All About Teaching and Learning Phonics

[tamarind]

pummanuel,

Both my hubby and myself have read and enjoyed all the wonderful children's literature that my kids have read, especially the Story of Doctor Dolittle, House of Sixty Fathers, the trumpet of the swan, Gulliver's travel, etc. My hubby even thanked me for introducing these books to him He reads very widely, from Roman history to computer science, but when he was young he read only the Secret Seven series and jumped straight to Lord of the Rings. He did not know that there are so many wonderful children's books around.

I have just finished reading Momo by Michael Ende, a fantasic children's book about time. Momo is a masterpiece and I highly recommend all parents and children to read this book, especially those parents who always complain that they have no time It can be read by a child of any age, so long as she is matured enough to understand a complicated plot. For example, a child who can read and understand Charlotte's Web should enjoy this book :

http://www.amazon.com/Momo-Puffin-Books-Michael-Ende/dp/0140317538/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1281072019&sr=1-1

I read that according to Michael Ende, this book is for children ages 8 - 80

[starz]

hi tamarind,


my girl is reading level 4b right now. I find its too easy for her age 4 yrs old. cos i was so busy that we delay almost a yr to restart P&J again. its like overdue. shall i skip to the next level? but which level is recommended? also issit a must to buy both book A and B?

else what is the most basic n easy simple chapter books to start off with? i dun wish to bore her with chapter books, just want to lightly introduce to her.

[cherrygal]

The topic is very helpful.


If I buy the Leapfrog DVD from amazon.com, can I watch it with a normal DVD player? Sorry to ask this. I seem to have seen this question asked somewhere but now cannot locate the answer.

My son learnt reading at 4yrs from Zoophonics (1 year). I sent him to Zoophonics as he was resistant to reading books by himself. After he was confident in reading, I took him out of Zoophonics. He's now 6 and can read Enid Blyton books, newspapers and ingredients from food packages. So which level should I start my son on with Ladybird series? He will enter P1 next year.

I now intend to use Tamarind's method to teach my daughter when she reaches 2+ and also to help motivate my son to read more extensively. I will also tell my son tonight that he can have ice cream at swensens if he finishes more books. Great idea!

[buds]

laughingcat:

Hello experts :rahrah: I do have a query and hopefully can get some expert view and suggestion. :salute:

Hi, laughingcat.

Received your PM with regards to the query below.
Apologise for the delay as i've been rather occupied.
I am NO expert but i will try my best to guide you where
i can, okie?

laughingcat:

All along I have been teaching my boy the short vowel first. Now that I need to move to teaching long vowel because of some advanced blending.

Yes, i suppose you are on the right track, dear.

Beginners to Phonics will begin from learning the sounds of
letters first (single letter sounds)... move on to wordbuilding
(listening to sounds in words :eg. t...i...n...) then to 3-letter
phonetic words family blending (eg. am, an, at ag, etc)...
followed by double consonant blends (bl, cl, fl, sp (etc)...
triple consonant blends (eg. spr, spl, etc)...

After which, children can move on to other combination
sounds, long vowels & special letter combinations & so on.

An effective phonics programme must be supplemented with
books or readers. Phonics should not only serve the purpose
of decoding words or learning how to spell, but also not forgetting
the whole intention of assisting the child with fluency in reading and
reading effectively. Children should progress from learning to read
short simple words to short sentences and move on to longer words
and longer sentences. The inclusion of sight words will be extremely
helpful in helping children to make sense of sentences in words, as
complete sentences will be made up of both phonetic and sight words.

laughingcat:

Can anyone advise me how do I go about teaching long vowels in order to avoid confusion? :?

You should ensure that you gao tim the blends first prior to introducing the
long vowels. There are blends that do not have long vowels in them like in
the words bl-ack... bl-and... and also in words like spr-ing... spl-en-did. Try
to avoid words like bl-oo-per-s... and br-oo-m... or scr-ee-ch... for starters.

