Switching reading programs...

[Esse Quam Videri]

Useful or detrimental?

 

DD5 is a young Ker (May birthday) and she's sounding out CVC words but it just doesn't seem to be progressing. We've switched programs twice now (I started at 4 because she knew her letter sounds). I know it will happen eventually and I'm trying to relax.. but I also know that reading is the one subject I want her to learn well this year. Everything else depends on it.

 

Is it better to just keep plugging away with one program? Am I naïve to hope that perhaps a different approach will suit her better? Or is she just not ready? I can't figure it out with this one.

[boscopup]

Some around here say the reading program that works is the third or fourth one you try. ;)

 

 

She sounds on target or a bit ahead for a K'er if she's reading CVC words at the beginning of the year, so I wouldn't worry.

 

Also, if she isn't developmentally ready to move on this year, it's not the end of the world. My middle son is still in the short vowel stage, sounding out a lot of words. He's doing fine with first grade work. Not much in K-2 absolutely depends on the child reading independently. It's easier if they're reading well, but not absolutely necessary. :) I've done first grade with an advanced independent reader (4th grade level) and one that isn't reading independently yet. As long as forward progress is being made, that's the important thing. I know a lot of WTM K'ers are reading chapter books by the end of K, but that's not reality for a large number of perfectly normal and/or very bright children. ;)

[boscopup]

ps.. My son has made forward progress any time we've changed things up. I just try not to confuse him by switching between programs that teach phonics very differently. We're even starting a new program Monday. We'll see how it goes. :tongue_smilie:

[Nart]

Useful for us.

My oldest learned to read with 100 easy Lessons, but wasn't a fluent reader at the end. That was followed by some Funnix, then we went through phonics pathways and finally to increase his reading fluency and stop him from guessing some words, Dancing Bears fast track.

 

My youngest hated 100 easy lessons and Funnix. He is now on Lesson 37 of All About Reading level 1 and loves it. I am so glad we switched.

[Lisa in the UP of MI]

Might be useful, might not be.  I've found with my kids I just have to wait for something to click.  When it does, they go from sloooowly sounding out individual words to reading a whole easy book (ds's first book was Green Eggs and Ham).  Our approach was to teach them to build words, then use AAS until they made the jump.  Oldest dd started reading at 4.5yo and was reading anything she could get her hands on by 7yo and ds didn't start reading until 6.5yo and at 7.5yo is just beyond Henry and Mudge.  Younger dd is 5.5yo and doing well in the building simple words and is doing pretty well with sounding them out in isolation, too.  We'll see how it goes, but I'm hoping to start AAS by January.

[Esse Quam Videri]

Might be useful, might not be.  I've found with my kids I just have to wait for something to click.  When it does, they go from sloooowly sounding out individual words to reading a whole easy book (ds's first book was Green Eggs and Ham).  Our approach was to teach them to build words, then use AAS until they made the jump.  Oldest dd started reading at 4.5yo and was reading anything she could get her hands on by 7yo and ds didn't start reading until 6.5yo and at 7.5yo is just beyond Henry and Mudge.  Younger dd is 5.5yo and doing well in the building simple words and is doing pretty well with sounding them out in isolation, too.  We'll see how it goes, but I'm hoping to start AAS by January.

 

Do you use AAS as written when you start with youngers just starting to read? As in, making sure they know all of the sounds for the phonograms before moving past lesson 4? We love AAS and I always thought it could work well as a reading program, but I couldn't quite figure out how to wing it (or didn't want to exert the mental effort :p). So I bought AAR, which I like, but it's not a love affair like AAS.

 

BTW, we're doing similar cultures/zoology study as well, tying in Home Art Studio... I'm slightly disappointed with it (HAS). How is Sassafras working out?

[Esse Quam Videri]

ps.. My son has made forward progress any time we've changed things up. I just try not to confuse him by switching between programs that teach phonics very differently. We're even starting a new program Monday. We'll see how it goes. :tongue_smilie:

 

Which programs have you tried, and which are you starting next :bigear: ?

[boscopup]

Which programs have you tried, and which are you starting next :bigear: ?

