I love reading apps for kids because they're not just mindless tech time but either provide practice or learning to read. Learning letters and letter sounds start a child's journey to reading words and these alphabet and phonics apps will help. Learning "sight words," or words to recognize at a glance, is another step. Download these sight word apps when your child is ready to learn these … [Read more...]
Learning to Read: Sight Words and Phonics Together
by Becky Spence In the world of literacy, the idea of learning words by sight has been highly debated for a few decades as the literacy pendulum has swung back and forth between phonics and sight words. I believe, based on reading research, that kids need both sight words and phonics as they are learning to read and write. But sight words (I'm using sight words interchangeably with high … [Read more...]
Beginning Readers Kids Will Actually Like
"I want to save these books for when I have kids and they're learning to read," announced my daughter as she organized and read each of the Tug the Pup and Friends beginning readers. So I had to read these and share with YOU. Because it's my never ending goal to find your kids beginning readers that they'll actually like! (And that aren't nonsensical!) She's more picky than me about … [Read more...]
5 Simple Ways to Play with Sounds in Words
Kids must play games with sounnds so they can hear the sounds in each word when they're learning to read and write. The ability to hear, blend, and break apart sounds in words is a huge building block included in the foundation of both reading and writing. To increase the awareness of these sounds, there a simple sound games kids can play. When creating sound games, we want to include activities … [Read more...]
Recommended Early Readers
I often struggle to find engaging early readers for JJ so I bet you have the same problem, too. Today, I wanted to share some of the best early learning (reader) books we've enjoyed lately, most of which are newly published. All these books include beautiful illustrations with appropriate text which in my opinion means not too much or too stupid. But, I'll share sample text with you so you can … [Read more...]
An Awesome Resource, Newmark Learning’s Early Readers
I'm impressed with the selection and quality of Newmark Learning early readers books. I know they're good because they passed the JJ test. JJ, my first grader, especially loved the nursery rhyme books mentioned below - the Around the Clock Fiction Kit. Around the Clock Fiction Kit There are 8 Nursery Rhyme Books of fun and funny stories expanding on the original nursery rhymes. Plus, the … [Read more...]