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Two early reading programs for your kids

I am an avid researcher when it comes to educating my children-especially my daughter who has Down syndrome. I want to give my daughter every head start she can get because a lot of milestones take her a little longer to achieve. I am fortunate to have attended two reading program workshops designed for children with Down syndrome. Both of these programs are whole language programs and are not phonetic programs. I found this site which explains the difference between phonetic reading programs and whole language reading programs. I think that a comprehensive approach is the best way to teach reading.

While these programs are designed for children with Down syndrome, I truly believe they can be used with any child of any learning ability. I feel that half the battle of teaching our child anything is finding some sort of direction. These programs do just that-provide guidance and direction for parents as they teach their children the very important skill of reading.

See-and-Learn

The first program I have learned about is called See-and-Learn. This program was developed by Frank Buckley in the United Kingdom by the Down Syndrome Educational Trust. Through much research, they have designed a reading program for very young children. This program is not a phonetic program and does not focus on shapes or sounds of individual letters. It is a sight-word based program and focuses on the shapes of entire words.

The reading program is divided into several steps:

  • My First Words
  • My First Reading
  • My First Sentences

Each of these steps follow the same pattern:

  • Let’s Look at the pictures or words
  • Let’s Match the pictures or words
  • Let’s Show we understand
  • Let’s Say or Sign

See-and-Learn is a very well researched reading program and I love that they specialize in teaching children with Down syndrome how to read. The program is still being developed, however you can get started today! All of their pilot materials are online available for FREE download, as is the power point slides from the conference I attended. You can print activity guides, session records, and step guides at their website. This program is being developed in the United Kingdom, so some of the words may not be appropriate (ie: “biscuit” instead of “cracker.”) The Down Syndrome Educational Trust is working with a group in the United States to make the vocabulary more American friendly. Please check out their site and check out the pilot materials! I am hopeful that the program will be completed very soon and that I can start getting the full resources soon for Darah, however I have been able to use their program by making some modifications and have been happy to have the direction and motivation this program has given me.

Out of the Box

The second program I attended a workshop on was the Out of the Box reading program. This was one of the funnest workshops I have ever attended. The presenters (and creators) have incredible energy and enthusiasm about their program. Out of the Box reading program is also a whole language approach to teaching your child to read. This program emphasizes repetition. It is also geared toward children who have Down syndrome, but again, any child could benefit from this program. Basically, through HUGE flashcards, and consistent repetition, Out of the Box strives to teach very young children to read. My only con with this program is the cost. It is pretty expensive, however, all of the friends I have who have purchased this program have sworn by it and are seeing results. Here is a video of how this program works:

What are your thoughts on these programs?

7 Responses to Two early reading programs for your kids

  • Gravatar
    Comment by Jenna
    January 20, 2008 @ 10:52 pm

    great, Great, GREAT information. I employed a few of these concepts this weekend and I am so excited about it. I have a four year old typical son and a 2 year old daughter with Ds and I can’t say enough about what you have posted. Thank you for all the links and for the extra push that I needed towards an early start to teaching my kids how to read.

    You should see my house. I have at least a hundred post cards with words on them attached to different items in the house. Nate keeps running around to each of them and saying the word based on where they are. I can’t wait to see how he’ll do when I take them to to drill him away from the object.

    thanks again!!!!

  • Gravatar
    Comment by Kelli Fritz
    April 1, 2008 @ 1:10 pm

    Thanks for the info – I too have attended the Out of the box reading program through my local down syndrome group and really liked the program, however, I did not purchase due to the high cost. Have you begun the out of the box reading program or See-n-learn – which program do you prefer. Thanks for sharing the info –

    Kelli

  • Comment by McKenna
    April 1, 2008 @ 11:56 pm

    @Kelli
    I prefer the See-and-Learn. I didn’t ever begin Out of the Box because of the price…but they recently broke it up so you can purchase the book separate. That seems much more reasonable to me. The See-and-Learn takes some work getting going because you have to make your own flashcards, but if you take a weekend to set it up (like I did), then it’s easy to do. Darah really likes the See-and-Learn and is doing well with it.

    Good luck!

  • Gravatar April 23, 2008 @ 12:16 am

    [...] Darah. I am already doing the See-and-Learn reading program that I raved to all of you about in this article. I also was already working on numbers, shapes, and colors with Darah. I was also already [...]

  • Gravatar
    Comment by Denise
    May 19, 2008 @ 7:00 pm

    Hello Jenna, Kelli, McKenna and the Moms reading this post. I just wanted to ensure that you were aware Out of the Box Reading has closed its doors. I have recommenced business independently as eReadingPro, and am offering the same reading system as before via OOTBR. The difference is that I have created eBooks that contain the same instructions, vocabulary, presentation schedules AND all of the images to create your child’s books! The eBooks cost substantially less, as they allow the user to integrate their own materials for making the flashcards and eliminate the expense of shipping a heavy kit. I welcome you to visit our new site at: http://www.ereadingpro.com!

  • Comment by McKenna
    May 21, 2008 @ 9:07 pm

    Thanks Denise! I’m really excited about eReadingPro! It looks like a great program! :D

  • Gravatar June 30, 2008 @ 11:01 pm

    [...] that was a little more complete. I began a new reading program with Darah a few weeks ago. I wrote an article reviewing Out of the Box reading a while back. The company has now changed and is called [...]

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