Teach Your Child to Read

In this episode I'm sharing what I used to teach my kindergartener how to read! You can do it too! Just take a listen!

Amazon Link to Book Resource
Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons: Revised and Updated Second Edition

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.

Transcript

Welcome to Homeschool Horizons! I’m Yvette, your host! Last week I talked about Charters vs filing a PSA. At the end of my podcast, I told you that I would be talking about curriculum this week. The topic of curriculum is too big to cover in just one short episode, so for today I will begin by telling you about my son’s kindergarten journey and what curriculum I ended up using to teach him how to read. 

We began his kindergarten school year by enrolling him at a homeschool charter learning campus in a kinder program called Little Lions Club. The class met twice a week from 9am-12pm. They covered reading, math, science, and social studies. My son loved that little class and the friends he and I made there, remain friends to this day! 

During that time, my son couldn’t yet read and he really wanted to! Especially because some of his friends in the class were already reading everything in sight! I was using phonic reading books at home, which were designed for beginning readers, in order to help him learn how to read. He would be able to read those books, which had simple sentences such as, Pat ran or Pat ate food, but he couldn’t read unfamiliar words. Meaning he could read these books, because he saw them over and over again, but he couldn’t read a word that he’d never seen before. I was also using an online resource called Reading Eggs, which he liked! My husband also read to him every night before bed because we were and still are big believers in reading to the kids so that they can develop a love of reading just by listening and to model correct English intonation and expression. But by the end of the school year, he still couldn’t read unfamiliar words. He was feeling down about it and I hated seeing him have to feel that way. So I began researching intently, on what else I could use that would actually work for him. I discovered the book, Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons on Amazon, where I have actually purchased many of my workbooks. 

I decided to have my husband use that book to work with my son during the summer. Since my husband is a public-school teacher, he was on summer vacation. I could’ve done it, but to be honest I myself was feeling like I was failing my son. I felt like all the things I was trying weren’t working and I felt responsible for that. I was losing patience as well, out of my own frustration! I honestly believed that because my husband was on vacation, he would have the patience and right attitude for teaching our son and I was right! My son was very happy that his dad would be his reading teacher and they began in June! 

They did a lesson every day. I made sure of it! They didn’t skip at all. By the end of August, my son was able to read any word he saw! He could now read any book he wanted to and he was so proud of himself and so were we! My husband raved about this book! Now keep in mind that he has taught 4th-6th grade for all of his career and teaching our son how to read was completely out of his element. He said that this book came with an introduction from the authors explaining how to use the book. He said it was A LOT of information and he had to read it at least twice while highlighting and taking notes to finally feel ready to teach the material to our son. He really liked the fact that the lessons were short enough to where they didn’t overwhelm our son and that the lessons built upon each other. So when it was time to teach our second son to read, we used this book again! This time I was the teacher, and by the end of the 100 days, my son could read any word, just like his brother!  

 With this type of success, I felt I needed to share this with you! If you decide to purchase the book, remember to read the instructions thoroughly, even twice if you need to. Make sure you highlight and take notes. Once you begin teaching the lessons, don’t skip days. In my opinion, I know that if you follow exactly what the book tells you to do and you don’t skip days, I believe you will be successful in getting your child to read, just like we were.

 Whatever material you end up deciding to use in order to teach your child to read, the most important thing you can do is research like crazy, until you find what works for your child. There are many options out there for teaching them how to read, besides the one I have shared here today.  Ask your homeschool friends for help! Ask around on social media. Get help from your charter. Read all the reviews on any workbook or full curriculum that you can! Pray about it! Don’t stop until you have found what will work for your child. Even when you get discouraged and feel like you’re failing. Remember you’re not alone, even if you feel like you are. I am so happy that you are listening to this podcast because this is definitely one way that you can find encouragement and information to help you on your journey. I pray that God will speak to your heart and that you will experience peace with whatever curriculum or workbook or online resource, or class, you end up using in order to teach your child how to read. 

Thank you for listening today and come back next week because I will be talking about another resource I used during the time when my boys were little that I couldn’t use with my charter, but I didn’t care because it was so valuable that I did it on my own anyway. Have a wonderful week! Talk to you soon!