AimeeM Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 DS is 5. He knows his letters, sounds for the letters, "magic E", ee, ay, and a couple more; he is blending (slowly) CVC words. I know on the site it says to start 5 year old pupils in A1 (industrial strength version of Book A), but it also specifies that this books is for children at the very beginning of reading (learning letters, sounds). Should I just use Book A instead? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TGHEALTHYMOM Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 I am not an expert on this, but we are using Dancing Bears A right now with DS6 who has no LD and DD9 who is rebellious about reading. Funnix software is working great for ds4. It is Reading and Math. The DB books before level A look very similar to the Funnix Reading lessons to me. I printed out the worksheets for Funnix as well. Educents had Funnix Math and Reading ( level 1 -2 ) absolutely FREE last December. I have a question after looking at your Sig.... Do you like PAL reading and writing? I almost bought it but decided on DB for simplicity since we have 8 children and very busy lives! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheryl in CA Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 DS is 5. He knows his letters, sounds for the letters, "magic E", ee, ay, and a couple more; he is blending (slowly) CVC words. I know on the site it says to start 5 year old pupils in A1 (industrial strength version of Book A), but it also specifies that this books is for children at the very beginning of reading (learning letters, sounds). Should I just use Book A instead? You could email the author. She has been very helpful to me! From what you have said, I'm thinking Bear Necessities A1 would be a better fit, but I'm not an expert! This year I started my 7 year old dd in Dancing Bears A. She was previously easily reading CVC words, silent e, and some consonant blends. She is doing well, but it might move too fast for your son since he is younger and more of a beginner. If you do Bear Necessities A1, you'll either need to go into Bear Necessities A2 or test into the appropriate level of Dancing Bears A. Bear Necessities A1 and A2 are basically Dancing Bears A broken into two parts, so you can't go from Bear Necessities A1 into Dancing Bears B. I hope that makes sense. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AimeeM Posted September 17, 2014 Author Share Posted September 17, 2014 I am not an expert on this, but we are using Dancing Bears A right now with DS6 who has no LD and DD9 who is rebellious about reading. Funnix software is working great for ds4. It is Reading and Math. The DB books before level A look very similar to the Funnix Reading lessons to me. I printed out the worksheets for Funnix as well. Educents had Funnix Math and Reading ( level 1 -2 ) absolutely FREE last December. I have a question after looking at your Sig.... Do you like PAL reading and writing? I almost bought it but decided on DB for simplicity since we have 8 children and very busy lives! I *did* like PAL. My son, on the other hand, did not enjoy the games (go figure - ugh), and he had little retention with it. I think it would be fabulous for a game loving child. With that said, it's a ton of prep at the beginning, but once the games are made (I pre-made all of them, only to end up selling the program, so I have a huge stack of games that I'm selling to someone who bought the program but found she had no time to make the games, lol) it is literally "open and go". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AimeeM Posted September 17, 2014 Author Share Posted September 17, 2014 You could email the author. She has been very helpful to me! From what you have said, I'm thinking Bear Necessities A1 would be a better fit, but I'm not an expert! This year I started my 7 year old dd in Dancing Bears A. She was previously easily reading CVC words, silent e, and some consonant blends. She is doing well, but it might move too fast for your son since he is younger and more of a beginner. If you do Bear Necessities A1, you'll either need to go into Bear Necessities A2 or test into the appropriate level of Dancing Bears A. Bear Necessities A1 and A2 are basically Dancing Bears A broken into two parts, so you can't go from Bear Necessities A1 into Dancing Bears B. I hope that makes sense. I couldn't find the e-mail on the site (only a UK phone number). Do you by any chance have the e-mail addy, or can you tell me where to find it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alisoncooks Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 DS is 5. He knows his letters, sounds for the letters, "magic E", ee, ay, and a couple more; he is blending (slowly) CVC words. I know on the site it says to start 5 year old pupils in A1 (industrial strength version of Book A), but it also specifies that this books is for children at the very beginning of reading (learning letters, sounds). Should I just use Book A instead? Given what your son knows, I would start in Book A and just move slowly & review when needed. My oldest started DB A at age 7... but she only knew CVC and some CCVC words. Same with youngest DD, when she started Book A at age 6. Neither of them knew "magic E" or ee, ay, etc. I will say I tried Book A1 with youngest DD for kindergarten last year and it flopped. I don't know why... but she's done much better with DB A this year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheryl in CA Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 I couldn't find the e-mail on the site (only a UK phone number). Do you by any chance have the e-mail addy, or can you tell me where to find it? I can't find my email to her at right now, but here is the one inside Dancing Bears A (at the bottom of the copyright page). I'll look some more and will let you know if the one I used before was different. sales@soundfoundationsbooks.co.uk ETA that I finally found my email, and that is the email address I used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AimeeM Posted September 18, 2014 Author Share Posted September 18, 2014 I can't find my email to her at right now, but here is the one inside Dancing Bears A (at the bottom of the copyright page). I'll look some more and will let you know if the one I used before was different. sales@soundfoundationsbooks.co.uk ETA that I finally found my email, and that is the email address I used. Thanks for this! I e-mailed her and you're right - she is very helpful. She told me to start with Book A (not A1). She said I may be able to skip the first bit of Book A, because it's blending, but I don't think I will - his blending isn't fluid, so I want to work on that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheryl in CA Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 Thanks for this! I e-mailed her and you're right - she is very helpful. She told me to start with Book A (not A1). She said I may be able to skip the first bit of Book A, because it's blending, but I don't think I will - his blending isn't fluid, so I want to work on that. You're very welcome! I knew she would be better able to advise you than I would :-) I hope you like Dancing Bears as much as we do! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AimeeM Posted September 18, 2014 Author Share Posted September 18, 2014 You're very welcome! I knew she would be better able to advise you than I would :-) I hope you like Dancing Bears as much as we do! I love Apples and Pears, so I think we will enjoy Dancing Bears :) How long did it take to receive once you placed an order? Did you only do the suggested 10 minutes a day? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheryl in CA Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 I love Apples and Pears, so I think we will enjoy Dancing Bears :) How long did it take to receive once you placed an order? Did you only do the suggested 10 minutes a day? I think it was 10 to 14 days (I placed more than one order and I think one came faster than the other). If you are closer to where they ship (I think this batch came from PA and I'm in CA), you could get them sooner. Somewhere on the BB (I don't remember which thread or who it was that said it), someone said that the author told them that they could do two 10 minute sessions if it was their only phonics instruction. I didn't ask her this question so I don't have first hand knowledge about her saying this. Usually I do two 10 minute sessions with my almost 8 year old dd. I don't strictly time them, so they often go over 10 minutes (often around 15). With my 6 year old who has some delays, I sometimes do two sessions, and sometimes one. I also don't usually go over 10 minutes with him. I'll usually do Dancing Bears first. That way, if we do another session, there will be a significant amount of time between sessions. There are more British words in Dancing Bears than Apples and Pears. We've had fun looking them up, but you can just skip them. The one different spelling I've seen so far is kerb for curb. I just wrote our spelling above it and it wasn't a problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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