Questions About Early Reading, Math & Speech

Here are some more questions from a reader .  My replies are in purple.

Hi,

I stumbled on your blog a few days ago, which is immensely helpful, and am hoping you can answer some questions for me.

My child is 24 months old and is speaking about 15-20 words, so working on speech is a priority for us.

I am wondering a couple of things:

- when did your DD begin to speak single words?

She was about 7 months when she spoke her first word, & if I remember right, she had about 8 or 10 by one year - I wrote it down, but I forgot where - oops.  

 .

- was she reading before she was speaking? if so, how did you know that she could read - did u test for actions or something?

I'm sure she was, but I feel very strongly that testing should be done very rarely, if at all.  I did test briefly, on one occasion when K was about 15 months & was certain then that she was reading some words.  We really didn't test again until she was about 2 & started voluntarily saying words out loud. It was really only in about January that we started consistently getting her to read books for us each day. Until that time, we waited until she was in the right mood to read to us.  I think it is much more important to make sure it is a good experience & that the child does not feel pressured than to have to know how they are doing.  It can be a very frustrating leap of faith, but a lifelong love of learning & reading is much more important. If I was going to try to test, I'd be sneaky & teach action words & model the action, hoping for a response.

-- what things did you think were most helpful for getting her to speak more words?

Probably the most important thing  wasn't anything I did! K is the youngest of 4 daughters & she hears a lot of talking from all of the family.  My next oldest daughter KJ, is a "gifted talker", & K has been known to say "KJ, please stop talking." lol!

Some things that we did that I think helped were:

 - talking to her a lot & explain things to her - we talked about just about everything even as a very tiny infant.  We talked about sounds we heard, we described what we were doing when changing or dressing her, we talked about colours, body parts, familiar objects, foods, you name it - even very uncommon subjects.  For example, last summer just after she turned 4, we  had a conversation about some irrigation equipment we saw on the side of the road.  

- to give her lots of time to respond to us verbally.  Even when she was too young to speak, we would listen very patiently for her to make some sort of noise & have a conversation.

Google Dr. James McDonald's site - his Communicating Partners method is wonderful. He also has an active Yahoo group you can join.

Longvida curcumin & fish oil are two supplements to research that can be helpful for speech.

- i have been doing Glenn Doman's sight words program with physical word cards (only the words - no pictures) for a few months now, and just saw the post on Little Reader. I am curious about why you stuck with the physical cards only for a while, and at what point you transitioned to the Little Reader program itself?

We actually stayed with physical word cards for a very long time.  Until K was about 3.5 years, she would not even look at a flashcard that did not have a picture on the other side!  From age 3.5 to 4, we started to do more word only cards, & only in the last 6 months have we transitioned right over to Little Reader.  We will still rarely do cards, but not often.  We still do home made, laminated books occasionally, but more often to help teach or prepare K for things like her recent trip to the dentist, which, thanks to all the  preparation with her personalized "My Visit to the Dentist" book, went very well.  The biggest reason we switched is that she was getting to the point that she was sounding words out & had so many sight words that her vocabulary was tested at age 4.5 at a 4th grade level.  I felt that it was better to just stick with longer sentences on Little Reader or getting her to read us stories. Even on Little Reader, besides finishing up a series of phonics files, most of what I pick to show her is more geography, science & French words because we are starting to focus more on learning a 2nd language.
 

 

This is a picture of many of our flashcards - those are bundles 

of cards, not just individual cards - we have thousands!

- on Little Reader, do u do all the methods each day - flash cards, multisensory and picture flash cards?

- when did you start Little Math?

 When we got the Little Reader program, it was just in it's initial beta testing stage.  The didn't have the semesters yet, so we just made our own play lists.  By the time the semesters were finished, K was too far along in her reading, so I just used some of their files & still created my own play lists &  more & more I find that I need to create my own files to keep her challenged  & entertained

We have puttered with Little Math off & on, but didn't officially get the full program until last summer.  It just seemed like I had too many things going on & didn't really focus on Math.  We also did the Doman red dot cards when K was little, but again, I wasn't real consistent.  Doman dots & Little Math are meant to be done with very little kids - under age 2 for typical kids.  We have & do still use Little Math, but have now gone to a program called Math N' More which was recommended by K's neurodevelopmentalist.  We have been consistently doing 1 or 2 pages a day since about October of last year along with some other math activities & it is going very well.

