Reading Eggs

Review     Hello Everyone, I thought you and your little one might like to trial the ABC Reading Eggs and Eggspress programs for two weeks absolutely FREE. Those of you who have followed our journey into home education will remember that we took up home educating our then 7-year old 2nd grader because he was struggling at private school and unable to read. Reading time was always a huge challenge & whenever I brought out a book for reading he’d tense up completely because he absolutely hated it. I kept on trying during the course of last year & finally, in June just gave it up & left all reading. No more books, no more tension & no more frustration. Then in January this year I stumbled on the Reading Eggs site & decided to give learning to read another try. This program caters for 7 – 13 year olds & addresses the way Misha learns best. I started him on Level 2 “Beginning to Read for emerging readers” on the 19th January & for the first week I just left him as he spent 6 to 8 hours a day working the programme. By the 26th January he had mastered 20 lessons & moved up to Level 3. Since then he’s completed a lesson a day & finished Level 3 reading on the 19th April. Reading Eggs activities include a Skills Bank with 96 lessons to teach spelling the fun way. There’s a Story Factory to encourage writing stories as well as Driving tests to assess student knowledge in one of three essential reading skills. For the little ones it includes a Play Room & a Puzzle park. When I checked his reports in at the end of April, he was still at 7 years reading age, but by last Friday when I checked again he had improved to 9 years reading age. I’m amazed at how much his confidence has grown & his hatred towards reading has reduced. Lately he’s insisted on reading the Clinker Castle stories to me before going ahead with the comprehension exercises. Today I was quite surprised that he wanted to read eNews to the group on our Field Trip to eTV. Although some of the words were a bit difficult for his current reading level, he wasn’t deterred… This afternoon he finished the last lesson at Storylands, Clinker Castle & will be moving on to Reading Express with its 200 lesson Comprehension gym & Library with its 650 levelled books with reading ages from 6 – 12+ years, next week. Finally learning to read is no longer a chore & completing his lessons is done in about 40 minutes each day. Finally, after 21 months of home education, we’re making a breakthrough with reading. Letting go & trusting God & Misha to pick it up when he’s ready, is finally paying off… Reading Eggs is working really well for Misha and registering is quick and easy. Give it a go, it really works! Blessings, Patrizia (a.k.a. Trys/Trixi) Schwartz Mom to Jesse (14) & Misha (9)     testimonials       Parents At first we thought that this is not suitable for ou… Teachers Reading Eggs is wonderful for early and beginning re… Special needs Hi I am the Curriculum Co-ordinator at an independen…       contact       Send us an email Tel: +44 1173 600246        9am - 5pm        Monday - Friday

ABC Reading Eggs is 100% Australian and is designed for 3 to 7 year olds who are learning to read. The program is successful because it makes learning phonics and basic reading skills a truly enjoyable experience, through a range of educationally sound, fun and interactive activities. Over 200 000 parents and 4000 teachers across Australia are using ABC Reading Eggs with their children. Be one of the 90% of parents who have reported seeing a noticeable improvement in their child’s reading skills and register for your 2 week FREE trial NOW! To receive your 2 weeks FREE access simply click on the provided link and complete the registration form provided > Register now for my FREE 2 week trial To see what parents and teachers have to say about the program click here > Testimonials Click here to visit www.readingeggs.com Yours sincerely Matthew Sandblom Chief Eggsploring Officer www.readingeggs.com   news       We are very proud to announce the launch of our NEW Storylands destination. The first 20 lessons of Clinker Castle are open to play! Storylands opens after lesson 60 with 4 exciting maps, 20 wonderful books and lots of new rewards. This area build…

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Home Educating a Struggling Learner

We removed our very active, yet highly intelligent 7-year old from private school in August 2010 because he was struggling with reading & writing due to his gross & fine motor skills foundation not having been addressed properly at a Gr. R level, hence the learning problems. He is also a Right Brain Kinaesthetic as well as Visual Spatial learner & his learning styles are not catered for in most of our schools today.

“A mother’s first duty to her children is to secure for them a quiet and growing time, a full six years of passive receptive life, the waking part of it for the most part spent out in the fresh air.”

~ Charlotte Mason

And that’s where the “system” failed our little one quite miserably…

The school focused too early & too much on academics & neglected the motor skills as well as visual perception. Midline crossing & skipping, being very important skills for fluent reading were just 2 of many areas that were not addressed properly. Although he could memorise paragraphs, like a parrot, he struggled to read. He Aced his spelling tests but could not spell when writing sentences. These were just a few of the issues we’ve been working on together with his pre-school teacher to get him through Gr. 2. He was able to cope thus far due to his intelligence, but the struggling impacted his self-esteem very negatively & caused him to dislike school with a passion.

Although the school tried to address the problem with remedial (at additional cost to us as parents) & extra lessons, these showed very little success, but instead placed extra workload & repetition rather than addressing the foundation of the problem… hence we’ve took him back to Hettie Hen Playgroup after school twice a week since August 2009 so she could do physical activities & brain gym with him in order to get the brain development going. This showed shown huge improvement, but his backlog was so big that he still got very fidgety in class when he didn’t understand the tasks at hand. The other problem was that he was constantly stressed & tired, thus making the progress slow.

The following are pages where I found some very useful information to help my struggling learner:

• Homeschooling Your Struggling Learner by Dianne Craft Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) Special Needs Coordinator

• Smart Kids who Hate to Write by Dianne Craft

• Child Diagnostics by Dianne Craft ~ Solutions for Dislexia, Disgraphia & Struggling Learners

• Learning Differently by Kathy Kuhl, author of Homeschooling Your Struggling Learner

• Anna’s House ~ Educational Remediation from the Brain StemUp.

• Heads Up Now! ~ Heads Up! is a company designed to provide expert information and products for special needs children.