 

:lol:

 

Let's see... We originally started with Webster's Speller, then did Dancing Bears, then did Phonics Pathways (caused huge jump in blending ability in both my younger kids the same week), did Spalding for a bit, back to Phonics Pathways, and now trying R&S Phonics and Reading. And yes the reading has sight words at first and I just don't care anymore. The kid wants so badly to read, and he's better at reading books with sight words than he is basal phonics readers. He needs confidence to move forward. He understands phonics well. But we've been stuck in short vowel land for almost 3 years now. The kid dreads reading lists of words or writing lists of words. He wants to read books, and I think the Bible stories in R&S will be interesting for him, as they'll be something familiar and he can build confidence. The phonics program is strong, and I think it will be interesting to him as well. It has a good mix of reading, writing, circling, underlining, etc.

 

This kid needs confidence more than phonics at this point. He also has a baby brother 2.5 years younger who is reading better than him now. The 4 year old reads the directions in his math book. First grader needs me to read them (yet he does fine reading the number words... he reads better than he thinks he can!). I think he'll take off with a bit of confidence boost from successfully reading those R&S readers, and that will make the phonics instruction more effective. He can sound words out all day. It's remembering them the next time he sees them that isn't happening very quickly. He needs lots of repetition to do that. R&S provides that without just having him read a list of words every day. I think it will be a good fit. We'll see.

[Esse Quam Videri]

:lol:

 

Let's see... We originally started with Webster's Speller, then did Dancing Bears, then did Phonics Pathways (caused huge jump in blending ability in both my younger kids the same week), did Spalding for a bit, back to Phonics Pathways, and now trying R&S Phonics and Reading. And yes the reading has sight words at first and I just don't care anymore. The kid wants so badly to read, and he's better at reading books with sight words than he is basal phonics readers. He needs confidence to move forward. He understands phonics well. But we've been stuck in short vowel land for almost 3 years now. The kid dreads reading lists of words or writing lists of words. He wants to read books, and I think the Bible stories in R&S will be interesting for him, as they'll be something familiar and he can build confidence. The phonics program is strong, and I think it will be interesting to him as well. It has a good mix of reading, writing, circling, underlining, etc.

 

This kid needs confidence more than phonics at this point. He also has a baby brother 2.5 years younger who is reading better than him now. The 4 year old reads the directions in his math book. First grader needs me to read them (yet he does fine reading the number words... he reads better than he thinks he can!). I think he'll take off with a bit of confidence boost from successfully reading those R&S readers, and that will make the phonics instruction more effective. He can sound words out all day. It's remembering them the next time he sees them that isn't happening very quickly. He needs lots of repetition to do that. R&S provides that without just having him read a list of words every day. I think it will be a good fit. We'll see.

 

Please update when you can :thumbup:

[MomatHWTK]

If you are intent on the child learning a particular way (i.e. strictly phonics) then switching may impair that goal.  At the least you would want to stick with the same 'genre' of curricula.  Otherwise, IMO it doesn't matter.  I let my kids experience reading instruction when and where it came- books, videos, online games.  We do some spelling work, we read together, etc.  Eventually everything comes together and they are reading.  My caveat would be that it is a slower process because I didn't do a lesson every day, I just maintained steady exposure to some type of reading until it clicked. 

 

Boscopup, the practices in Reading Rescue 1-2-3 are excellent for building confidence.  I used a lot of the techniques from this book with my first. 

[sbgrace]

Well, I switched successfully with my struggler. However, I'm not thinking she's actually struggling at all for her age. Maybe her siblings just clicked it in on a developmental different time table? I'd make sure whatever I'm doing is pleasant and makes her feel good about herself as a learner/reader. If I couldn't find that, I'd lay off for a while. I did that in fact. It didn't hurt a thing to wait a while before beginning again with a new and better plan.

[alisoncooks]

With my struggling reader, nothing helped until we got to Dancing Bears.  

