Letterland

[buds]

spring:

Im sure u wld hav made a gd choice. But yea...guess u will need times to adapt to a new environment.

Adapting to the environment part, i know i can handle. What i cannot
envision is the daily cycle of sending the girls to school to and fro! :!:
Not planning to change schools for them unless if really terribly forced
to make that decision..

We'll see.. :xedfingers:

spring:

Thank you buds for tis informative advice. things u mention really does make sense. I wouldnt want my dd to lose interests in reading! It does sound scary. :scared:

Once again, you're welcome. :hugs: I suppose i can make sense of it as i
have seen children fall back into a distant level of interest when this skill
is tackled inappropriately and though i cud reduce the damage when i
troubleshoot it, a lot of precious time is wasted back tracking and re-
learning, whereas it cud have been done right from when it first began.

spring:

Will try out e activities on tapping on e listening skill. It does sound more appropriate for her age now. hehe.... :ugogirl:

Actually it is the most appropriate exercise to do right after perfecting the
single letter sounds stage. Also ensure your girl knows which letter each
sound represents when you pronounce any sound to her. If she oredi
knows how to write or trace even better.. can get her to write the letter of
the sound you say out to her. Very helpful for future verbal and
written spelling skills as the child can distinguish between letter names and
letter sounds and also know each corresponding letter shapes at an instant!

Just to let you in on something.. i'm currently helping a fren to sell off her
Large Moveable Alphabet (A Montessori Material) used during Montessori
Phonics lessons. It aids the child in recognizing letter shapes with given
corresponding letter sounds. The LMA can also be used for those listening
skill activities i shared in my previous post.

You may ask the child to pick out the letter that makes the sound /b/ as in
the beginning sound of bus... then ask her to listen to other sounds in the
word bus... after she manages to pick up all three letters from the LMA, u
show her how individual letter sounds put together can make a word.

We use this in our classrooms up till Blends and reading up to 6-letter
phonetic words like your nick for example... spr-ing! You can check out
the material here at this link! > http://www.kiasuparents.com/kiasu/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10176

Let me know if you are keen. Specially for you, i will include a freebie item
as well, if you decide to purchase the item from me.. Great for your girl and
can keep for when your #2 grows a lil' older too.. :love:

spring:

Hmmm... soft skills? Actually wad r they huh? :? U mean e.g social skill, selp help skill? Craft work like tearing, pasting, colouring n cutting, r they consider as prewriting skills? Im doin quite alot of tat with my dd, n also finger tracing of letters, n now she has started to trace letters with crayons. anymore activities u wld suggest on improving e writing skill?

Yes Yes! Soft skills like saying please and thank you, table manners, setting
the table.. sorting cutlery.. She can use her dolls or teddies to organize a tea
party and tackle social attributes in an inviting set up. Uh-oh.. teddie spilled
his tea? What should we do? Is teddie a bad bear, should we scold him or
how can we teach teddie to be more careful... Or monkey is naughty, always
bullying the other animal friends.. How can we help teach monkey to be at his
best behaviour? (etc)

Activities that strengthens finger muscles and the pincer grip for writing can
be using the scissors.. sorting colour balls using a spoon.. learning to use a
chopstick.. picking up stamps using a small tweezer.. pegging clothings..
(etc)

If you have sand, moist it and put it in a box or container and get her to
trace alphabet shapes in it, apart from the typical pencil or crayon and
paper.. Use play dough to curve little roll-outs into letter shapes.. (etc)

Veggie stamps you can create with potatoes and carrots with either letter
shapes, simple shapes (square, triangle, circle & rectangle) that you can
use with paint or even cut out sponges too!

The possibilities are endless really! :celebrate:

spring:

Okie... i will try when she tries to pretending reading again. For now, i hav not read to her any readers collection. Do u tink i can try e peter n jane series to her? Must she knows word blending before i can read to her e sight word method using e peter n jane series? Or any other readers u wld recommend for her age?

It can wait till mebbe when she's 3 or 3.5yrs.. but if you think she is mature
enuf to handle such readers go ahead. Different children have different
temperaments hence there is no hard and fast rule to age introduction..

Readers are repetitive and work on the sight words. There are many in the
market other than Peter & Jane these days.. you'll be spoilt for choice.

buds:

If only you stay nearer, mebbe got chance.

Thanks for your compliments. :love:

I am still learning.. :celebrate:

spring:

U make me v curious of ware u r staying.
Care to share?

Okie dokie, sure thing!

I'm still looking for some stuff to show you on how you cud
move on from the Letterland phonics and have yet to find
them.. sollie. :salute: Hope i can dig it out soon. :oops:

Keep in touch & you take care.. :hugs:

[spring]

The LMA seems like gd stuff! But is ur fren willing to lower e price to ard $120? I cant see e picture clearly. R u able to send e pic to my email?


