Thank you so much for mentioning this. I honestly had no idea. I heard from friends who have kids that go to public school about the fact they are falling behind in reading and math too! Math seems to be a struggle for lots of public school. Speaking of reading, my daughter now is SK. We started a program all about reading because she seemed to be struggling. My son, who's in grade 4 now has thrived through the same program !! I can totally relate to how our kids can thrive differently. I am just so surprised that they haven't updated science !
We Love All About Reading, such a solid program! They just updated the math, but it's still using a lot of the "new math" concepts which confuses a lot of parents making homework tough. And they basically just added coding. The science they did update a few years ago, but it's was a very light update.
The lack of phonics instruction and using pictures to guess words is why my dyslexic daughter wasn’t progressing in school and why she hated reading. She couldn’t read successfully that way so it’s no wonder she hated it. We decided to homeschool near the end of her first grade year when we were told how well she was doing, but then her reports, and what we were seeing at home didn’t match up with that at all. We’re beyond grateful for the privilege of homeschooling and the immense amount of support we’re able to provide for our children with the use of customizable resources.
As a person coming from a Caribbean background I find the swings so interesting. We haven't changed language curriculum in about a 15 years. We learn to write both script and cursive. Cursive is my favorite for letter writing.
Love this story time video! I remember when they made the “back to basics” switch. I’d love to hear what your opinion is on the Waldorf method. I’m seeing a lot of people talk about Waldorf lately. What phonics based literacy program did you do with Alexie when she was 5? 😊
Waldorf is a great method. It's focus on nature and it's delay in structured reading lessons definitely appeal to parents. But it's does have a bit of a higher price because it does focus on very high quality art supplies. Other wise a great approach. We did All About Reading with Alexie and Zoe!
Very interesting. I was not very familiar with the Ontario school system, but we've lived here 7 years now. When we went to enroll my special needs son and we did IEP meetings and all that, it was EXTREMELY evident that he would not be given adequate support for him to actually learn anything. School was nothing more than a baby sitting service for SN kids. I remember asking about phonics instruction for my son during a multidis meeting and I was actually laughed at. I pulled him very quickly after that and what do you know, I taught him how to read in about 3 months with explicit phonics instruction. I'm grateful for the freedom to homeschool, but angry for how this government neglects special needs kids in and out of the classroom.
For families with SN kids, it's such a mess honestly. They're so focused on pushing kids into regular classes, but they offer almost no support to do it appropriately and then everyone suffers. And the fact that they didn't teach phonics, which is essential for almost all SN kids, was a travesty!
Very thorough discussion. I had only really begun educating myself in teaching reading, in earnest, when my second child didn’t pick up on reading as easily as my first (who seemingly learned by osmosis). I remember being shocked when I listened to the documentary podcast Sold a Story (highly recommend), which uncovers the “research” and conspiracies that lead up to this literacy crisis, and sheds light on the science of reading. You covered some interesting points here. I’m curious which homeschool reading programs you recommend?
When picking a reading program, I'm looking for a phonic approach for the first little bit. We've done All about Reading with great success. But teach your child to read in 100 lessons is another simple but much cheaper option: amzn.to/48w5cn3 . I also like Chalkboard publishing phonics work books too! amzn.to/4hqU0w5
Thank you! I am using Happy Cheetah at the moment but every day l panic bc it is very little phonics. l have all about reading sitting here but he has never been able to remember the phonics rules.Taught all my own kids with Sing Spell Read and Write.This sweetheart that l teach now is my nuerodivergent grandson. So hard to know what to do.
Oh that's tricky! Chalkboard publishing has some great phonics workbooks that are simple and work slowly to reinforce those concepts. amzn.to/48t2sqE Another great option are the app Teach your Monster how to read (6.99 one time purchase as an app or it's free on a computer). And we recently discovered the Duolingo abc app (free)
Thank you so much for mentioning this. I honestly had no idea. I heard from friends who have kids that go to public school about the fact they are falling behind in reading and math too!
