-in-one curricula to see how Kindergarten is put together. You could look at online samples, scopes and sequences, etc. Some popular examples are My Father's World, Calvert, Oak Meadow, Sonlight, Christian Light Education, etc. You might be surprised at all the different ways Kindergarten is taught. It might give you ideas and a timeline for what you want to do for Kindergarten.

 

I would wait to teach reading until summer/fall of Kindergarten. You could work on something like Five in a Row or Sonlight P4/5 to get used to doing school and learning together. My 5 yro was dragging the My Father's World K box around the house for weeks when we first started Kindergarten. She was soooo excited. :D It was funny. :lol:

 

FWIW, I also tried Abeka K4 and 100 EZ and my daughter absolutely hated them both. I think she would just start crying when I brought 100 EZ out. My daughter qualifies as a Social Sue (Cathy Duffy's Top 100) and needs something extremely interactive. :tongue_smilie:

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  • 2 weeks later...
My son started the TYCR100EZ lessons program at 4. I got the same response from my son. I waited a few weeks and decided to implement a rewards chart. My theory is that learning to read early is a lot of hard work. In the real world, you get paid for hard work. For every 20 lessons, he earns a movie night, day at the local jumpee place or a $5 toy. This gives him some ownership in learning. We used TYCR100EZ lessons. He is begging to do lessons, and I do not have to convince him to do "his lessons." Also I invited a guest professor to teach....Professor puppy, his beloved stuffed animal. It is silly but it works. Somehow his puppy is less intimidating than mommy. He loves getting licks of praise and a high paw. He also does not mind professor puppy correcting him. We are on lesson 75 and he is telling everyone he LOVES "his lessons". He loves that he can see that his hard work paid off. You may have the right material but the wrong approach. Just sharing from my experience. I feel for you. KEEP HOPE ALIVE :)

 

Thank you SO much for the wonderful idea. I was frustrated the day I wrote my original post. I have kept add it and added a professor puppy and she is very excited about the whole thing. We are at the point where she is reading the small 'stories'. I think the initial lessons were all too easy for her and completely boring. We might make it through this book after all. Yeah!!

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I am using Little Stories for Little Folks with my 4.5 year old. I skipped the letter cards since he already knows the sounds of all of the letters. They have these strips you can use to teach beginning reading.

 

 

ad

 

ad

 

ad

 

ad

 

an

 

an

 

an

 

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etc....

 

 

Then there are consonant strips that you can slide up and down to make words. DS has really responded to these and it was so cute seeing a light go off in his head when he realized he could read!

 

The program is Catholic (the first story is about going to mass), but you could make those strips on your own. We also play games on http://www.starfall.com and use his erase board to make words. I'll write AD and then we'll add a bunch of different letters to the front. Sometimes he tries to trick me by writing his own words.

 

I am trying to keep it really light and fun and not really school like at this point. Good luck!

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I also think you should just read, read and read some more at this age.

 

We used "Get ready for the Code" at 4 but just so he could work on his letter sounds and writing the letters, and it was completely child led. When he wanted to do it, he did and if he didn't that was fine too. He is almost 5 and we just started Explode the Code book 1, and again we are reading, reading and reading some more. We also play with phonetic skills like rhyming, and listening for what sound a word starts or how it ends.

 

Mine hated 100 EZ lessons, although I know some people who love it. When she is ready (and she very well might be) I would look at Explode the Code, and Ordinary parents guide to reading, or Reading pathways. I also highly suggest AAS since it teaches just as much phonics as any other program I have used.

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I know this is late, but I wanted to chime in. My oldest is 5 at the end of May. Last year, at two months shy of 4, she begged for me to teach her to read. My mom taught me with 100EZ Lessons so I grabbed the book and we sat down for lessons. Abby LOVED it...until we got to the rhyming part. She COULD NOT figure out how to rhyme. So, we shelved it and did a lot of playing and sounding of letters and TONS OF READ-ALOUDS. Developmentally she wasn't ready.

 

Just after she turned 4, she asked again. (Why, yes...she does love all things reading!) So we sat down with the book again. At this point I knew she how to rhyme (we'd been playing rhyming games) and I'd figure we'd try. We made it to lesson 68 or something insane like that before running into more issues. She had some words she knew from sight, but was having difficulty remembering when a vowel was short or long, even with the line at the top. Around this time her daddy came home from a deployment so we shelved it again.

 

Fast-forward another few months and she asked to start reading lessons again. I started back at about lesson 15 or so thinking we'd breeze through, but for whatever reason, she didn't remember much of her sight words and was sounding out everything. She was really frustrated that she couldn't just look at the words and "do it the fast way". So, we put it up for a bit and called it good.

 

Last month Funnix did its free trial so I downloaded it and thought we'd give it a spin. I still want to place an emphasis on phonics and decoding the language, and I was pleased with 100EZ Lessons' approach to it all so I was hopeful. We started Funnix almost immediately and she LOVED it. We started back at the very beginning for a bit of review and confidence builder. But soon it was apparent that it was too easy because she didn't want to stop what she was doing to do something for "babies". I skipped her ahead a bit, but still doing each lesson. She's at lesson 45 now and still really liking. And I THINK (cross your fingers) that she's really ready, and the program works for her that she is actually really starting to read. And LIKING IT.

 

The approach in Funnix is slightly different than 100EZ Lessons, but not by much. Abby is a parent-pleaser and I think it was frustrating her with 100EZ Lessons that she couldn't do it perfectly and I was correcting her. Doing it on the computer has removed that negative reaction, but I am still reinforcing what she's learning.

 

So, all this to say...don't dispair! Shelve it for a time. Try out different programs. Let her play and let her learn at her own pace. It really will be okay.

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I might have to check out some computer based lessons. She loves playing games on the computer. You are all very right that she is young and I need to be patient!

 

 

I'm late in this conversation, but would agree with others that patience is key. My ds knew his letters & sounds by age 2, but was not ready to put them together until about age 5.5. After a few frustrating weeks (around age 4) of trying to get him to put things together, I finally decided he just wasn't ready and it wasn't worth the battle. We set lessons aside for several months until he was ready. He is now 10 yrs old/5th grade and reading above grade level. Waiting didn't hurt him in the slightest. In fact, I'm sure it helped.

 

Anyway, I was replying to suggest that you check out Reader Rabbit. Ds had tons of fun with those cds - so much so that he was almost 9 yrs old before he was willing to give up the preschool version! They cover more than reading topics. JumpStart is another good one.

 

Another great way to encourage learning fun is file folder games. A google search will lend you tons of ideas. And they can be easy to make and store.

 

Children, especially the younger ones, learn more through play than in any other way. They will amaze you with what they can do when you don't even know they've been paying attention!

 

Don't be discouraged. She is learning. I might also recommend "The Way They Learn" by Cynthia Tobias. It's an easy read that helps you identify different learning styles. The way you approach things can make a huge difference. :grouphug:

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