Guest rebelpapa Posted February 14, 2011 Share Posted February 14, 2011 I think my Daughter is ready to read. She turns 4 next week and is so excited about letters. She knows all uppercase letters and sounds and I've started working on the lowercase letters. She looks at simple words and tells me the sounds the letters make. I've started to sound out simple words for her. She's very responsive to books. She loves, loves, loves books. I looked at getting the Bob books, but they are kind of boring and the drawings leave something to be desired. Is she ready for something like the Bob books? Any other recommendations? Thoughts? I'm new at this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snowfall Posted February 14, 2011 Share Posted February 14, 2011 She needs to know all her lower case letters before she starts trying to read books. Otherwise, you're going to be the one reading the books, since books don't come printed in capitals, lol. If BOB books look too boring, try the Nora Gaydos books. They're in the same vein, but the pictures are much better and more colorful. My biggest recommendation would be not to push her, though. She might be ready, but she might not. My daughter always loved books and being read to, but she hasn't been so fond of learning to read. If she's ready, don't hold her back, but if she starts resisting, let it go. Four is very young. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest rebelpapa Posted February 14, 2011 Share Posted February 14, 2011 Thanks for your thoughts. Just to be very clear, I'm not pushing at all. I'm letter her lead anything to do with letters and numbers because she's so young. I just want her to have lots of fun. If anyone is doing the pushing it's her pushing me! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TracyP Posted February 14, 2011 Share Posted February 14, 2011 I would recommend either Phonics Pathways or Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading. They are very similar except OPGTR is scripted. You may be able to find these at your library so you could look them over before buying. Both will start with lower case letters and go through 4th grade (roughly) phonics instruction. My kids happened to like BOB Books - even though I didn't. They are good for practice but won't actually teach child to read. Just let your daughter set the pace and have fun!:001_smile: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snowfall Posted February 14, 2011 Share Posted February 14, 2011 Thanks for your thoughts. Just to be very clear, I'm not pushing at all. I'm letter her lead anything to do with letters and numbers because she's so young. I just want her to have lots of fun. If anyone is doing the pushing it's her pushing me! Oh, no, I didn't think you were. I just wanted to say that in case it should become tempting later on. lol Sometimes they're all ready and raring to go, then a few weeks later they lose their steam and it's hard for us to let it go when they lose interest. We start thinking, She wanted to do it a week ago and she was doing fine, so let's just keep going. I absolutely believe that she's very into learning to read right now and I bet she'll continue to be interested, but she might not. That was all I meant. I hope you guys have a blast! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cmarango Posted February 14, 2011 Share Posted February 14, 2011 Let her get on the Starfall website and go through the alphabet. That will be a quick way for her to learn her lowercase letters...or at least that is how my dd learned them. Just be aware that some times there is a long period between knowing the letters of sounds and being able to blend the sounds into words. Keep trying to put together 2 letter blends, such as "at" and "on", periodically until that developmental stage is reached. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest rebelpapa Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 Oh, no, I didn't think you were. I just wanted to say that in case it should become tempting later on. lol Sometimes they're all ready and raring to go, then a few weeks later they lose their steam and it's hard for us to let it go when they lose interest. We start thinking, She wanted to do it a week ago and she was doing fine, so let's just keep going. I absolutely believe that she's very into learning to read right now and I bet she'll continue to be interested, but she might not. That was all I meant. I hope you guys have a blast! Don't worry I wasn't being defensive or taking what you said the wrong way :D I like to think I'm a writer, but not everything I write is proofread over and over again. Somehow on forums, it's easy to be misunderstood. Thanks for all the advice so far. I've broken out TOPGTR and will work on that with her. We use the Starfall iPhone app (on the iPad). It's the same thing as the website, but she seems to ignore lowercase letters. There are some other great iPad apps I've found. We're taking it slowly. I try to do letters with her everyday, but some days she isn't interested. Like yesterday, for instance. She refused to do letters. I bought her a small airplane lego kit for Valentine's Day. So she was obsessed with that. I showed her how to follow the directions that came with the kit. I barely had to coach her and she put the airplane together. I was impressed. The lego box says ages 6-12, bah :lol: Thanks again everyone. I feel like such a newbie on all this stuff (and I am). It also feels lonely since I'm a Dad at home. More suggestions are of course welcome. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MeganW Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 Let her get on the Starfall website and go through the alphabet. That will be a quick way for her to learn her lowercase letters...or at least that is how my dd learned them. Just be aware that some times there is a long period between knowing the letters of sounds and being able to blend the sounds into words. Keep trying to put together 2 letter blends, such as "at" and "on", periodically until that developmental stage is reached. My almost-6 year olds have known all their letters and sounds (upper & lower) for almost 2 years, and STILL aren't reading. The blending thing has "come in" for 1, but not the other two. They just don't get it, and I'm not willing to stress them out of it by pushing. So just know that it may be a while yet before she is ready. Give it a try, and put it aside for 3-6 months if she gets stuck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chelli Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 My dd told me that she wanted to learn to read when she was 4 as well. She knew all of the letters and their sounds, but she could NOT blend. It didn't matter how hard we tried. She was getting REALLY frustrated and I was afraid that she would hate reading, so I told her that we would take a break for a while (by this point she was ready to). About 6 months later (she had turned five by then) we tried again and this time she got it! I didn't have to really try to "teach" blending; she just understood how to put the sounds together. In short, what I'm trying to say is to watch your child. They may say that they want to read, but actually aren't ready to read yet. If that is the case, then let it go. No point in frustrating her. Just watch her progression and if she seems to hit a road block, then just focus on letters and sounds for a while. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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