All About Reading Level 1 Review

You all ~ the wait for All About Reading Level 1 program has been so amazingly worth it.  We loved the All About Reading Level Pre-1 program and this is a wonderful next step in the reading process with Kaleb!

      

Program Basics

 

All About Reading Level 1 is a program for beginning readers. It picks up where the Pre-1 reading program ends ~ when children know their uppercase and lowercase letters as well as letter sounds and are ready to put the sounds together to make words. If you aren’t sure where to start your child, you can use the Reading Readiness Checklist to help you decide.

All About Reading focuses on phonological awareness, decoding skills, fluency, comprehension, vocabulary and lots and lots of reading practice. Similar to the other programs from All About Learning Press, the Teacher’s Manual includes step-by-step directions, so there is no guesswork in what you need for each lesson or how to teach the concepts covered.

Each of the 49 lessons include hands-on practice using letter tiles, word cards, fun games, and activity sheets to go along with the day’s lesson. Lessons can be tailored to meet the needs of your child ~ review concepts as often as you need to in order to know that they are being retained.

   

{playing letter sound bingo}

Each lesson takes about 20 minutes to work through and then another 20 minutes of reading to your child is recommended. We usually divide up our time and read at different points during the day, instead of doing it all in one block of time.

 

Sight words are incorporated in to the program {so far Kaleb has learned ‘the’ and ‘a’}. They are treated as ‘Rule Breakers’ and given special treatment. :) Kaleb has loved this part of the program, to the point that he came running into my bedroom early one morning and woke me up when he found ‘the’ on something that he was playing with ~ ‘It’s a rule breaker!!!’

And the moment you want to do a happy dance {and actually do??}. When your child picks up a book, sits down with you and reads a real, honest-to-goodness story to you for the very first time. It just makes a mommy’s heart happy and there is much rejoicing to do!

 

 

I have also been using the program with Zachary {2nd grade} to help increase his reading fluency. Reading has never been a favorite part of his day, but his fluency has already greatly improved in the weeks that we’ve used it and it’s also built up his confidence in his reading abilities. He’s on the ‘fast track’ through the program, but part of his motivation has been seeing his younger brother start doing things that he was more recently complaining about {grins}.

Quick tip: Not sure if you should start out with All About Reading or All About Spelling? While the two programs go hand-in-hand, children generally move ahead more quickly in reading, so I recommend starting with All About Reading first.

 

The All About Reading Level 1 Kit comes with the following items: {Regularly $107.70, currently on sale now for $99.95}

• Teacher’s Manual 
• Student Packet {includes word cards and an Activity Book}
• Run, Bug, Run! reader
• The Runt Pig reader
• Cobweb the Cat reader

         

You will also need a Reading Interactive Kit to complete the program. Choose between the Deluxe Reading Interactive Kit {$48.95} or the Basic Reading Interactive Kit {$28.95} ~ or buy the pieces individually. The reading kits are a one-time purchase and will be used in all levels of the program.

Quick Tip: If you currently use any of the All About Spelling programs, the letter tiles are the same, so you may only need a few additional components to complete the kit.

A Few More Thoughts…

One thing that we all look at is the initial price of the program, and while it is a bit more, it truly is worth it. Here are a few of my thoughts on it:

• The bulk of the components are non-consumable {only the Activity Book and the smiling star stickers cannot be used again}. This means that you can use the program with children coming up through the ranks or eventually re-sell it to another mom.
• The program is completely laid out and lessons are scripted, so you can just relax and not worry about planning!
• Minimal prep-work. The word cards are perforated, but need to be torn apart and the letter tiles need to be assembled with magnets. Once that is done, you can grab your manual and go.
• The ‘Go Ahead and Use It One-Year Guarantee’. You and your child have a full year to try out the program! If you find that the curriculum does not meet your needs, simply return the materials at any time within one year of purchase for a full refund of your purchase price.

I can honestly tell you all that we have all of the products from All About Reading and All About Spelling, use them daily, and love them tremendously. Their curriculum is one of the first that really got me excited about teaching and I KNOW that they are getting solid teaching using the programs!