Once you're assured that your child understands the blends, i can guide you
further with the long vowels. As usual, you're always welcome to PM me your
doubts. Will try the best i can, k.. with whatever time i have here.

Regards, buds.

[hquek]

cherrygal:

The topic is very helpful.


If I buy the Leapfrog DVD from amazon.com, can I watch it with a normal DVD player? Sorry to ask this. I seem to have seen this question asked somewhere but now cannot locate the answer.

Hi cherrygal,

You can actually borrow the leadpad frog dvds from local library - normal members (ie don't pay money type) can borrow 2 discs.

And if you buy from amazon, as long as your dvd player can read the region the dvd is under, no issues.

if you have a region-compatibility issue, no worries. Just google and there will be someplace that teaches how to change the region code of the dvd player. For all machines, there is a chain of buttons to press that will enable to make the machine multi-region.

[buds]

It is usually easiest if one has the multi-coded DVD player.

The one i recently sold off couldn't be played on desktop,
laptop or netbook but could play automatically on our DVD.
No fuss for region code changes and such.

[cherrygal]

hquek:

Hi cherrygal,

You can actually borrow the leadpad frog dvds from local library - normal members (ie don't pay money type) can borrow 2 discs.

And if you buy from amazon, as long as your dvd player can read the region the dvd is under, no issues.

if you have a region-compatibility issue, no worries. Just google and there will be someplace that teaches how to change the region code of the dvd player. For all machines, there is a chain of buttons to press that will enable to make the machine multi-region.

Thanks hquek and Buds for your advice! I just ordered mine via Amazon and it should arrive in Sep. Hopefully I will have no problems watching. I bought the 3xDVD set with flash cards (US$24.95 before shipping). Tot it would be a good investment since we are supposed to show to the kid everyday or so.

This website is really making me kiasu man...

[laughingcat]

HELLO Buds :rahrah: Thanks so much for the advise. I really need it ...hehehehe :lol:


Your advise came in just in time. As I have finished with the initial consonant blends and that is when I felt stuck :whut:

Okie....shall try out the triple consonant blends. I was thinking of skipping this actually and just go straight into long vowels. heheheh seems like I can't take the short cut way.

[tamarind]

starz:

hi tamarind,


my girl is reading level 4b right now. I find its too easy for her age 4 yrs old. cos i was so busy that we delay almost a yr to restart P&J again. its like overdue. shall i skip to the next level? but which level is recommended? also issit a must to buy both book A and B?

else what is the most basic n easy simple chapter books to start off with? i dun wish to bore her with chapter books, just want to lightly introduce to her.

Hi starz,
It is not necessary to buy the \"b\" series if your girl can read most of the words in \"a\" without any help.

Check out this page from my blog :

http://tamarindphonics.blogspot.com/2010/03/picture-books-from-my-home-library.html

I listed many books suitable for reading level 4.

[tamarind]

buds:

An effective phonics programme must be supplemented with
books or readers. Phonics should not only serve the purpose
of decoding words or learning how to spell, but also not forgetting
the whole intention of assisting the child with fluency in reading and
reading effectively. Children should progress from learning to read
short simple words to short sentences and move on to longer words
and longer sentences. The inclusion of sight words will be extremely
helpful in helping children to make sense of sentences in words, as
complete sentences will be made up of both phonetic and sight words.

Hi buds,
I totally agree with you.

In my blog, I have always advised parents that they must teach both phonics and sight words (using the Peter and Jane series or other books).


For my boy, I started him on the Peter and Jane book 1 after I taught him how to join 3 letters to form words. The results are amazing.

He will be 6 years old next month, and now he is reading Charlotte's Web. He reads very fluently, and he knows most of the words, I rarely need to help him. I remember struggling when I had to read Charlotte's Web at Sec 1. My boy is only of average learning ability and he used to have a very short attention span. I believe that if we use the correct methods, all kids of average and above abilities can be taught to read amazingly well by the age of 6.