We have applied many of the tips contained in these pages & together with the stress release, this has resulted in a huge improvement both in his abilities as well as his confidence.  ~ If you have a struggling learner, be sure to visit these pages & get some help to avoid yourself & your child some stress & frustration.

“ADD seems like a matter of convenience to many adults who are in charge of “round kids” who don’t fit into the “square holes” of home and school. The label helps a teacher get a troublesome child out of a regular class and into a special education room, helps a parent get a drug prescription to set the problem right (instead of first considering other more fundamental changes, and even helps many students get more time to take tests and complete assignments in class. Unfortunately, though it’s the child who gets saddled with the disability label and has to go through school looked upon as less normal than the other kids. Nowhere in this litany of deficit, disability, and disedase is there the recognition that these children may learn very well IN THEIR OWN WAY.” from In Their Own Way: Discovering and Encouraging Your Child’s Multiple Intelligences by Dr. Thomas Armstrong

We have one of those “round kids” that doesn’t fit into the “square holes”, but refused the ADD label and instead, removed him from the “square hole” environment & today, just over a year later he’s flourishing & growing to become a confident student once again.

I’m currently reading this book & am slowly starting to understand why our youngest had such a struggle at school. It seems he’s a right brain kinaesthetic learner. Keeping him interested in schoolwork is quite a challenge & I’m constantly having to change my strategies because he gets bored very easily. Thus far we have used the All-In-One Programme, Switched on Schoolhouse as well as Teaching Textbooksall of which were effective only for a while. I have recently had to change strategy againand now we’re using Time4Learning and loads of interactive educational PC games. Of course I’ve also added an Art tutor, because he enjoyed the few sessions for his art project last term so much.

I have decided to take next few years one day at a time. We’ll continue with Time4Learning for as long as it works for him. In the interim I still have loads of links and books to work through in my quest to find ways & means to help him through.

I trust that in the near future we will be able to conquer this hatred for schoolwork & be able to restore his love for learning.

Educating a Reluctant Learner

School in general is quite a mission in our home for both our boys. Although our eldest managed to cope quite well in school, his love for learning has been destroyed by school pressure.

Next year he will be doing 4 subjects with Alpha Omega Academy. As for the rest of the “normal” grade 9 curriculum I’m planning to do “Story of the World” with them and let him continue his technology lessons with his current tutor. I also want to try our some Woodworking lessons for them. Since they both love the Junior Engineering (JEFA) classes so much, I will let them continue those as well.

Here are some books I’ve found for teaching the child who hates school…

• Teaching a Reluctant Learner by Tony @ Simple Homeschool.
• Teaching the Reluctant Learner By Terry Spray @ NATHHAN National Challenged Homeschoolers Associated Network

The Shut-Down Learner

Helping Your Academically Discouraged Child

Richard Selznick

I Hate School

How to Help Your Child Love Learning

Cynthia Ulrich Tobias

Unfortunately I’ve been so busy helping my struggling learner that I still need to find the time to read through all these books. I’m thus not yet sure whether they contain any tips that will help with my boys.

I know however, during the next few years my greatest challenge will be restoring their love for learning. Yet, I still have no idea exactly how I’m going to achieve that.

Please visit this page frequently as I will be posting regular updates as I find more resources.

Left-Handed Learners

I was myself a left-handed learner and remember the pain and agony of having been forced to become right-handed. Handwriting was the one area where I failed all my life & this didn’t do my self-esteem much good. To this day I still write like a crab & am unable to even do my signature consistently the same.

According to Wikipedia there are 4 types of handedness:

• Right-handedness is most common. Right-handed people are more dexterous with their right hands when performing tasks. A variety of studies suggest that 70–90% of the world population is right-handed.^[4][5]
• Left-handedness is less common than right-handedness. Left-handed people are more dexterous with their left hands when performing tasks. A variety of studies suggest that approximately 10% of the world population is left-handed.^[6]
• Mixed-Handedness is the change of hand preference between different tasks. This is common in the population with about a 30% prevalence.^[1]
• Ambidexterity is exceptionally rare, although it can be learned. A truly ambidextrous person is able to do any task equally well with either hand. Those who learn it still tend to favour their originally dominant hand.^[2]

This article, How to Determine if Your Child is Left or Right Handed by Backup Care describes Hand Dominance as well as the Indicators for Hand Dominance.

Below are some links with info & suppliers that might help you avoid similar struggles with your left-handed learners.

Local Info & Suppliers

Left-handedness is not a curse by Isebell Gauche

Left-Handed Child in the Child Magazine. Left-handedness used to be a stigma that parents and teachers tried to eradicate. Here are some tips for keeping that in the past. by Denise Pape

 

Left-hand Learning is a South African website that offers a comprehensive service dedicated to left-hand learners, their parents and educators!! Providers of left-hand products and workshops. Email Tracy or contact +27 (83) 417-3316

are the main Importers and suppliers of ergonomically designed left handed stationery and accessories for children and adults. Email Admin or contact +27 (11) 794-1696

International Info & Suppliers

On this website you will find all the information and advice you’ll need to help left-handed children from nursery right through their school days to overcome the annoyances and frustrations of living in a right-handed world. You’ll find lots of ideas and resources specifically for left-handers, giving them the best techniques for adapting right-handed teaching and resources across the school curriculum. Armed with these techniques, left-handed children can learn new skills confidently and efficiently, without awkwardness or frustration, leaving them free to achieve their potential.

Left-handed products and information for lefthanders since 1968. Offers over 250 left handed products  that make a REAL difference -  see how YOU can benefit from  using left-handed equipment.

Rosemary West's Left Handed Page Your left hand, your right hand, and both sides of your brain

Please visit this page frequently as I will be posting regular updates as I find more resources.