I recognize you are probably superbusy but would be most grateful for any light you can shed to help me out.

THank you,

The other thing I would like to add is that it is really important to use pictures to help teach comprehension.  I think it is easier to teach to word meaning & develop comprehension at the same time rather than have a child that can parrot back words but doesn't understand what they are reading. Because K insisted on having the pictures too, we accidentally helped her to have really good comprehension of what she reads. She reads directions all the time - it is her job to read directions in her math book & follow through & she does a great job of it.

Good Luck & I'd love to hear an update down the road!

Huge Big Brag! Drum Roll Please..................

 As I write this post, I find myself in awe of my little girl once again.  I think I have said before, that I only learned about early reading when K was a baby, so I was never able to try it with my older girls.  I had never seen a child a 4 year that could read even very simple books.  It still seems so amazing even to me & I see it every day. 

Anyways..............here is the big news:

K had her neurodevelopmental evaluation yesterday. Back in September, K was evaluated as reading at a 2nd grade level. She is now reading at grade level 3.9!  Meaning 3rd grade, 9th month! That's almost 2 grade levels in 4 months!

I should explain though, that this doesn't mean that she would willingly pick up a 3rd grade chapter book & read it from cover to cover - she has the ability to read the majority of the words, but she prefers not to. She does easily read shorter grade 3 level stories though. She can read at that level of vocabulary, she just chooses not read that length of story. Although I think K has a good understanding of what she reads, I'm not sure if she would follow the storyline of a long chapter book, but at this point, I have learned not to underestimate her either.  She  also still prefers to read books with larger print. This could be vision related though, & I am planning on trying to get her in with the pediatric opthamologist a little sooner if I can.

31 for 21 - "W is for Wabbit"

I know its supposed to be 31 for 21, but I have completed my next 2 posts & want to do a Halloween post on Monday, so I'm going to add an extra.  35 or so for 21 is OK right?  This is a neat story so I really want to share it. You would think that I'd have run out of things to  talk about already:)!

Although K's speech is quite good for her age, we do have a lot of things to work on.  For example, she is starting to be able to say her R's, but still has quite a bit of trouble. It does lead to some funny situations sometimes. Tonight, Kassie asked me to play an alphabet game that she enjoys.   When we came to the letter W, she said "W  -  Wabbit"  I told her "No,  R - Rabbit".  Of course she insisted that W was for Wabbit & carried on through the alphabet. 

Although she was wrong about the spelling, it really showed that she is comprehending how to figure out the first letter of a word, because I'm sure none of us played this game using the word "Wabbit" or wrote "Wabbit" as a sight word.  She was able to sound the word out in her head & come up with what she thought was the first letter.

31 for 21 - BrillKids Little Reader Program Review & Giveaway

I have been asked by BrillKids to review their Little Reader program.  Anyone who has been reading my blog for a while already knows that I love this program!

Of course K loves it too!

Little Reader is a computer based program which is intended for kids from around 3 to 6 months & up Little Reader Basic starts at $149. This program allows a parent to customize a play list of words & images to suit the needs or interests of their child. We have been using this program with their print function to make wonderful, clear, concise flashcards as well as by using the computer program since a little after K's first birthday. With this program you are able to flash the words quickly. Before we found out about BrillKids, we were fast flashing anyways, so it is nice to carry on with that as we have had so much success with it. Words & pictures are flashed on the screen & the word is spoken at the same time. You can choose between available pictures or add your own.  Fonts can be changed or set to display randomly.  You can even record your own voice if you wish. Little Reader has a set curriculum, or you can choose between thousands of files that are available. We are now using Little Reader as a computer program as it is intended, but in the past, I printed out & laminated many files to make wonderful, high quality flashcards.

