I Can Read!

I was so proud of Selena today, I told her instead of working on her "b" work from her Christian Liberty Press Curriculum we would spend time learning her "at" words from her Progressive Phonics Curriculum. She hasn't been too thrilled with working with me on this much, but I insisted today. At first she was enjoying the stories but she just really still did not want to try to pronounce the words. Since I don't want her to get frustrated we put the book up and I said we would try again later.

Later came, and I again pulled out her book and flash cards and told her Grandma thought we should try again. This time she was a little more interested. She started right in with the flash cards, pronouncing first the short letter "a" then the word "at" from there we started working on the words "cat" "hat", then she lost interest. So once again we put it away, but I told her I know you can learn to read these words, so we will try again later.

After dinner I again brought out the flash cards and told Selena we need to learn these words before we do any more school work. She of course wanted me to read the book to her again, and I told her not until you read these words for Grandma. This time she again started with the short sound of "a" then the word "at" from there she went through all the "at" words, "cat", "hat", "bat", "rat", "mat", "sat", "fat", "pat". She carefully pronounced each letter then put the sounds together to make the word. She was then rewarded with reading the stories again from the book.

Tonight before she went to bed, she had to show Grandpa her achievement, and amazed him as she sat there pronouncing the words, letter by letter, then putting them together to form the correct word. We are both proud of her and now know she has reached the maturity to truly start learning to read. She has known her alphabet and phonic sounds of each letter for about a year or a little longer, but this was truly her first time to handle words, besides her name. Which believe me her name was a huge achievement as she never could pronounce her name, and always called herself Selah, until a lot of hard work and pronouncing it bit by bit from our felt board for a couple of weeks before she put it all together and finally came up with Selena!

Anyone who thinks 2.5 year olds can't learn to read really needs to visit Progressive Phonics and check it out for themselves. I must add that the Curriculum from Christian Liberty Press is absolutely great and fun for this age as well, they focus not only on the letters and numbers, but the fine motor skills needed to start righting, cutting, simple math, critical thinking skills, and following simple instructions. Just give it a try, I bet your little one will surprise you. I am so proud of Selena and am looking forward to moving forward with more short "a" words, before long we will be moving on to short "e" words! Good Job Selena!!