Thinking about buying Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading

[amselby81]

We've been doing a mish-mash of phonics. I had bought the pre-k Hooked on Phonics in the beginning of the year b/c DD needed to work on her phonemic awareness. We're still working through it. Honestly, I hate it but DD loves it, so We do a couple pages a week. We've also been doing some Progressive Phonics, and I have the pre Explode the Code books that we've gradually been working on. I also let her play on websites like Starfall, Reading Eggs, and we're trying Ooka Island.

 

I've been pretty laid back this year, and I just haven't been doing any organized phonics program, except maybe the Progressive Phonics that we just started 2 weeks ago. Next year she'll be in K and I think we might need to step it up a bit and I feel I need direction. So that's why I'm thinking about getting the Ordinary Parents' Guide. I was wonder what kind of an approach it takes toward phonics? Does it teach word families like H.O.P. and BJU, or does it teach phonics like Abeka? I don't even know what the Abeka approach is called, but you teach beginning blends first, and then add the ending sound. So instead of word families you learn short vowels with blend ladders. (ba, be, bi, bo, bu, then add a 't' to blends to make bat, bet, bit, bot, but)

 

Also, I already have the first Explode the Code book. Would you say that ETC compliments The Ordinary Parents' Guide? Thanks.

[Tawlas]

Honestly I can't comment on the other phonics programs, we only use OPGTR along with with ETC 1. The first 20 (or so?) lessons teach one consonant at a time. My ds had learned these before we started (there are sooooo many ways to do that) so we started at the next lesson after that.

 

Lessons 27-40 teach CVC words with each vowel sound. My ds will be 5 in April. We've gone through these lessons v-e-r-y slowly. I think we started last summer-ish with some breaks etc. I spend as much time as I think he needs to solidify and practice on each lesson before moving on. Having said that, I don't think that following OPGTR to a tee would have worked for us. It's very basic. There's a lot of script on each page. I've done everything from using magnet letters, to whiteboards, to the ipad, to writing it in a notebook, to drawing pictures of the story as he reads. Sometimes I lay the word out and have him read it, sometimes I tell him the word and have him lay it out. It can be fun to be creative with it! I really appreciate having the flow of phonics laid out for us more than anything, so I use it as a reference.

 

So to answer your question, it's appraoch is simply "words with short-I vowel sound" . Review consonants about to come up in lesson. Read the words to your child, then read it together, then child reads by himself. (if fib bib, I am sad if I fib). And so on until all the sort vowel sounds are covered. Moves on to the next concept such as blends, diagraphs etc) Very thorough and sequential. But most find they need to spruce it up.

 

And ETC goes very well with it. My ds is working through ETC 1 with the CVC section. I don't try and match it up, just work through it as review or as a preview of OPGTR.

 

Hope that helps!

[alpidarkomama]

As far as I can remember, there are no "non-words" for reading practice in OPGTR. I love using ETC alongside OPGTR. It complements it perfectly. The only way I spiced up OPGTR was to re-write it using my kids' names as the characters in the stories, and personalizing it in a few other ways.

 

Other than OPGTR and ETC I do nothing else but read to them a lot and make sure they always have access to plenty of books at their level. It's been working great this way and only takes a few minutes per day.

 

DD5 and DS6 do ETC on their own, and OPGTR only takes a few minutes. DD8 went the same route and reads at a 7th/8th-grade level now. We love OPGTR!

[Tanikit]

OPGTR does not teach beginning or ending blends first - you just sound out from the beginning of the word though they do seem to link word families (based on ending blends) certainly in the early teaching. They do it according to vowel sounds (so you do short "a" first then short "e" and so on. My daughter already knew all the consonants and how to blend cvc words when I started so I just briefly and quickly reviewed the cvc words and moved on. I have not used it as scripted since my DD was already reading books when she started - I just use the word lists to teach a new phonics rule and then point out words that fit that family when we are reading other books or when I am reading to her.