Flash Cards X PowerPoint

Early Learning Teaching Your Child to Read
1

Is there any difference between using Flash Cards or PowerPoint when teaching your child how to read?

Dear all

I am a new member (2 days old :slight_smile: ) and I am already loving some of the topics discussed… fantastic!

What do you all think about using PowerPoint rather than flash cards as normally recommended?

Do you think it is less effective?

Will the output be the same with PowerPoint?

I would love to hear your opinion on this, based on your experiences, as I am trying to figure it out which one is best or if at the end it does not matter.

Thank you members. :slight_smile:

Cheers

2

I’m mostly commenting to subscribe to thread as this is one of my questions as well.

But, to answer your question as best as I can, each method has pros and cons.
PowerPoint pro is that it’s easy to put together slides at effectively no cost (no printing, no raw materials, no laminating) and you can theoretically go through the slides extremely fast since you don’t have to flip anything.

The benefit for physical flashcards is that they’re easy to “shuffle” or re-arrange the order (though you can do this easily in PP) and the biggest benefit is that it’s physical. Children like to be able to touch and play with the cards themselves. Some parents adopt a strategy of handing the cards over to the child after going through them. There may be a logistical benefit as well: doing physical cards might be easier to do in some situations where using a computer or screen of sorts is too limiting or not practical.

I see no reason not to do PP “flash cards” using a large monitor or laptop - the question is if the benefits of tangible flashcards is worth the extra effort…

eager to see what people think.

3

Thanks a lot PokerDad

I totally agree with the points you made… It is quite relative I suppose.

My child is very active and can’t wait to grab the cards. Sometimes he is to egger to do it and then I struggle to simple show the cards/words… He is not the type that seats still for too long… PP seems to be working better. I have watched several videos where kids are just watching the cards been flipped and they don’t attempt to grab them. I can’t make my kid behave like that…

I guess the main thing is either way the child will learn isn’t it?

Thanks again.

4

I think both methods do have pros and cons.

Personally, I have just found that PowerPoint is so much more versatile, quick and easy to create personalized presentations and so we have concentrated on this (plus we also use and love LR). I would not have been able to use a quarter of the material if I’d had to print it all out. Actually my oldest (now 3) never really liked physical flashcards and has always preferred the computer. We keep the sessions very short (usually during breakfast). She likes to be in charge of clicking the button and advancing the slides.

I love the fact that you can use so many interesting pictures from Google images so I’ve been able to write phonics based flashcards, stories, poems, EK presentations, maths - all sorts of different things. We use PP to teach reading whole words, phonics, sentences etc, and she seems to have no difficulty relating this to the written word on paper and in books. I use a range of fonts but most often Comic Sans MS.

At the moment I’m having to make a lot of phonics presentations as I’m trying out a new format where she sees a short presentation once and the next day we move onto something else. This stops her simply memorizing the flashcards and encourages sight reading. It also stops her getting bored. We will loop around and see the presentations more than once over time to reinforce the learning. BUT it needs a LOT of work from me!!! I’d never manage this without PowerPoint.

I’ve never learned how to completely randomize a presentation though - is that possible?

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Hi Izp11

Thank you for your contribution to this topic.

It is quite reassurance to know about your experience as I am most inclined to use PP rather than FC. It is certainly faster to put it together, I agree.

I randomize manually just by dragging slides up and down. I am unaware of a more efficient alternative unfortunately to help you… sorry :(.

Thanks again.

Cheers

6

How big of a screen do you use? Or, what type of screen? Or, how do you go about doing the PP presentations?

I’ve noticed some parents on BK use tablets, which sounds nice but I’d rather wait on a tablet… do you use a laptop, or something else?

My initial idea is to use a laptop with an external monitor cable that attaches to a larger screen; my main desktop has 3 (I think) 23 inch screens and these seem to be a good size - or I could try to hook up to our regular TV but don’t think that would be very practical.

When using flash cards, the parent will hold the cards while facing the child. Do you emulate this with the PP presentation? In other words, do you get behind the screen so that the child can see you while also viewing the screen? Or do you prefer to have the child sit next to you or on your lap while you go through it together?

I’m just trying to get an idea of what’s working for you.
Thanks!

7

I am using a laptop… standard one and although it is not practical to attach it on the TV, I am considering doing it when I get to couplets and sentences (otherwise I think the computer screen will be too small).

At one point he lost interest so I started adding photos by moving the word down and then adding them on the space above.

I sit my kid on my lap while going through the presentation. To be honest, I did not consider being behind the screen at all. By being close to him, I find the interaction way more interesting than showing cards.

I hope that helps.

Have you started with the program? How is your experince going if so?

Cheers

8

We’ve done a combination of TV (47 in), laptop, flashcards shown while the kids were babies and in their high chair, bouncy seat, or excersaucer, giving them the flashcards when the lessons are over to play with, read, and do matching games, and flashcards put into the BrillKids Flap Binders (which are absolutely ideal and sooo worth it, along with the deluxe kit books). My kids really LOVE the flap binders, we still use them somewhat, printing costs of course add up a bit but they love to touch so I do what I can. As the kids got older, they participated in advancing the laptop more on their own with me present.