(And we went through:  AAR, Phonics Pathways, R&S Phonics, OPGTR, ETC, CLE LTR, HOP).   :huh:

 

With my youngest, we've been plugging along with McRuffy Phonics K.  We're about 40 lessons in, and I started getting fidgety, wondering if another program would fit better.  I looked around... but came back to McR.  It's working fine, I just took out all the stuff that annoys me. :)  

[Nart]

:lol:

 

Let's see... We originally started with Webster's Speller, then did Dancing Bears, then did Phonics Pathways (caused huge jump in blending ability in both my younger kids the same week), did Spalding for a bit, back to Phonics Pathways, and now trying R&S Phonics and Reading. And yes the reading has sight words at first and I just don't care anymore. The kid wants so badly to read, and he's better at reading books with sight words than he is basal phonics readers. He needs confidence to move forward. He understands phonics well. But we've been stuck in short vowel land for almost 3 years now. The kid dreads reading lists of words or writing lists of words. He wants to read books, and I think the Bible stories in R&S will be interesting for him, as they'll be something familiar and he can build confidence. The phonics program is strong, and I think it will be interesting to him as well. It has a good mix of reading, writing, circling, underlining, etc.

 

This kid needs confidence more than phonics at this point. He also has a baby brother 2.5 years younger who is reading better than him now. The 4 year old reads the directions in his math book. First grader needs me to read them (yet he does fine reading the number words... he reads better than he thinks he can!). I think he'll take off with a bit of confidence boost from successfully reading those R&S readers, and that will make the phonics instruction more effective. He can sound words out all day. It's remembering them the next time he sees them that isn't happening very quickly. He needs lots of repetition to do that. R&S provides that without just having him read a list of words every day. I think it will be a good fit. We'll see.

He might like the Pathway Readers. They use phonics with a lot of sight words that are repeated.

Here is a link to sample pages from the first primer reader.

http://www.milestonebooks.com/item/2-140/?list=Pathway_Readers_Grade_1

 

http://samples.milestonebooks.com/2-150/#1

I ordered from rainbow resource.

[alisoncooks]

:lol:

 

Let's see... We originally started with Webster's Speller, then did Dancing Bears, then did Phonics Pathways (caused huge jump in blending ability in both my younger kids the same week), did Spalding for a bit, back to Phonics Pathways, and now trying R&S Phonics and Reading. And yes the reading has sight words at first and I just don't care anymore. The kid wants so badly to read, and he's better at reading books with sight words than he is basal phonics readers. He needs confidence to move forward. He understands phonics well. But we've been stuck in short vowel land for almost 3 years now. The kid dreads reading lists of words or writing lists of words. He wants to read books, and I think the Bible stories in R&S will be interesting for him, as they'll be something familiar and he can build confidence. The phonics program is strong, and I think it will be interesting to him as well. It has a good mix of reading, writing, circling, underlining, etc.

 

This kid needs confidence more than phonics at this point. He also has a baby brother 2.5 years younger who is reading better than him now. The 4 year old reads the directions in his math book. First grader needs me to read them (yet he does fine reading the number words... he reads better than he thinks he can!). I think he'll take off with a bit of confidence boost from successfully reading those R&S readers, and that will make the phonics instruction more effective. He can sound words out all day. It's remembering them the next time he sees them that isn't happening very quickly. He needs lots of repetition to do that. R&S provides that without just having him read a list of words every day. I think it will be a good fit. We'll see.

You might be on to something here. 

We had a jump in reading ability when we went from straight phonics to CLE/R&S phonics for a stint.  I think some kids do well with a bit of sight words thrown in (oh, the horror.... :p)

[Korrale]

Maybe just use a program like www.readingbear.org it is free.

[MistyMountain]

I switched around a lot with both kids and I do think it can get to be too much but sometimes what you are using just doesn't work so you need to. If I could do it again I would switch less and stick with things a little longer. My son is 5 and he is struggling a bit learning to read. I know he is still young and it could be just that but I think it is something else too. He had an articulation delay and I think it is related. He will learn but it is going to take a lot of practice. My now 7 year old dd struggled for quite a while. She could sound out words but had no fluency. I tried several things and one day it finally clicked and progress was faster. My ds is having a harder time then her even when she was struggling but he is younger too so it could be that. He a very bright little boy with broad interests, a great memory and ability to comprehend. It would be helpful if he could read and write but for now I read a lot to him and scribe for him. At least he loves being read to. Reading simple sentences with simple words isn't exactly exciting to him but once he gets past that I know he will love having the ability to read. He will get there eventually but I have no idea when that will be.

