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Whenever parents who are thinking about homeschooling their soon-to-be preschoolers ask me for advice, I always say the same thing: read to them all the time, learn through play, and start slowly with Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons.
Seriously. This book is the absolute only formal instruction I recommend when starting to homeschool preschoolers.
I’ve mentioned my love of this book before. My dog-eared copy has taught my three oldest kids to read well above grade level and is now helping my youngest to learn to read at the age of four.
The book is worth its weight in gold.
Let’s get into what sets this book apart from other reading programs, what the lessons look like, and some tips that I’ve learned along the way.
Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons
First of all, I know: the title is a little gimmicky. It kind of sounds like a late night infomercial. After using the book for about 7 years now, though, the title actually delivers on its promise.
So what is the book and how can it teach your child to read?
Like the title says, the book is broken up into 100 lessons and starts with the assumption that your child has no previous knowledge of the alphabet or letter sounds. Zero.
That may not sound like a big deal, but it is! Usually, kids start out by learning the alphabet, then the letter sounds, then how to blend letters together to sound out words.
With this book, there is no work that has to be done first- you just dive right in!
That’s the beauty of the book, which is based on the DISTAR method of teaching reading. If you’re not familiar, let’s take a minute and talk about it.
The DISTAR Method and Why it’s Better
The DISTAR Method, short for Direct Instructional System for Teaching and Remediation, was created in the 1960s to accelerate reading skills in disadvantaged schools. Following many studies of the DISTAR program versus other programs, it was found that the DISTAR program had the most significantly positive outcomes.
The method is also favored when teaching kids with learning differences such as dyslexia.
So what exactly is the DISTAR method and how does it teach kids to read?
The DISTAR method is a phonics-based program that is delivered in scripted, explicit, predictable lessons.
Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons uses this approach, along with its modified alphabet. This is what it looks like:
At first, it may look daunting, but it eliminates the need to teach every single spelling rule and exceptions to the rules at the very beginning.
If you look at the vowels, you will see several different versions. For example, there is a regular e along with an e with a line over it. The first stands for the short vowel sound and the other stands for the long vowel sound.
Isn’t this confusing for kids?
I’ve actually never had this be an issue! As the lessons progress, these symbols are slowly phased out until they are completely eliminated.
At first, I had expected there to be a bit of a learning curve once the letters were replaced with standard ones.
Surprisingly, the transition went almost completely unnoticed by my kids, though!
The Lessons
The book is broken up into 100 lessons. Each lesson looks the same, so kids know exactly what to expect each time.
Lessons begin by teaching a new sound (most of the time), and then they move into review of sounds and words.
After reading practice, kids learn how to write one letter, so that at the end of the book they are not only reading but able to write well, too.
Lessons slowly begin to include progressively longer stories.
That’s it! The lessons take anywhere from 5 minutes to 20 minutes to complete. Usually, they only took about 10 minutes, which is great because any longer and kids start to lose their steam.
What I Love About It
No Parent Prep
I love that that this is an ‘open and go’ book. It takes no preparation or effort on my part, which is great! I love to spend time planning lessons for art, history, and science, but with other subjects, it’s wonderful to be able to have everything done for me.
Teaching reading is daunting, and if I can have all the lessons planned for me, then I’m all for it!
Short Lessons
With lessons being short and predictable, it’s so easy to work this into a routine without it feeling like a huge task.
Especially for preschoolers who aren’t used to formal schoolwork, sitting down for a short 10 minute lesson is very doable. On top of that, short daily lessons tend to be more effective and less intimidated- a win-win!
Some Advice
I love this book. I really believe it is a tried and true way to help your child learn to read and develop really solid literacy skills. That said, there are a few things that I always tell everyone if they’re interested in using it.
Read the Parents Sections First!
Before diving into the book with your child, make sure you know exactly how the book teaches. This is super important!
There is a parent’s section in the beginning of the book that explains the modified alphabet the program uses and how the parent should teach the material.
I highly recommend reading through that several times to really get a grasp of everything and then look through the lessons. Over half of each lesson is guidance for the parents and scripted sections that parents should follow.
Do you really need to follow the script word for word? No. I’ll get to that now!
Make it Your Own
So like I’ve just mentioned, the book is scripted. Like, really scripted. It will tell you the words you should use to praise your child after doing something well.
To be honest, it feels pretty weird to read the scripted portions, and I’ve done my own thing instead of following the book.
I recommend reviewing the book before starting and really understanding what the point of the scripted encouragement is. After that, you can say things in a more natural way rather than going by the book.
Every Child is Different
I mentioned that my 4 year old is learning to read with this book. She actually started on it as a two year old after learning alongside her older brother. We will work on a lesson and sometimes go back to it 10 times before moving on. We also take breaks and work on it only when she feels like it.
One of my older kids started on the book as a 5 year old and found it too difficult. By 6, she was still working through the lessons.
Every child is different and will be ready to learn to read at their own time. Before starting the book, look for signs of reading readiness in your child. Try one of the lessons and see if it ‘sticks’.
One of the reasons this book is so great is that it’s open to customization. You get to decide the pace your child moves at. The book could take 4 months to complete or a few years.
Each of my kids has taken their own time with it, and they have come out of it as confident readers. More importantly, they have come out of it loving reading which is really the whole point!
You Will Hit a Wall
I’ve seen this every. single. time. Don’t expect each lesson to take the same amount of time, and don’t expect to teach this book at a steady pace.
Without fail, my kids would hit a wall in their progress. It almost always happens around lesson 40 and lesson 70.
Why is this? I’m not sure why it’s always at the same place, but there is a point where so much has been learned that kids need some time to take a break and process what they’ve learned so far.
Sometimes this could be a week long break, and sometimes kids will need longer.
Whenever my kids get to this point, I usually slow the lessons down, or even stop moving forward and just review. At times I’ll even set the books aside and find very easy books that will help them practice what they’ve learned while building confidence.
As long as you’re aware of ‘the wall’ and don’t get discouraged by it, you’ll be able to keep going and fully benefit from following the book through to the end.
Make it Fun With Incentives
It’s no secret I love to give incentives to fire up my kids to work hard- it’s how I turned my kids into bookworms! This is no exception.
To keep my kids excited to move through the lessons, I give them incentives. I love using incentives to reward hard work, and it definitely helps motivate them to work hard when things get difficult as the lessons progress.
First, I let my kids pick out a big pack of stickers. At the end of each lesson, they get to put one of their stickers on the first page of the lesson to mark that it’s been completed.
I don’t know about your kids, but stickers are a big thing over here, so it works for us!
The second and most important incentive is a reward for completing ten lessons.
For this, I take a bright marker and draw a big star on the last page of lesson 10, 20, 30, etc. Once we have finished 10 lessons, we go out for an ice cream.
Finally, at the end of the book, the new reader is allowed to go to the bookstore and pick out one of the book recommendations from the list at the end of the book.
Learning to read is hard, and working hard to learn is a big deal that should be celebrated!