Math seems to be a struggle for lots of public school.
Speaking of reading, my daughter now is SK. We started a program all about reading because she seemed to be struggling. My son, who's in grade 4 now has thrived through the same program !! I can totally relate to how our kids can thrive differently. I am just so surprised that they haven't updated science !
We Love All About Reading, such a solid program! They just updated the math, but it's still using a lot of the "new math" concepts which confuses a lot of parents making homework tough. And they basically just added coding. The science they did update a few years ago, but it's was a very light update.
The lack of phonics instruction and using pictures to guess words is why my dyslexic daughter wasn’t progressing in school and why she hated reading. She couldn’t read successfully that way so it’s no wonder she hated it. We decided to homeschool near the end of her first grade year when we were told how well she was doing, but then her reports, and what we were seeing at home didn’t match up with that at all. We’re beyond grateful for the privilege of homeschooling and the immense amount of support we’re able to provide for our children with the use of customizable resources.
I love your Ontario content! I am from same province so am always interested in your views of the education system here.
So glad you're enjoying the content!
As a person coming from a Caribbean background I find the swings so interesting. We haven't changed language curriculum in about a 15 years. We learn to write both script and cursive. Cursive is my favorite for letter writing.
I think cursive is so pretty! I just think it's funny that they got everyone worked-up about it here just to hide the fact that they got sued!
Love this story time video! I remember when they made the “back to basics” switch. I’d love to hear what your opinion is on the Waldorf method. I’m seeing a lot of people talk about Waldorf lately.
What phonics based literacy program did you do with Alexie when she was 5? 😊
Waldorf is a great method. It's focus on nature and it's delay in structured reading lessons definitely appeal to parents. But it's does have a bit of a higher price because it does focus on very high quality art supplies. Other wise a great approach.
We did All About Reading with Alexie and Zoe!
Very interesting. I was not very familiar with the Ontario school system, but we've lived here 7 years now. When we went to enroll my special needs son and we did IEP meetings and all that, it was EXTREMELY evident that he would not be given adequate support for him to actually learn anything. School was nothing more than a baby sitting service for SN kids. I remember asking about phonics instruction for my son during a multidis meeting and I was actually laughed at. I pulled him very quickly after that and what do you know, I taught him how to read in about 3 months with explicit phonics instruction. I'm grateful for the freedom to homeschool, but angry for how this government neglects special needs kids in and out of the classroom.
For families with SN kids, it's such a mess honestly. They're so focused on pushing kids into regular classes, but they offer almost no support to do it appropriately and then everyone suffers. And the fact that they didn't teach phonics, which is essential for almost all SN kids, was a travesty!
Very thorough discussion. I had only really begun educating myself in teaching reading, in earnest, when my second child didn’t pick up on reading as easily as my first (who seemingly learned by osmosis). I remember being shocked when I listened to the documentary podcast Sold a Story (highly recommend), which uncovers the “research” and conspiracies that lead up to this literacy crisis, and sheds light on the science of reading. You covered some interesting points here.
I’m curious which homeschool reading programs you recommend?
When picking a reading program, I'm looking for a phonic approach for the first little bit. We've done All about Reading with great success. But teach your child to read in 100 lessons is another simple but much cheaper option: amzn.to/48w5cn3 . I also like Chalkboard publishing phonics work books too! amzn.to/4hqU0w5
Thank you! I am using Happy Cheetah at the moment but every day l panic bc it is very little phonics. l have all about reading sitting here but he has never been able to remember the phonics rules.Taught all my own kids with Sing Spell Read and Write.This sweetheart that l teach now is my nuerodivergent grandson. So hard to know what to do.
Oh that's tricky! Chalkboard publishing has some great phonics workbooks that are simple and work slowly to reinforce those concepts.
amzn.to/48t2sqE
Another great option are the app Teach your Monster how to read (6.99 one time purchase as an app or it's free on a computer). And we recently discovered the Duolingo abc app (free)