 

I used reading bear with both of my kids and it definitely wasn't the magic bullet for them. It was useful for my dd but my ds needs a lot more then reading bear. It is a great resource and I do recommend it to people to try but it doesn't work for every kid. My son does okay sounding out the words on reading bear but it doesn't translate into reading sentences or to later readings of the words in isolation. I think using reading bear got him sounding words out with pauses and that has been a very hard habit to break. He can do it without the pauses but the consistency isn't there. I am thinking of stopping the switching around and sticking with AAR for now even if he isn't flying through and he gets a little stuck but of course that can change again ;) I also think I will use meet the sight words with him too eventually. I was debating that but I think that will help him.

[boscopup]

He had an articulation delay and I think it is related.

 

DS2's Bible class teacher at church has a daughter in school to become an SLP. The daughter told her that apparently, kids with speech delays often have reading delays also. Guess what? DS2 had a speech delay. He didn't start talking until age 3, due to multiple ear infections from 0-18 months (he got tubes at 2 years when he didn't have the requisite 5 words or whatever - he still had fluid in his ears despite having not had an ear infection in 6 months). Since he had learned some things wrong the first 2 years, we had to correct individual words. He is mostly understandable now, though I still have to correct individual sounds or words. For example, when learning more advanced phonograms, I discovered that he couldn't say the sound in "put", "foot", etc. I worked with him on that and finally got him to say it correctly. Now he can say it. When he was 3-4, he had issues with /m/ vs. /n/. So "milk" was pronounced "nolk", "mail" was pronounced "nail", etc. He had to learn each individual word. Then when we started learning to read, I saw that he still had issues with distinguishing the letters 'm' and 'n'. I used pictures from IEW's PAL reading (my friend had it, and I just copied one page) for those two letters. 'm' is a mountain letter that you can drive cars between the mountains, and 'n' is a nose letter. Now he can tell the difference. He thinks in pictures, so I try to use pictures when he's stumped on something.

 

I know reading will come. My son is progressing all the time. It's just the slow, painful route. :) I try to make it less painful for HIM, at the very least.

[RootAnn]

The daughter told her that apparently, kids with speech delays often have reading delays also. Guess what? DS2 had a speech delay. 

 

Four of my five kids were late talkers. The one that talked on time was my earliest & easiest-to-teach reader (but not my best one right now). The other two were late readers & caused me some worry!

 

Guess I have two more kids who will be tough to teach to read. (Where's my 'girding my loins' emoticon?)   :001_unsure:

[boscopup]

Four of my five kids were late talkers. The one that talked on time was my earliest & easiest-to-teach reader (but not my best one right now). The other two were late readers & caused me some worry!

 

Guess I have two more kids who will be tough to teach to read. (Where's my 'girding my loins' emoticon?)   :001_unsure:

 

Yeah, my oldest taught himself to read, and then comes along the later talker (my "early" talkers didn't talk until age 2, so they were on the late side of normal, but still normal... the "late" talker started talking at 3). Middle son is so completely different from my oldest. He takes more direct instruction and repetition, but then he's also a better problem solver. I know he'll be fine later on. We just have to keep swimming in these early years. :)

 

I got lucky with my youngest... He's my most language-oriented kid. He talks everyone's ear off (and it's gotten worse now that he's 4!). He picked up reading pretty easily, and he writes well too. I'm not sure what to do with a kid that actually likes to write. :lol:

 

[Korrale]

Anecdotal evidence that the late talker, harder to teach reader theory is not set in stone. My son was reading before he was talking. To clarify, he was unable to say anything spontaneously except "gah" and "dada". However when I taught him to read he started saying letter sounds, but ONLY when he saw the letter. And then he was saying words, ONLY when he saw the word.

[Lisa in the UP of MI]

Do you use AAS as written when you start with youngers just starting to read? As in, making sure they know all of the sounds for the phonograms before moving past lesson 4? We love AAS and I always thought it could work well as a reading program, but I couldn't quite figure out how to wing it (or didn't want to exert the mental effort :p). So I bought AAR, which I like, but it's not a love affair like AAS.

 

BTW, we're doing similar cultures/zoology study as well, tying in Home Art Studio... I'm slightly disappointed with it (HAS). How is Sassafras working out?

