Our Reading Routine

Our reading program has undergone quite a transformation since we first began teaching Syd to read back when she was three.  (Hey, she asked, I provided.  Don't judge.)  We have a system now that, I think, works pretty well, so I thought I'd share with you how we spend the first part of each day.

The spine of our program is Jolly Phonics.  From what I've seen, it's somewhat similar to AAR, but I think it's more fun for younger children.  We have the complete JP curriculum, and most days go something like this:

Our (Tentative) Plan for the Coming School Year

Now that Syd is four years old, it feels like the coming year, her K4 year, will be our first "official" year of homeschooling.  And believe me, when you've been planning to homeschool since your firstborn was in utero, that's a big, big deal.

We have pretty much everything we're going to use, though I'm still nailing down the logistics of the scheduling.  Just doing the work when Syd requests it is a bit too loose for me, but I don't want to be standing on the table cracking a whip while she frantically tries to wipe the tears from her handwriting assignment, if you know what I mean.

Here are our plans:

A Shameless Brag.

As I've stated in other posts, Sydney has been using Funnix to teach her reading, usually doing about one lesson every other day.  And just because she's three and a half, please don't picture me standing on the arm of the couch, screaming threats and cracking a whip above her head as she tearfully tries to memorize vowel sounds.  The child LOVES her lessons.  I don't even load them up until she has thoroughly begged me for a phonics lesson.

At this point, she's up to lesson twenty, and she's reading CVC and some CVVC words.  She would probably be further, but she's slowed by the fact that every time she reads a word, she takes a minute to do a happy dance and hug me.  It's very cute.  She's even begun sounding out some short sentences in her easy readers.

Painting with watercolors at the kitchen table

And yes, I am bragging.  Shamelessly.  I suppose I feel slightly more entitled than the average doting mother because doctors have been telling me for awhile now that Sydney had a good chance of turning out "with some degree of intellectual impairment," given her genetic diagnosis.

Well, doctors, *blows raspberry*.  My three and a half  year old is reading.  AND we're going to start Saxon K math as soon as it makes its way to my mailbox.  AND she has a better vocabulary than half the adults I know.  So put that in your pipe and smoke it, and quit trying to convince me that she's never going to be normal.

Okay, I think I'm done now.  *deep cleansing breath*

Funnix- A Review

As I mentioned in previous posts, we were able to snag Funnix during the two-week period this month they were giving it away.  Now that we've been using it for a couple weeks- Sydney is up to lesson sixteen, I think- I thought I'd review it for anyone considering paying the near forty bucks it costs normally.

Funnix is a computer program you download through the website via an emailed link.  The download itself can be a bit glitchy, and I had the best luck when I stopped trying to use Firefox and used IE instead.  The download comes with several parts.  You get the lessons themselves, of which there are one hundred and twenty, the workbook, the readers, and Funnix 2.  Obviously, as we're only up to lesson sixteen, my review doesn't cover the readers or the second part of the program.

I was initially hesitant to use a computer program to teach phonics, as we limit screen time pretty heavily around here, but it's not an animated, hyper freakshow like some other reading websites (I'm looking at you, Reading Eggs) and the vast majority of what you see are letters and still drawings with a voice-over giving instructions and asking questions.  The woman's voice isn't great, but I've heard much, much worse.  There are occasional places in the audio where the sound quality changes for several seconds, as if they had to rerecord some parts, but it's not too much of an annoyance.

You are going to want some kind of screen protector for your computer, because a big part of the exercises involve having the child touch different letters and pictures on the screen.  If your kid is more of a jabber than a toucher, you might want to find a different program.

The exercises themselves are simple and fun.  Your child will learn letter names, sounds, and blending simultaneously, so it doesn't have the soul-crushing monotony of some other programs.  The storytime segment is my daughter's favorite part.  The program reads a story accompanied by pictures, slowly sounding out the occasional word and asking Sydney what the word is.  

Each lesson ends with a worksheet which you have to print out from the pdf file.  The worksheets are fairly simple, and are a bit on the dull side, but nothing too terrible.  There is a writing component in each of them, but that's easily skipped if your child isn't quite there yet in fine motor skills.

Overall, it's a great program if you manage to get it for free.  Is it worthy almost forty bucks?  That, I'm not so sure about.  I could have bought two phonics programs in book form for the price I would have paid for this.  If your child has a good attention span and loves to snuggle, you'd probably be better off buying one of the many books out there, but if your kid has trouble staying engaged, this would probably be a great program to try.

Funnix Website