 This is a picture of K reading a small selection of her Little Reader flashcards that we used when she was about 2 years old.

We are currently working on stories, various science, geography & other subjects, while doing several sets of phonics/word families each week as well.  The focus on phonics is really paying off as I am noticing that K is finding it easier & easier to decode new words. I am so impressed with the versatility of this program!

Besides teaching our daughter to read, we have noticed a number of other wonderful benefits as well!

We have found Little Reader to be excellent for working on speech. Because a word is spoken each time a picture of word is flashed, K also speaks the word.  Recently, we have been recording more of our own words. I have been having K do this herself & she loves to hear herself speaking on the computer!  The more I am able to get my daughter talking, the better! This is in addition to the proven benefits of teaching sight words to help strong visual learners like K learn to speak. 

Although I got the Little Reader program for K, her eight year old sister, KJ is also benefiting from it.  She is not using it for reading practice as she has been reading chapter books for quite a while now, but  this summer, KJ expressed interest in learning a little french.  For the past month or so, she has been using little reader too.  The wonderful thing is that, although I do speak the limited amount of french that I learned in high school, I do not speak with the accent of a native speaker & the wonderful french files I found at BrillKids are really helping me to teach her.  We are both very excited about her progress so far!

I have even used Little Reader for my oldest two daughters on occasion!  They are avid, actually advanced readers for their ages, but I have occasionally found some files, often science related that were relevant to what they were doing in school.  We have viewed them on the computer as well as printed them off to take to school for everyone to enjoy.

 I could talk all day about this program!   The biggest benefit to me is again, the versatility.  This is the only program that has been able to keep up with K as she progressed from learning a few words, to last night, being able to pick up a 3rd grade reader that KJ brought home & read it with ease. I can happily credit BrillKids credit for a huge part of my daughter's reading success.

Click on this link for lots of information, links & details on how to sign up for the Little Reader free 14 day trial: Little Reader

BrillKids has a wonderful forum: BrillKids Forum 

BrillKids also has a blog which you can find here:  BrillKids Blog

This review was written in exchange for a free copy of Little Reader's first semester, which all of you, my fabulous readers can enter in a draw to win! I was not paid for this review, nor was I required to write a positive review.  This is my honest, unbiased opinion on this product.

If you are interested in entering the draw to win a free copy of Brillkids Little Reader program, stay tuned for tomorrow's blog post for details  on how to enter.

When to start teaching phonics?

Since we started teaching K sight words, my plan has been to begin teaching her phonics when she is 6 or 7. I agree with articles such as this one:

http://www.specialhelps.com/Articles/PhonicVSSightReading.htm

that explain why a younger child will usually have difficulty learning with phonics, however, I have also heard the experiences of early sight word readers starting to intuit these rules and be able to begin to use phonics to figure out words much earlier than this. I have always found this intriguing, yet never really understood it until recently. I'm still not 100% sure, but at least I have a theory now!  Is it possible that kids can be taught phonics earlier, but with a sight word approach rather than learn phonics rules in the traditional way?  It is the only solution that I can come up with and has helped me to figure out where to go next with K's reading program. We are almost done with the Dolch word list (up to grade 3), as well as phrases that we have been working on.  Next, I am going to work on groups of phonics words. The biggest reason for my new theory?  K has started to figure out new words by herself!  The most recent example is her ability to read the word "Poc" on my older dd's helmet. This is definately not a word we have taught her. K is doing this more and more and I'm excited to see if this new direction in learning words will boost this emerging ability!

The great debate - Phonics VS sight reading

My question?...................Why is this even a debate?

We have mainly done sight words with K, but my intention has always been to teach her the rules of phonics when she is old enough. In my opinion both are necessary. Today as you go through your day, pay attention to how often you need to use phonics. Very seldom right?  I hadn't thought about this until a few months ago. I was actually kind of surprised at how little I use phonics. I can go days, sometimes weeks, without needing phonics. Does this mean I think phonics is unnecessary? Not at all.  We can't learn every single word in the English language by sight, just like we can't sound out every word in a language that has many words that don't follow any rules. Both are necessary and K will be taught both.