Instructions

• This is play, not work. This should be a fun experience all the time. Stop if anybody gets frustrated. Try a different game next time or maybe at a better time. Only you know what your child likes best.
  
• Play the games your child has the most fun at. We played all of these games at least once, but played the games that they liked the best 90% of the time. We just adapted it for letters/sounds/colors/shapes/etc.
  
• If your child is hungry, tired or sick - don't play. It is easier to get frustrated at these times. (Especially for parents)
  
• Sessions should be kept short (5-15 minutes), but played frequently (3 times a day). If you can't manage than, then try one 30 minute session and see how it goes.
  
• This program doesn’t take a lot of time for a child to learn to read. It works best when parents are excited about the games and consistent about playing them. A lot of praise is needed.
  
• These games can be adapted to anything you are teaching: letters, numbers, sounds (phonics), words, colors, shapes, etc.
  
• These games may seem very simple, but children love them.
  
• HAVE FUN!!!!

After the letter names have been learned you can go into learning the sounds. You can explain to your child that a cow doesn’t say “cooooow”, it says “moooooo”. The letters are the same way the “B” doesn’t say “B”; it says “buh”, and so on. The Leapfrog video "Letter Factory" is VERY helpful for teaching letter sounds.

** The Blends and Silent E are to be played after basic phonics is learned.

• Blends: Blends can be learned by using any games listed in these instructions.
• Silent E: Silent E words can be learned by using any games listed in these instructions or by playing the Magic E game.

How, When & What to Teach

With Hannah, I taught her the alphabet, colors & shapes before she turned 2 (but not reading). I tried to teach whole words to Hannah right after she turned 2, but I fizzed out on that. I started teaching phonics and whole words right after she turned 3. Children are capable of understanding the English language by the time they are 1, so don't let anyone tell you that you're child can't learn to read before they are 5!!

For ages 2/3 and up:

1. Colors, Shapes and Letter Names/Alphabet - in no particular order
2. Letter sounds
3. Simple phonics with Whole Words added in.
4. Blends
5. Magic E
6. By this time they are reading everything with little help from you. Great job!

For all of these I would play the games listed under Games - Explanations. All of these games can be adapted for any thing you are teaching (with the exception of Magic E). There are over 30 games so please scroll down to the bottom and click "older posts". Find that game that is right for you! That game can be played over and over and over...

Just a note: You do NOT need to teach the letter names first. Children do not need to know the letter names to know how to read, they need to know the sounds the letters make. I always taught the letter names first because I wanted to, and that's how I figured it was supposed to be done.

For ages under 2:

Buy or borrow Glenn Doman's books. They are WONDERFUL!! Just because I couldn't keep it up doesn't mean that you can't. Do what is best for you and your child. Anything else (in my opinion) just won't work. It's not going to work if it's not fun :)

Whole Words vs. Phonics

Apparently there is a big debate over how to teach children reading. Should they be taught Whole Words or Phonics? Whole words is teaching a child the word as a whole, not by sounding it out. Phonics, of course, is teaching a child to read by sounding out the letters of a word.

Glenn Doman teaches Whole Word exclusively.

Sidney Ledson teaches Phonics exclusively.

Felicity Hughes teaches both.

I teach both and I think both are needed. Some words in the English language don't follow any rules of phonics and therefore you cannot get around whole words no matter how much you want to :) For ages 2 and under I would only teach Glenn Doman's method. For children ages 2 or 3 and up I would teach both. For children 3 and up I would teach phonics only.

If you want a deeper explanation or debate that this, you will have to read these authors books. I say whatever works for you then go for it. Both methods work, as these authors have proven over and over.

Our Daily Plan

This is our daily "Plan of Attack"

Here is our 2009 Daily Plan

• Work on a few pages in our Hooked on Phonics book
• Play a few File Folder Games
• Work on our Numbers (1-100)
• Read Bedtime Stories

All of this (not counting bedtime stories) takes about 30 minutes. We do this everyday, unless someone gets sick or we go out of town.

This was our Daily Plan in 2008. We changed it because Hannah loves the Hooked on Phonics, so we will be using that for 2009

• Work on 9 "Whole Words" using Glenn Doman's method - adding one new word daily.
• Work on a set of phonics words daily - adding a new set every couple days.
• Put a new sentence on the dry erase board daily.
• Add the previous day's sentence to Hannah's notebook.
• Point out words we have learned during bedtime story time.

Don't forget to read the instructions (aka rules)

Hannah's Daily Sentences

Each night I write a new sentence on Hannah's Dry Erase Board. I also write the phonics words that we are working on. The sentence is only made up of words that Hannah already knows and can read. After Hannah read the sentence, it goes into our homemade notebook. This was she can keep reading the sentences after she erases the board. The sentence is either:

1. A silly sentence (like so)

2. A sentence out of a book that Hannah is going to read.

This sentence is from the book "Just Like Dora".

Before she reads a book she will have read each sentence on our Dry Erase Board first. This way it will be easier for her to read a "whole, big, book" all by herself. She will have already read it on the Dry Erase Board without knowing it.

Don't worry if your child doesn't leave the sentence up. This is what our dry erase board looks like 5 minutes after she reads her sentence and words (that's why we have our homemade notebook!)

Games - Overview

Most of the games that I have posted can be used with anything you want to teach - letters, sounds, words, colors, shapes etc. I have also listed where I received the game idea from. Most of the books that I got ideas from are out of print, but I'm sure you want still find them on ebay or the library. There are over 35 different games listed so make sure that you click "older posts" when you get to the bottom of a page, so you don't miss any games.

Review of Games

Click on the link above for a quick review of most of the games that I played with my boys. Any new games that I played with Hannah are covered on the blog.

Here are some notes from when I was teaching my son to read:

• I would never criticize Takeshi. If he got one wrong I would simply say the correct answer. He would or wouldn’t repeat it, either way I would say “great job” or “very good”.


• Sometimes he would say a word/letter/sound that I didn’t think he knew and I would say, “How did you know that ____?” Takeshi would just smile, he thought it was so fun to trick me :)


• A lot of times Takeshi would say, “I’m the mama.” And you’re “Kakeshi”. I would still get him to write or say it himself by saying “Mama, can you show me how…” or “Mama, what is this?” Takeshi would be more than happy to help me.