Shasta Mom Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 DD is 5 1/2, in ps, and a little above average in her class (she's in the 2nd highest academic group out of 4 in her kgarten class). We're starting to hs about 2 months before kgarten ends, and will do so through the summer in a "light" fashion. I don't know what will happen in 1st grade. So, I want to spend no more than 1 hr a day with her on academics, and I'm wondering what the hive recommends. I thought I would do some math, and then for language arts I'm not sure what to do. She doesn't read yet (except a few simple words), but is fascinated with language and writing. She will talk to me in the middle of the night when she crawls in bed with us and tell me how so-and-so mis-spelled their name the previous day at school.... I'm comfortable with my reading lists - thanks to all those wonderful lists on the internet, but am wondering about putting the pencil to the page. I think she would enjoy the "workbook" aspect of a program.....Any ideas? Thanks so much!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TxMama Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 Summer Bridges is inexpensive and could fill in the gap until you decide what to do next year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
myfatherslily Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 I would probably focus on reading. I'm not experienced in this area, as my oldest is not quite 5, but that is my top thing to focus on right now:) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chiguirre Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 If she's ready for short vowel CVC words, try Explode the Code 1 or Plaid Phonics A along with Bob books or Nora Gaydos readers. ETC has funny b&w pictures, Plaid has color pictures, ETC has 8 books and the typical 1st grade would cover 1-3, Plaid A is a whole year course. Both are very good and just the right amount of writing for my 5yo girl. We're using ETC 1 now because I had it on hand. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amber in AUS Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 You could look at working though Teach your Child to Read in 100 Easy lessons, 10 mins or so per lessons. Start Explode the Code or Get Set for the Code another 10 mins or so, you would need to look at if she knows letter sounds? If she can write all her letters? That will help with placement. Then you could look at Singapore Early Bird for math (perhaps just 1 book), bright, colourful and fun, just start her where you think and work a few pages each day. Then do a read a loud. That would give you a solid LA & math program and would be less than 1 hour duration each day for the summer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shasta Mom Posted February 19, 2009 Author Share Posted February 19, 2009 Amber - I'm a little nervous about placement in Explode the Code. I don't want to spend $18 on a placement test.......She knows and can write pretty much all her upper and lower case letters, and generally know the sounds they make. She just doesn't put it all together yet...........any ideas on placement? And, yes, we'll continue Singapore. We did the 1a,b of the early bird..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aurelia Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 ABeCeDarian level A has a workbook where the child practices handwriting in addition to reading. It's designed to take 24 weeks if you do one lesson a day, 5 days a week, and should get the child from K level reading/non-reading to mid-first grade. We combined/skipped some lessons and ended up finishing in about 12 weeks because Ariel had already mastered some of the material, like the individual letter sounds. They recommend BOB books or I See Sam readers for practice. It is also very good about teaching segmenting and blending - good skills for both reading and spelling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aurelia Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 Amber - I'm a little nervous about placement in Explode the Code. I don't want to spend $18 on a placement test.......She knows and can write pretty much all her upper and lower case letters, and generally know the sounds they make. She just doesn't put it all together yet...........any ideas on placement? And, yes, we'll continue Singapore. We did the 1a,b of the early bird..... If she knows all the consonant sounds, she would start with book 1, but if she needs to work on them, look at the Before the Code books. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheCoffeeChick Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 Amber - I'm a little nervous about placement in Explode the Code. I don't want to spend $18 on a placement test.......She knows and can write pretty much all her upper and lower case letters, and generally know the sounds they make. She just doesn't put it all together yet...........any ideas on placement? And, yes, we'll continue Singapore. We did the 1a,b of the early bird..... Start with Book 1 rather than the Before the Code books. It starts with the short vowel sounds with CVC words and is very gentle. Book 2 goes onto 2 letter beginning and ending blends. Book 3 has long vowel, silent e words, digraphs/trigraphs, and long vowel digraphs (ee, ea, ai, ay, oa, ow). Seriously, I can't believe they charge for a placement test!?!? :eek: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joannqn Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 At that age, I kept it simple with inexpensive workbooks and lot of library books. My daughter used McGraw-Hill's All about the Alphabet followed by All about Phonics workbooks and a k-2 math workbook they put out. My son used Spectrum's phonics grade k and Spectrum's math grade k workbooks over the summer between preschool and K/1. It was a transition time from public school to homeschool. He moved straight into first grade work from there. Each costs about $10 each and is colorful and simple to do...not too much writing. Neither of them needed a specific or more involved phonics program to read. Both of them read chapter books by the time they were 6 so they worked well for us. My daughter has since moved on from workbooks but my son still loves them so we've continued with the Spectrum series with good results. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ElizabethB Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 Webster's Speller is free and leads right into the phonics needed for multi-syllable words. While it is not at all workbook-y, my daughter really enjoyed working from the whiteboard in K, and she also enjoyed the syllables. We laughed together at the very funny sounding ones. The start with 2 letter syllables makes blending much easier to teach. For a good explanation of how to teach beginning phonics, read through the instructions with Blend Phonics and Word Mastery, free from Don Potter's page. They are also both good beginning phonics programs, but would need to be followed on with a complete program like PP, OPG, or Webster. http://www.donpotter.net/education_pages/ And, here's my explanation of how to teach a beginning student to read, with a link to a fun free game. http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Reading/newstudents.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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