Wow.... u really does hav los of ideas of improving writing skills! :ugogirl: Especially e one of collecting sand in a box, nv tot of tat before. For using chopsticks, my dd is recently keen on learning also, may i know hw shd i teach her on tis? Also for e veggie stamp, u mean cutting e carrot or potato into e specific lette shape?

Also, regarding e letter sound of 'a' n 'e', 'c' n 'k', lookin forward to ur pm soon ya....

[buds]

spring:

The LMA seems like gd stuff! But is ur fren willing to lower e price to ard $120? I cant see e picture clearly. R u able to send e pic to my email?

I've asked her liao.. She's willing to part @ SGD $130.00 when i mentioned
you bought from me before. If you can self-collect better, so will not incur
any delivery costs.. but no freebie item la for this discount. Sollie. :salute:

PM your email address and i will send the same picture to you. No problem.

spring:

Wow.... u really does hav los of ideas of improving writing skills! :ugogirl: Especially e one of collecting sand in a box, nv tot of tat before.

Ideas are built up over time. You would have too! By the time you
have your baby #2 you would have accumulated ideas enough to run yer
own class!

spring:

For using chopsticks, my dd is recently keen on learning also, may i know hw shd i teach her on tis?

You can read my article on it at this link here.
> http://www.kiasuparents.com/kiasu/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3607&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

spring:

Also for e veggie stamp, u mean cutting e carrot or potato into e specific lette shape?

For carrot and potato stamps i suggest shapes as in 2D shapes like circle,
triangle, square, (etc) cos not too much trouble to cut. For letter shapes,
better with sponges. Easier to cut.

spring:

Also, regarding e letter sound of 'a' n 'e', 'c' n 'k', lookin forward to ur pm soon ya....

Ok, can. I PM-ed it to another forumer before . Will try to scour my over
loaded inbox to see whom i sent it too and will forward it to you. Cos she
broached the same questions you had in mind.

[spring]

Hey buds....



I had replied to ur pm. Once again..... sorry for e late reply. :imsorry:

[pummanuel]

Hi Buds and Spring, I'm a SAHM too :celebrate: and read with interest the exchanges on Letterland.


I toyed with the idea of homeschooling my girl once when we were based in China and scoured through tons of homeschooling articles then. In a twist of fate, we relocated back to Singapore but my homeschooling-research has enabled me to arrive on a conclusion - I will let my girl learn phonics. As such, I chose a preschool which teaches phonics using Letterland.

I totally second with Buds that it will be better to teach the names of the alphabets before introducing the sounds of the alphabets. As my girl's first language is Chinese, she was totally impervious to English, even ABC, when I tried to introduce the language to her when she turned 2. Things didn't help that we were in a totally Chinese environment. I just let it go and thought she will pick it up in preschool. To my surprise, as all of her classmates came well-versed in ABC, and my girl could parrot after her classmates, her teachers focused more on the sounds of the alphabets. And in due time, when I tried to teach her to write or read, she would only recognise the sounds but not the names. I tried to teach her the names but she was resistant, telling me 'This is not what the teacher taught.' Thankfully, one day I chanced on her singing the evergreen ABCD song (in the Twinkle Twinkle Little Star tune) that her friend taught her. I made use of it and taught her the names of the alphabets using the Letterland Frieze.

However, after several months, it will still take her a moment to remember some of the names as opposed to the sounds. I found that children who learnt the names first will have less of such a problem, i.e they can remember both names and sounds better.

And to sidetrack a bit, as I was keen to be part of her learning process, I tried to buy Letterland products (to learn phonics by myself) through the UK distributor and was told to refer to Francis. I went to his office and he patiently went through with me a range of Letterland products. According to him, Tumble Tots used to own the distribution rights and the Tumble Tots operations but as another company bought over Tumble Tots, the previous company owns only Letterland distribution rights now but they are still sharing the same office.

I like the Letterland frieze very much and bought a GBC laminating machine just for it. (Having promotion at Popular now @ 1/3 of the price I paid) The frieze now decorates the wall of my foyer and greets every guest when they come into the house. I also bought an easel white cum chalk board when I realised my girl was into writing. She would trace on the frieze and write on papers. To make writing and reading fun for her, I will also let her write on the cement staircase landing outside, a bit like my kampong days, but I will scrub the floor after the exercise. I even came up with the excuse if anybody complained 'I'm practising drawing the rangoli for Deepavali.' :lol:

As Buds mentioned, Letterland is great on introducing individual letter sounds but for blending, I adopted the method that Tamarind recommended. However, for some of the digraphs like sh, wr, ow, aw, I will use the Letterland stories as my girl can co-relate better. Like many experts here mentioned, there is no hard and fast way to teach phonics. For a self taught mother, I learnt through a mix and match way and imparted the knowledge to my girl in the same fashion. As Comrade Deng Xiaoping said, be it black cat or white cat, any cat that can catch a mouse is a good cat.

