Grade K Readers w/ Language Arts K

by Ginger G on 2012-08-29
I am reviewing the LA K with readers. Hope it's in the right place! I was really not impressed when I opened the package, and didn't see how it would flow into a cohesive unit. I'm sold. My 5 year old can read. We are on week 13 of this program, and she is reading the fun tales, with (I feel) just the right amount of struggle. She has to sound out most of the words, and is becoming more familiar with them. Her writing has greatly improved. I like the simplicity. LA takes us maybe twenty minutes a day, and it's not all over the place. No, I don't like all of the activities. We skip some. Personally, we will be using the Language book next year (it is scheduled optionally in LA 1, and I think it would be better suited for a 6 year old). This program gives me the structure I need, with the flexibility of diversion when needed.

by Emily C on 2012-04-28
My son is 5/6 while doing this program. He loves reading the fun tales books by himself. However, they are well below his reading level. Too simple and silly I think. Im sure they are well suited for children at a lower reading level though.

by Franklin R on 2011-10-19
At first, I wasn't to sure about these books. I thought the stories were odd and the drawings were odd. My children love them though. The progression of letters works great, even for my Dyslexic child. The kids love the pictures and get to color them in when the successfully read the book, so I have to order a new set for each kid. My kids don't have trouble understanding the stories because the odd words that are not used much tend to be onomatopoeic. This helps my kids figure out what they are reading.

by Amber K on 2011-05-01
As simple readers, as silly as they might be they did help both of my kids start to enjoy reading. Yes, they are silly, they have situations that could be handled differently. But we looked at them like watching Tom and jerry. Silly and fun but not harmful. Ex: One book has an animal "bop" another on the head for not listening. Not a great example but use it as a way to explain good choices from bad. Overall we enjoyed them and my kids were very proud of themself when they read their first set of books.

by Ashley C on 2011-03-19
I can see how some people are disapointed with this set. There are words that are not used often, such as a cam (my husband had to explain the car part to us!) and a character does whack another. HOWEVER, my son loved reading these. He would laugh out loud at some of the silliness! We did get to talk about what a better way to handle a situation would be. These stories worked very well for us. Towards the end, my son was so excited about reading, he tried to read the information on the back to me! This is a program that has allowed my son to experience the joy of reading and is a great confidence builder to transfer that knowledge to other books.

by TRACY G on 2010-02-13
My boys love these books! My oldest read them when he was 6, and now my second is 6 and he has been reading these. He thinks they are wacky and funny. The pictures often make him laugh. They love the info about the animals on the back. I think these are fantastic and will use them with my youngest son when he is ready to read in a couple years.

by JOY E on 2010-02-02
First I want to state that I LOVE Sonlight. But about this product, I am disappointed. The illustrations are poorly done. For the majority of them my daughter and I have had to look at the picture on the back to try to figure out what the animal is supposed to be. They look second-rate, not high quality like most Sonlight materials. Many of the books include someone hitting, “bamming”, rapping or patting someone or something. And the characters regularly express anger (mad, having a fit). I seize the opportunity each time to talk about how the character ought to have responded, but it’s distracting to my new reader when she must constantly stop reading and say, “Mommy he shouldn’t be doing that, right?” I welcome examples of sin and misbehavior in the read-alouds as teaching tools, but wish they didn’t exist as much in these beginning readers. We have another set of books from a different company using the same basic letter progression without the anger and violence that we use a lot more.

by MARIA R on 2009-09-22
My daughter really struggled with these last year b/c much of the time they didn't make sense. After going through several readers with tears and listening to her say "this doesn't even make sense", I switched to the Hooked on Phonics readers I had on hand. What a change. Beautifully written with beautiful illustrations. Chelsea loved them. I sifted through and used a handful of the Sonlight readers that were o.k. B/c of this experience I first read the reviews for the I Can Read it Readers for gr. 1 and I'm seeing many of the same comments. The few samplings people have written tells me already that they would be painful for my daughter to get through. Sorry Sonlight I'll have to find another reading program. Please revise. I love the rest of your curriculum.

by SARAH J on 2009-07-26
We loved these books. It was great finally getting books that they COULD read, that went along with LA K. I had been getting "preschool" readers from the library that introduced words that they just could not read yet! These books gave them confidence that they could read an entire book, even though they are short.

by CAROL S on 2009-05-19
We've really enjoyed these books. They are very short and simple. I have found them useful in helping my daughter learn how to sound words out. They stick with the basic phonograms and sounds, keeping it simple so the child doesn't have to wonder is this /a/ or /ay/ or /ah/, etc. We started with some other phonics books but I felt they moved too quickly into two letter phonograms (ch, sh, etc.) and alternate sounds. I used other materials with my oldest two, who proved to be very quick learners for reading, but my third child has not been as fast to pick up reading and these were exactly what we needed.