Hi there!

The Little Lounge Introduce Yourself
1

Hi! I’m new to the BrillKids forum and wanted to introduce myself.

I’m an elementary school music teacher and mom to 2 1/2 year old Ellie. We are big Signing Time fans, and own the whole series. Ellie signs very well, and even started to memorize the words that were presented on the DVDs (as in reading them). Since she seemed to be picking up reading so well, we tried Your Baby Can Read. She could read every flashcard that comes with the set after only a few viewings of the videos. We read kindergarten level books together now. She does really well, but I didn’t know where to turn next.

She already knows all of the words on the Trial version of Little Reader, and I’m wondering if the full program will be helpful to her, or be too easy. She likes using the Little Reader iPad app a lot. I’ve been looking at ABCMouse.com, but I’m not sure if that would be too advanced.

I love the Little Music software and am planning on purchasing that when it becomes available. I would be even happier if they came out with an iPad version of Little Music, too.

Anyway, if anyone has any advice for me, I’d love to hear from you. Thanks!

2

Maybe you should introduce systematic phonics. See my suggestions and that of others on excellent phonics primers on this thread: http://forum.brillkids.com/teaching-your-child-to-read/what-order-to-teach-phonics/msg81574/#msg81574. Most of the primers are free, yet very comprehensive.

Welcome to the forum!

Best,
nee1

3

Thank you nee! The don potter site was great! Thank you for the advice!

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I hope you found the other free phonics resources on the site. To do that, go to his education home page at http://www.donpotter.net/education_pages/, then to ‘Reading Instruction: Theory & Practice’. You’ll find the FREE phonics books under ‘Download Free Phonics Programs’. For example, you’ll find:

  1. Word Mastery: http://www.donpotter.net/pdf/word-mastery-typed.pdf (Very baby-friendly with large print)
  2. Remedial Reading Drills: http://www.donpotter.net/pdf/remedial_reading_drills.pdf,
  3. A host of others, e.g., Blend Phonics, Essential Phonics, How to teach Phonics
  4. And there is also the complete Flesch word list: http://donpotter.net/pdf_files/fleschphonicsexercises.pdf
    My favorites are 'Remedial Reading Drills (which was the very book Flesch used to teach Johnny), and the Flesch word list itself.

And see my posts on the thread below, where I listed more phonics resources such as

  1. DadDude’s ‘Fleschcards’ (flashcards made from the Flesch word lists): http://www.larrysanger.org/PhonicsFlashcards.zip
  2. Powerpoint files made from the Flesch Cards (its link is on the thread)
  3. The FREE phonics software called Reading Bear (its link is on the thread), etc
    Thread: http://forum.brillkids.com/general-discussion-b5/where-to-start-with-22-month-old-all-hints-tips-and-advice-gratefully-received/msg80194/#msg80194
5

Yes all of the above, but also if you are thinking LR will be too easy consir getting the second semester rather than the first one. The first semester has lots of familiar words like colours and words your little one may have seen already. The second semester ( and the end quarter of the first semester) has lots of other unusual words and couplets and stories. Thinks like “wall hook” were really interesting to my son who really didn’t want to see baby playpens…
Definately get the iAccess too, so you can play your corriculum on the iPad while out and about! Then use the computer time at home to play all the wonderful files other mums have uploaded onto this site. Things like weather words and phonics and site words and bugs and African animals and… It’s endless! If Ellie is learning words so fast be sure to expose her to lots of different categories so her comprehension grows as fast as her reading does…or at least try to keep up, lol