Comparing Pre-school English Reading and Phonics Enrichment

[orlenkoirina.041954gmail.041954com]

Hello Mommies and Daddies


Do you know any enrichment centre that uses Letterland?

[minionmummy]

Hi, any comments about Jan & Elly at Rail mail vs I-creative learner at Clementi? which is a better school for 4 year old trying to pick up phonics, reading and writing? Thanks!!

[booksnbooks]

Hi annalee, I always recommend Learning Point to friends for pre school phonics. The approach use by LP is really very effective and engaging for the little ones. My 2 kids have no issue doing well in EL by the time they entered P1.


The weekend classes are always full though. You may enquire directly from the centre for next year schedule.

[jasmineong]

My English School is good too for phonics.

[annalee]

Thanks jasmineong and booksnbooks..:) My English School I heard it also depends on the teacher..

[annalee]

booksnbooks:

You are welcome annalee. Just to add on, for the primary school level I find it so-so (materials are quite good though) and it really depends on teachers. Some are experienced ex-school Teachers but boring and vice versa. Therefore I only recommend LP for pre-school phonics. Maybe TAS is better for Pri School level in view of the mostly positive comment here.

Got it thanks..will prob call these few centres for phonics..hope can find a good one, cos it was quite painful for my older one, I had to guide him a lot at home as his phonics tuition did not work.

[annalee]

czaire:

annalee:

Thank you! Yes I am intending to sign up for their hol programme also:) Is their holiday programme very tough?

One of my colleagues who recommended said the same thing, her son is now in sec 1 and he is consistently top in English because of his grounding in TAS, now he does not need to sign up for any English tuition also. That impressed me and also the fact that she had recommended TAS to other colleagues and their kids also improved.

Now I am trying to hunt good phonics schools also haha..

Hi Annalee,

Actually I'm pondering between TAS vs TWC. I don't know which centre will suit my gal n is better. My gal is P1 next year, intending to let her start Creative writing to build up her foubdation. I agree w your point of reading. My friends' kids are avid readers. Btw after doing some research, I signed my gal for reading program under L central n it is good coz after 1st lesson, my gal is learning his to blend e words n now after 4th lessons, she can blend almost all those unfamiliar words at her level.

Hi czaire,

Have you seen anything by I Can Read and Learning Point and Learning Lab for their reading and phonics? How does it compare to Lcentral?

For my older one, I did not bother that much then when I saw him struggle at K2 that he still could not read well, I got a home tutor she helped him to be a slightly more confident reader but still it was not that effective and now she is busier and is not able to do home tuition on top of her preschool teaching. So now I really need to search for good phonics class for second one.

This is what people have been telling me or what I seem to feel when going around to look at centres:

- Zoophonics- quite good for introduction of A-Z. It seems they teach more than just 2-3 letters per lesson. They will cover a greater range so children are exposed to a wider range at one single lesson. The sounds made by the letters are also quite clear to remember. They are all linked to animals.

- I Can Read - more for K2, their programme for N1-N2 age, I heard is not bad but not as good as their K2 programme. Their K2 programme has very clear word families for example - short 'a' sound, 'th' sounds. I heard they teach the blending of words rather systematically but again teacher is important.

- Learning Point and My English School and now LCentral are some other names that people recommend on the forum or among friends but I do not know that much about them.

Another thing is that I bought some things on Carousell like phonics blenders that are DIY by some mothers. I am now using it with my daughter. She seems to like them. Another mother recommended me to get this series, Phonics Tales and Sight Word Tales by Scholastic.

I have been on a hunt for good centres or good ways to help my dd these few weeks hee. But I am still not very clear on which centre is really good so still doing my research.

For TAS and TWC. I am not sure of the difference. From reading about TWC on their website, they seem to focus more on the children writing their own work and then the teacher would mark and give detailed explanations and the children would do re-writes? For TAS, I heard good reviews from my colleagues so I became interested. Yesterday, one of my colleagues was nice enough to bring some of her son's P6 and P4 work to show me as I was kind of asking her a lot of questions (pai seh but she was very nice about it).

From looking at it, this is what I understand about their compo teaching:

- Model compo (teach them how to change sentence structure, what is personification, break up difficult words to get them to spell the words right)
- Children draw a plot curve (not for every compo- she showed me 3-4 for each level) to plan out or think through ideas (not so sure about this- its from what I can see drawn in her child's work)
- Application worksheets (show how to apply for example what is learnt in kind deed about helping an old lady to kind deed about helping an injured dog and then a pregnant lady, the difference is the phrases used must change but some can be similar, the plot must be slightly different)
- Summarised compo? worksheets (show summarised version of full length compo given to help for easy revision) for the P6 materials
- Compo flashcards on ideas for more difficult topics for the P6 material

She said there was a lot more especially for P6 and it filled up more than 3 files. There are some survival kit booklets for P6, she said it was a number of compos given inside and also an oral booklet given.
Anyway I am probably going down to ask more. From what I see, I do not have that clear an idea but it looks good and it seems its a lot of work done. My colleague said usually lessons do not end on time, teachers are willing to give extra time so they do manage to cover quite a bit.

[staypositive]

Hi, it’s me again. This is my take on phonics prior to P1.


I sent my no.1 to I can read and my no.2 to Lcentral from K1 to K2. Both programmes are equally good in the sense that my kids benefitted and made vast improvements in their ability to read independently, diction and understanding the contents or phrases in the context of the story.

My no.1 was able to spell words that he hasn’t seen before using the phonics he learnt. My no.2 wasn’t so good at spelling new words but could read independently and achieved a higher level of understanding of what she was reading earlier than my no.1.

Based on my children’s experience, I would still recommend either one. They liked their Teachers and always looked forward to going to the classes. Hope this helps.

[annalee]

Thanks Czaire. For phonics, I am most probably signing up with LCentral. For Pri level for my eldest, I am most probably going with TAS or Learning Lab for English. Will be going down to view their materials (though for Learning Lab, I am required to make an appointment to talk to one of their personal).

[FantasyLandDreams]

Hi Mummies

Don't mind can I suggest that the discussion on phonics course and so forth be moved to the relevant thread instead, like the one below?

https://www.kiasuparents.com/kiasu/forum/viewtopic.php?f=94&t=584&start=1150

As it is a bit inconvenient to read everything in TAS thread now when we are discussing about other vendors actually? Thanks.