Pummanuel

[badgal]

Hi mummies


My ger is currently learng letterland phonics in sch. She’ll b 3 yrs old tis yr. Teacher at sch is teachg them the names of the alphabets nw & their sound, like Jumping Jim says jer. Guess next yr when she’s in nursery, the teacher will then teach them blendg of words.

If I were to send my ger to montersori phonics class nw, will the 2 methods confuse the kids?

[buds]

badgal:

Hi mummies


My ger is currently learng letterland phonics in sch. She'll b 3 yrs old tis yr. Teacher at sch is teachg them the names of the alphabets nw & their sound, like Jumping Jim says jer.

Jumping Jim should say j-uh instead of jer.
Click link to hear the sound. > http://www.starfall.com/n/level-k/letter-j/load.htm?f

Yes, LETTERLAND introduces characters to the
letter names (ABCs) and each character says
a special sound in words. It's a fun way
or approach to learning phonetic sounds esp 4
young children.

badgal:

Guess next yr when she's in nursery, the teacher will then teach them blendg of words.

Yes, you should be right about that. Next step is indeed blending of sounds.

badgal:

If I were to send my ger to montersori phonics class nw, will the 2 methods confuse the kids?

Montessori Phonics' blending is more straightforward as compared to the
Letterland way that has stories to complement the sound combinations tt
they introduce. If by then your child is 4+ yrs old and mature enough to
exclude/ignore the Letterland characters when you ask for the sound of
a letter you've shown her, then it should be fine. The association of the
Letterland characters complement their story focus and makes it more
fun & supposedly easier for children to remember. However, that said...
children should be also ideally be able to identify sounds of the alphabets
without the need to include the character names to them.

May i inquire the need to send your girl to a Montessori Phonics class if
the school your girl is attending will be teaching the complete Letterland
Phonics curriculum?

[badgal]

Hello buds

My ger is wif Pat's nw. I dunno if she'll be learning the complete letterland phonics curriculum coz I neber really ask her teacher :oops: . So I tot mayb I can send her to montessori to reinforce watever is taught in Pat's.
I read Tamarind's blog & tot the montessori enrichment class she sent her DD to seems v gd wif blendg words. tot mayb thru montessori, I can expose my ger to further aspects of phonics tat letterland is lacking? On the other hand, was oso thinkg mayb both Letterland & montessori can compliment her learning curve in phonics. Think I kiasu champion liao

[buds]

badgal:

Hello buds. My ger is wif Pat's nw. I dunno if she'll be learning the complete letterland phonics curriculum coz I neber really ask her teacher :oops:.

Mebbe you can ask so at least you know.

badgal:

So I tot mayb I can send her to montessori to reinforce watever is taught in Pat's. I read Tamarind's blog & tot the montessori enrichment class she sent her DD to seems v gd wif blendg words.

As a Montessorian myself, i take the above as a compliment. :love:

Montessori Phonics indeed has good and complete blending techniques
& comes with complete apparatus to match the exercises done. A good
Montessorian directress will ensure that the students get good repetitive
hands-on practices with the materials. Tam has simplified the method by
making her own cards.

badgal:

tot mayb thru montessori, I can expose my ger to further aspects of phonics tat letterland is lacking?

I won't use the term lacking for every phonics method has its merits and
strengths. It is how we use them to the best use possible. A good teacher
however can deliver lessons regardless of the method used.

badgal:

On the other hand, was oso thinkg mayb both Letterland & montessori can compliment her learning curve in phonics. Think I kiasu champion liao

We're all kiasu here, darling. So no worries. :lol: That's why we're here in
this KIASU parents forum. Hehee. :lol: Yes, i suppose you mean well since
you're thinking of complementing the two together. My advice is for you to
find out more abt the Montessori Phonics methodology before you dive in...
you should be able to get your child assessed at a Montessori enrichment
centre that offers the programme upon completing the Letterland single
letter sounds stage to see if it suits her. Hope this helps.

[badgal]

Hi buds!

Thks! I really like it tat u break down all our replies & tat u take the trouble to reply each & evry query we hv. Appreciate it veri much!!! muack! :love: Oso wanna thank u for the sound advice u hv given mi.

Okie... will check wif my ger's eng teacher tmr to see if tey r learng the full letterland syllabus for these 4 yrs. Coz I casually ask her teacher ytd on wat tey r learng for this whole yr. She told mi oni single letter sounds. Oni next yr term 4 wld tey b intro to word blendg. Seem v slow leh. The sch takg 1.75 yrs to teach them single sounds? Coz my ger oredi can recognise all her ABC & abc & even the phonics nw. Scare the sch's pace too slow, then she will be bored. Nw tat she's v interested to learn new things, tot I better strike while iron hot & let her learn more. Tatz y i'm askg abt montessori. Tot montessori can speed things up a wee bit?

Btw... any gd montessori sch to recommend?