Curriculum Corner — Exploring Phonics

In preparation for the school year, many of you are probably deciding on which curriculum choices to make depending on the needs, learning styles and goals of your learners. As a result, we will continue to publish some Educational Facilitator favorites for the core academics.

As important as “what” children learn is “how” they learn. With each program suggested, we will also include whether it works well with visual learners, auditory learners, or kinesthetic learners. Here is a link to several learning style assessments to help you determine your children’s learning styles.

Sing, Spell, Read and Write:
TK-Grade 2
Learning Styles: Visual, Auditory and Kinesthetic

Sing, Spell, Read and Write is a fabulous reading program that utilizes all learning styles and covers phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, writing, spelling, grammar and comprehension. The program incorporates a singing component with a CD. There are also games, readers, workbooks and manipulatives to help children learn to read. Sing, Spell, Read and Write is a strong, comprehensive program that covers the different aspects of learning to read that children enjoy doing. Additionally, Rainbow Resource sells several homeschool bundles.

All About Reading:
TK-Grade 4
Learning Styles: Visual, Auditory and Kinesthetic

All About Reading is another comprehensive reading program. It focuses on phonemic awareness and phonics skills using all of the learning styles. Learners use a hands-on approach to learn to manipulate sounds to become fluent readers. An interactive manipulative kit is essential to this program and is used effectively to give children a strong foundation on phonics. Readers are used to build fluency and increase comprehension. All About Reading will help you teach a young and/or struggling reader how to read.

McRuffy Language Arts:
TK-Grade 4
Learning Styles: Visual, Auditory and Kinesthetic
McRuffy is a great phonics program. It uses all of the learning styles to teach children to read using phonemic awareness and phonics skills. There are games and a workbook used to reinforce the skills the students are learning. Colorful readers are used to practice phonics skills and increase fluency and comprehension.

Words Their Way:
TK-Grade 5
Learning Styles: Visual, Auditory and Kinesthetic

Words Their Way is program that teaches phonics, spelling and vocabulary. The homeschool bundles sold at Rainbow Resource are Kindergarten level (K) and Levels A-E, which are compatible with grades 1-5. The homeschool bundles come with a grade level teacher’s guide, a word study notebook and a parent guide. The word study notebooks include color copies of the word sorts needed for the year which makes lesson planning easy. Learners that are kinesthetic and visual will benefit from sorting the words and pictures in the daily lessons to learn phonics and spelling.

Zoo Phonics:
TK-Grade 1
Learning Styles: Visual, Auditory and Kinesthetic
Zoo Phonics is a fun approach to learning how to read. Animals are matched to each sound to help children learn phonemic awareness and phonics. Music and games are also used to make the program more hands-on. The program is not comprehensive like the other programs suggested, but for young learners it is fun and interactive.

Other Phonics/Learn How to Read Books
TK-Grade 3
Learning Styles: Visual and Auditory
There are many books that have been written in textbook form to teach children how to read. The books do not contain supporting materials. Some homeschool parents have been successful using just these books to teach their children how to read. Some of the titles include:

Teach a Child to Read with Children’s Books

Teach Your Child to Read with 100 Easy Lessons

Phonics Pathways

The Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading

Exploring Curriculum is a series covering the core academic subjects for grades TK-8. Here are some of the past subjects covered:

Math

Please keep in mind that while links are included to the publisher’s website, many of the resources are available at Rainbow Resource and some of the curriculum may be cheaper there. As you begin to place orders, it is usually more economical to place one big order versus paying the shipping costs on several smaller orders.