We have a computer hooked up to the TV “full time” (we’re a no cable family) but for BrillKids, we just use an HDMI cable. It’s really simple. Go for a middle of the road model, I bought a ridiculously cheap HDMI cable once for $7 lol and the connectivity was pixelated and lacking in everything, from no sound to the picture coming in and out. Aim a little higher than that, and get a super long one if needed if you have a stationary desktop that you need to connect. I think it’s totally worth it!

9

Thank you for the imput!

Your experience sounds like a very successful one.Fantastic!!

I particularly liked the idea of using flash cards at the last day session as they play with them afterwards.

Cheers

10

I am always using printale flash card which done by myself. I did not put my little baby in front of the computer as I worry she will only interesting on how to play with computer and not for learning. I hope i am doing the right thing…

11

Currently, my son and I aren’t doing much of either. He didn’t seem to be learning much from the screen. He did learn lots of vocabulary, which is of course great, but I am not sure what else. He doesn’t like flash cards so that is not an option for us either. Instead I have been paying close attention to how he likes to play and have been trying to build the cards into his play.

Here are some games we play. He learns from them because every time he looks at or handles a card I read it to him:

-Cards with a string loop attached to the top. He hangs them on a hook.

-Large poster of Elmo (love Elmo) taped to a box with his mouth cut out. He feeds Elmo with cards taped to toilet paper rolls.

-An empty floss container filled with laminated letters. He likes to put them in and take them out.

-He also puts the letter cards through a slot in a piggy bank.

-Cards taped to empty soda bottles. He knocks them over with a ball like bowling. It is supposed to be like bowling anyway. He refuses to let go of the ball so its more like punching. lol

-Boxes with holes cut out and and some cards slightly covering the holes. He puts balls through the paper into the holes.

-I have a word taped to his basketball hoop. (I need to change it.)

-Cards taped to the mirror in the bathroom. We drive his toy cars from card to card.

-ping pong balls with letters written on them. He uses a little net to fish them out of the water in the bath. Of course sometimes the letters may be facing different directions. I sometimes show him “This is u,” flip it over, “now it is n”. He gets it because he imitates me.

-cards taped to hangers. He likes to help hang the hangers in the closet.

All of this is a lot of work of course. But it is fun for him and he is learning from it. So for me it is worth it. I am not sure why he didn’t seem to learn from the screen. I tend to think on a tablet it would be more interactive and he would learn better…or even if he could use the mouse. I am sure there are a hundred more ways to play. What you do depends on the age of the child. I try to get ideas by watching my son and seeing what he is already doing.

12

These are all fantastically creative, amazing ways to teach your child (although lots of work of course) but how inspiring to everyone here. I love them all!! Karma to you!

13

In my case, flashing flash cards in front of my baby doesn’t seem to work very well, she lost her attention very fast and was more keen on trying to snatch the cards from me, so I’m using powerpoint, which is a little better at catching her attention, though I’m not sure if she’s learning much.

However, I noticed that my baby, who is 10 months old, loves pointing at stuff around the house and says “eh?”, which in her language means “What it is?” So I began sticking cards with words around the house, “mirror” on the mirror, “photo” under a family photo, “fish” next to a fish tank. This is so far the most effective in getting her attention. She points at all these cards to ask “eh”. So I guess, depending on each baby, we have to find out ourselves how he/she wants to learn stuff.

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Thanks mybabyian, I like your ideas and I will defiantly be useing some of them myself.

I personaly use lot of velcro stickers, my 14 month old just loves pulling cutout pictures of animals off the walls and sticking them back somewhere different. I have pictures and words laminated together with the word on the back with a bit of velcro. She comunicates with only a few words but mostly with SL and body movements. I’ve started leaving her cardboard flash cards out so she can just grab them and read them whenever she wants. I do have just paper flash cards that wouldnt live up to the hands of a toddler so I stick them up higher on the walls for her to visually find. I rotate different words all around her bedroom for her to read. The word “kicking” was stuck up high late last night and this morning she got a lot of enjoyment out of finding it and getting my attention while doing the kicking action with her leg.

I think put words everywhere you can, the more they see it the better they will learn it and the more they will ask what the word is. The words don’t have to be on cardboard, I sometimes just write on masking tape and stick that everywhere.

15

I am sure I read somewhere on this forum a while back about a program you could use that automatically shuffled PowerPoint slides. Does anyone else remember it? It had links to the program too.

16

I agree whole-heartedly! I think of it as an immersion environment for literacy. :slight_smile: Books, flashcards, screens, labeling in the house, games, and anything else you can think of!

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I know this is an old thread but I was hoping to see if anyone had any suggestions on dealing with a baby who snatches flash cards. I bought a ton of EK Bit cards from the GR website and I want to continue using them. I looked at laminating them, but given their size (11 X 11), I am finding it a bit tough to buy sleeves. I bought a few bit bags from the GR website but they couldn’t last 5 minutes with my son (he ripped one out).