 

Sorry, just saw this.  I haven't been on much lately.  I do use AAS as written.  They learn all of the sounds and I use it to teach spelling.  Other than reading games that I play at a different time, we don't officially work on reading as a separate subject until they start reading.  They choose when to pick up a book and read it.

 

We actually haven't started our world cultures study yet.  We are finishing up American history and general science from last year.

[Seeking Squirrels]

We started with 100ez and we both hated it. We switched to HOP for a while. Dd liked it but I wasn't a big fan. It was working for her though so we stuck with it through grade 1 level 1. Before breaking into level 2 I asked if she wanted to try a switch because she'd started resisting reading lessons and didn't seem to be progressing anymore. She said yes so we switched to OPGTR. That's working well. I still don't think she's as far as she could be, but I feel more confident that she's getting a solid foundation than I did with hop.

[Esse Quam Videri]

Sorry, just saw this.  I haven't been on much lately.  I do use AAS as written.  They learn all of the sounds and I use it to teach spelling.  Other than reading games that I play at a different time, we don't officially work on reading as a separate subject until they start reading.  They choose when to pick up a book and read it.

 

We actually haven't started our world cultures study yet.  We are finishing up American history and general science from last year.

 

Maybe I should try this! She's a strong speller (with simple CVC words) but I worry she would have a really hard time remembering all the phonograms (aside from the first sounds). Hmmmm... I just worry that if I switch programs or try something new that DOESN'T work, then we've lost valuable time (since my goal really is to have her reading by the end of Kindy). I worry that even trying to introduce different phonograms will confuse her.

[Lisa in the UP of MI]

Maybe I should try this! She's a strong speller (with simple CVC words) but I worry she would have a really hard time remembering all the phonograms (aside from the first sounds). Hmmmm... I just worry that if I switch programs or try something new that DOESN'T work, then we've lost valuable time (since my goal really is to have her reading by the end of Kindy). I worry that even trying to introduce different phonograms will confuse her.

 

This is how I've taught both of my older kids and will be teaching the 5yo soon.  It did/does not confuse them.  Most of the single letter phonograms only have one sound, so it isn't really too hard if they already know the most common sound.  That being said, they don't have to be perfect on the phonograms that have more than one sound before moving on.  The other sounds aren't used early in the level and most not until other levels.  Just keep practicing the phonograms that she struggles with (if she does) while moving on.  If she already knows how to spell cvc words (which my kids did when we started level 1) then the first half or so will be pretty easy.  But that's okay.  I thought it was good to introduce a new spelling routine, letter tiles, etc. with spelling words that were easy for them.

[boscopup]

Anecdotal evidence that the late talker, harder to teach reader theory is not set in stone. My son was reading before he was talking. To clarify, he was unable to say anything spontaneously except "gah" and "dada". However when I taught him to read he started saying letter sounds, but ONLY when he saw the letter. And then he was saying words, ONLY when he saw the word.

 

No one said it was set in stone. My original statement was:

 

"kids with speech delays often have reading delays also"

I do think that learning to read can be very helpful to kids with speech delays. My middle son moved ahead in speech when we started learning phonics. While it didn't help his reading move that quickly (almost 3 years later, he's not reading independently yet), it did help his speech quite a bit. He thinks in pictures, so "seeing" the sound he was trying to make helped him remember that sound for that word. Unfortunately, he doesn't remember the word itself. :tongue_smilie:

 

The point of my original statement was that if your kid had a speech delay and is struggling to read in K-1st, the two may be related. That is all. I never at all meant to imply that if your kid is speech delayed, reading will be very difficult. That certainly isn't the case.

[eleileen]

Just try focusing on phonics -- starfall/leapfrog is very helpful initially.

my late talker (DS1) who didn't use basic words till around 3 & started speaking around 3.5 was a CVC reader by 4.5 & at 5 now, reads fluently at mid grade 1 level. the I see sam & early bob books is quite helpful as well (DS1 brings home 1 bob book a day (set 3/4/5) which he flies through -- he probably misses 1-2 words in the entire book). we love reading mo willems books because it's styled like a comic book & is pretty funny.

I gave away my 100ez book because *I* felt like crying when we used that! we mainly learned from the HOP books/leapfrog/starfall/early-reading.com series & explode the code for reinforcement.