My daughter is having trouble with her sight words in kinder. Does anyone have any suggestions? The words are like "circle, eight, where, come". I see her trying and wanting to sound it out but she doesn't understand the concept of vowels. I'm proud of her wanting to try and sound out the letters and she tells me "let me figure it out" and I give her time to sound it out. Words like "red, it, zero" she can do. Please I'm needing some help with how to teach her the words. She has so much spirit and life and she loves learning.
Does she like to work on-line?
www.starfall.com is a great educational site with LOTS of reading activities.
I also recommend "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons". My son is currently in kindergarten as well and we wanted to do a little extra at home to help him with his reading. We are currently about half way through the book and it is just amazing the progress he has made. It has definitely made him much more confident in his reading. He actually asks to do his ready lessons as soon as he gets home from school because he looks forward to them. Even his three year old brother wants to do them as well. It's a great book!
We love www.starfall.com. Another idea is Leap Frog. They have videos that teach phonics, blends, and vowels. Plus it teaches how the letters work together to form words. Our older children really enjoyed them when they were learning to read, and now they watch them with the little ones. It is a good refresher for them.
Make her some flash cards of those words. She'll learn to recognize them soon.
A great book is "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" If you don't do the writing portion it will take only 10-20 minutes a day and she will be reading great by the time you get to about lesson 70. It is only about $20 new and I see it at Half Price Books a lot for less. It teaches the phonogram sounds that will help her with difficult words as you move into the last 30 lessons or so.
I make notecards/flashcards with my son's sight words on them - I actually make 2 sets. One set is for in the house, the other is always in my purse (or you can have a set in the car). Whenever we have a little extra time we'll pull them out and practice. He thinks it is a fun game and will ask to do them - we "play" the flashcards while driving down the road (while my hubby drives), sometimes during dinner, before/after homework, waiting for dr appt, etc. I just make up "rules" for the situation - we whisper the words as quick and quiet as we can in the dr office, we say them fast and loud in the car or at home . . . have fun with it and make it a game. Also, fun songs about the words help too, especially if there is a "rule" that doesn't apply to all words (like a silent e or when two letter "act different" when they're together). Good Luck!!
make flash cards for her sight words. Then only do like 5 or 6 words at a time, if she doesn't know the word at first, tell her the word, don't let her sit there a minute trying to figue it out. So that she gets use to knowing the word when she first sees it. I'm not saying don't let her figure it out herself. I'm saying don't let her sit there for a long time not getting anywhere, I hope this helps. It works for my son.
Sight words can't be sounded out. They must be memorized. Let her choose 5 or 6 words to work on and then write them on little cards and put them around the house in different places she often goes. One on the bathroom mirror, one on the refrig door, one on the wall by her bed, etc. This way she can see them all the time and the words will become familiar to her. Also, read a lot to her and point out these sight words as your reading or have her find them in books. Just be patient and give her time. There is no quick way for kids to learn to be good readers. Good luck!
Spell the word out in song or put some type of rhythm to it. My oldest learned to spell all her colors that way, and my youngest's K teacher taught them little songs for all the colors with examples and the spelling included. We took that and used it as they got older and the words got more difficult.
It is funny, to this day everytime I spell purple, I clap it out in my head...
p-u-r-(pause)-p-l-e.... Good luck!