 

Visit these great companies!

• Betty Luckens ~ educational and fun felt sets for children
• Weekly Homeschool Planner ~ manage and organize your homeschool day, year after year

 

Disclosure ~ I received parts of the program for review in exchange for my honest review. I already owned several of the components and have been using products from this company and love using them with my family. I was not paid for this review.

WordBuild® Foundations ~ Dynamic Literacy {Review}

At our homeschool convention this year I had a chance to talk to the people at the Dynamic Literacy booth about one of their vocabulary programs called WordBuild® Foundations. I left with an armful of product and was so excited to start using it this year during our school time.

The program does not focus on drilling words and vocabulary into children but teaches them HOW words are built and put together. Just because a child can read and sound out a word {phonics} doesn’t mean that they can understand and interpret what it means {morphonics}.

The WordBuild program is divided into two series: Foundations and Elements. Foundations does exactly what the name implies ~ builds a vocabulary foundation with prefixes and suffixes. Elements then takes what children have learned in Foundations and builds on it, including more complex root families.

Based on the simple formula WORD = (prefix) + root + (suffix), WordBuild® is fun, easy, and effective.

The biggest question for me ~ “Would it work and would our children enjoy it?”  For the last two months we’ve been using WordBuild® Foundations and can honestly say that we are enjoying it! Want to know why?

~ Ease of use: One of the things that really attracted me to the WordBuild® vocabulary program was how easy it would be for me to implement it with the kids. I didn’t need to carve out a huge chunk of time from our already full day. All I needed was the teacher’s manual, activity books for the kids, and 15 minutes a day ~ tops.

Some days we work right up to the 15 minutes and other days take much less. Even if we have a word or two left to do, we stop and move on to the next section the next day. This is something that the publisher recommends ~ stop at 15 minutes!!

~ Fun exercises and variety: Each of the units follows the same format so once the girls became familiar with the layout, they jumped right into the routine. The word search and magic square are favorites in this house {and sneaking in some other learning too!}.

Here’s a look at what each day looks like in a week’s plans {you can view a sample lesson here}:

1. Prefix square ~ build new words by putting the center prefix word in front of each of the words surrounding it
2. Affix adder ~ create new words using the affix, write what you think the word means and use it in a sentence
3. Magic Square ~ match the words to their definitions and they all add up to a magic number
4. Word Search ~ find and circle words within the grid
5. Review ~ a review of the words/concepts from the week

~ Solid lesson plans: Nothing makes me happier than well-laid out plans. Each unit gives objectives, hints, materials needed, week-at-a-glance, discussion ideas and more. View a sample lesson here.

~ It’s working! The kids are carrying over what they are learning into everyday life. When we were talking about compound words in the introduction booklet, they made up games for us to play in the car together…and the learning spilled over into everyday life.

~ Humor: As we were talking about compound words and I was trying to help Zachary come up with words that started with the word ‘head’, I pointed to my head and said “This is something that Mommy gets a lot.” His eyes got big and he said, “OH! That’s right! Head lice!”  More like headaches…but he did get a new word, right?

~ A great guarantee {and discount}: If you aren’t completely satisfied, the company will refund your money {including s/h}, no questions asked.

As an added bonus, Dynamic Literacy is offering Homeschool Creation readers a 25% discount until 12/31/2011 when using the code HSC2011.

Recommended Ages

If you aren’t sure where to start, Dynamic Literacy has a great placement chart to use. Their rule of thumb ~ always start with Foundations Level 1 or Elements level 1 regardless of age {and I agree!}. You can also view samples of both the Foundations and Elements levels here on their website.

At first I thought we would be able to pull Zachary {Grade 2} into this with us. While he did understand the concept behind much of what we were doing and was able to complete the introductory booklet for Foundations Level 1, once we started into the actual student workbook, he was really in over his head. His reading and writing comprehension level are definitely not at the same level as the either of the girls {4th and 5th grade}, so we will be holding off on the workbook for him at this point.

Find Out More

Visit the Dynamic Literacy Homeschool site to find out more information about the program. I’ve also included a few more links for you to check out.

~ Informational video about the WordBuild® program

~ Scope and Sequence and State Standards information

~ Purchase information {don’t forget to use the code HSC2011 for 25% off your order!!}

 

I was provided this curriculum by Dynamic Literacy in exchange for my honest review and opinion from our family’s use. All opinions expressed in this review are my own {and my kid’s}.

All About Reading Level Pre-1 Review

A little over a month ago we started working ‘full-time’ on the All About Reading Level Pre-1. I had been anxiously waiting for the release of the program for many months and was really excited to see the completed product.

Why? Because I had fun helping create the ABC crafts for the program!! Last fall, I was sent some sneak peeks of the rhymes included with All About Reading Level Pre-1 and helped put crafts together that went specifically along with the rhymes.

Kaleb and I had fun ‘testing’ out many of the crafts in December, but I can honestly say they are MUCH more fun when we get to do them along with the actual reading program itself!

About the All About Reading Level Pre-1 Program

This reading program for preschool and kindergarten age children focuses on the “Big Five Skills” or five skills that are important for children to have in place before they begin to read. Those five are letter knowledge {recognizing letters and knowing names}, phonological awareness {hearing and identifying parts of words}, print awareness {knowing text has meaning}, listening comprehension, and motivation to read.

All About Reading Level Pre-1 includes an in-depth Teacher’s Guide that walks you through the “Big Five Skills”, providing tips for each lesson in the program along with step-by-step instructions for each letter lesson. The lessons walk through the alphabet letter by letter in ABC order starting with uppercase letters and then move to lowercase letters.

Lessons include poem readings, an ABC craft focused on the letter your child is learning, special games, and many additional activities to do together. There are go-along picture and activity cards that are used with the lessons as well as audio books and a cd-rom too. You can view sample lessons at the bottom of the All About Reading Level Pre-1 page.

There will be future levels of the All About Reading program coming too! The next level is scheduled to release in June of 2011.

My Thoughts

It’s probably no surprise that we are loving the program! One of the biggest hits of all has been including the Ziggy the Zebra puppet in all that we are doing! When Kaleb has his ‘school time’ he knows exactly where the our reading bag is, grabs it and waits for me in ‘our chair’ to do his school time.

Although we’d already worked on quite a few of the letter crafts, Kaleb was even more excited doing them this time around because they tied into something that we had read together and were ‘learning’. One of the biggest hits has been the go-along activities and picture cards that we use with each lesson {part of both packages}.

The ABC crafts are simple to do also {yes, they were planned that way!!}. The majority of the items used in the crafts are things that can be found easily in your house or without difficulty at your local store {yarn, glue, tinfoil, construction paper, crayons, watercolors, salt, etc…}. I put together a basket with all of the supplies that were needed and pull it out when we are working on the letter crafts.

We didn’t have anything like the All About Reading Level Pre-1 to use with our older three children {otherwise known as ‘winging it’}. I pieced together things for them and while they have all learned to read, I LOVE the simplicity of the program and the fact that it is all put together in one place for me to quickly gather and use. The only consumable part of the program is the ABC craft book, so it can be used again with younger children, or multiple children if you want to purchase an additional craft book.

Find Out More

The All About Reading Level Pre-1 Basic package includes {you will need to add your own puppet and index card box}:

• Teacher's Manual (208 pages)
• Student Material Packet
  • My Book of Letters and Sounds Activity Book (192 pages)
  • Picture Cards
  • Letter Sound Cards
  • Capital Letter Alphabet Chart
  • Lowercase Letter Alphabet Chart
• The Zigzag Zebra: a rhyming alphabet hardcover book
• Lizard Lou: rhymes old and new hardcover book
• Divider Cards {to keep Picture Cards and Letter Sound Cards organized}
• "Letter Sounds A to Z" CD-ROM.

The All About Reading Level Pre-1 Deluxe package includes the above items and also:

• Ziggy the Zebra puppet
• a charming Activity Box to hold your student's learning cards
• All About Reading tote bag to keep your components organized

This post is included in the Homeschool Curriculum Review Roundup.