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Summary: Takes Reading Reflex one step further
Review: Allographs by Diane McGuinness helps reinforce Reading Reflex. If you use Reading Reflex, than use Allograph to contuine with your childs learning.
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Summary: A Method to help every child or adult learn to read.
Review: As a mother of 5 with 2 children who have struggled to learn to read, I have been pleased with the help I have found in Reading Reflex. For those of you who have children who have difficulty reading this is the book and method for you. Before finding Reading Reflex I researched many other reading methods and never was able to find any answers as to why some children can learn to read with relative ease and why others struggled so. This book answered those questions by explaining what skills a child needs to be a successful reader. Carmen and Geoffrey McGuinness have done the research to develop a way to help make sense of the English code so that parents can assist their children to learn to read. It is well written and gives all the materials anyone would need to help individuals become confident, fluent readers. It is also a great resource for teachers.
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Summary: Foolproof is exactly what it is!
Review: As a Special Education teacher, I have used a great deal of techniques and reading methods. This one works out beautifully for my students! They are truly fortunate to have come in contact with this particular method because it is organized so as to be successful for even the most jittery of readers. For me, this book is paced well, easily understandable and it has a solid theory walk through... For my students, just the right amount of learning and controlled overlearning and a transfer to other schoolwork that is truly amazing. I am a truly happy customer!
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Summary: This book changed our lives
Review: As an early reader myself, I just assumed my daugher would be just as quick to catch on to reading. When she was 3 we began our phonics instructions with the alphabet. When she was 4, we continued, but we couldn't seem to get past letter recognition. At 5, we tried reading simple books, but it was hit and miss at best. 6, some progress, but we couldn't get past basic consonant-vowel-consonant words. By 7 I was extemely concerned, to say the least.Someone told me about Reading Reflex and I bought a copy. It seemed that anything this simple and inexpensive couldn't work. And yet, within days of beginning work on seemingly simple games, we saw improvement. Within a month, she was reading away and on grade level. I can't explain what is different about it than other reading approaches, but I know it works.
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Summary: Reading made easy
Review: At first glance, this book reminded me of - "A Home Start in Reading" by Ruth Beechick (a wonderful little pamphlet for homeschoolers/parents). I would still recommend the pamphlet, but Reading Reflex has much more information that might be needed to teach a beginning reader.
Although Phonografix has a reputation for being very effective in remediating reading, it is very easy, effective, and fun to use for beginning reading as well. The skill of reading is broken down into more basic components -- blending, segmenting, auditory processing, and code knowledge. There is a test at the beginning to help pinpoint problem areas so that no time is spent on areas the student understands. A beginning reader would just begin without the test and cover all the lessons. There are some other aspects of reading that the book covers that I have not seen so thoroughly and effectively explained in any of the other reading methods I've encountered. The English language is based on a phonetic code, but some letters/letter combinations can represent multiple sounds and some sounds can be represented in multiple ways. The authors include information about how to effectively explain these ideas and lesson plans for how these ideas work in practice. For example, the word 'out' might be pronounced 'oat' or 'owt'. The only way to know which is to have the word read to you or to figure it out from the context of a sentence. Part of reading is simply remembering which pronunciation to use on particular words. There are often patterns to these pronunciations and noticing these patterns is included in the lessons. If all this information isn't enough, the authors include "error corrections" in each lesson. The authors emphasize that mistakes are where real learning happens. One minor point I disagree with is the emphasis on writing. Some children really dislike writing or simply don't have the skill to write to the extent suggested by the authors. Fortunately, writing isn't necessary to learning to read through this method. It was easy to adapt the activities so that writing wasn't necessary. Another area I disagreed with was the assumption that a tutor/teacher should control the learning. The activities can be easily adapted into fun games that children can choose to play and learn from. It is the information about reading that is useful and makes this book great, not the format. Another tip -- instead of cutting out all those puzzles, just make up a set of letters (multiples of the ones that are used twice or more in words). Additionally, the authors have a website with more great information. Overall, this book is a great resource for any person interested in helping others - children and adults - learn to read.
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Summary: A Preschool Teacher has a different view....
Review: Despite some five-star reviews, I do not think this book is good for reading. While this book does have a method which could help children to read, the philosophy for it is flawed. There is much misinformation. The book talks about the "failure" of Phonics and Whole Language in teaching schoolchildren how to read. That is just plain wrong. Phonics ONLY instruction produced children who could read but not understand what they read. But phonics must be a part of effective instruction in reading. Part, not all. Whole Language instruction did produce excellent when it was used properly; with all of the components used according to the model. But many times a "whole language" program did not fully follow the model and so children could not read well. Whole Language died a political death but an effective systems, a "Comprehensive Literacy Program," does work. If your school system uses it you'd be better asking your child's teacher for things to do at home to help your child rather than buying this book.
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Summary: This is not the old phonics!
Review: For anyone that wants a child to learn to read buy this book. For anyone looking at phonics programs buy this book. Phonics layers complexity upon complexity. Phonics goes from the letter to the sound, contrary to the logic of the English written code. Phonics teaches letter names and that these letters work together under a system of rules. (They don't - letters are simply signs for the sounds in our language.) Phonics teaches some auditory processing in isolation from the what that is meant for: reading. Phonics turns a complexity of 140 into a complexity of 1500 by teaching consonant blends, etc. Phonics works sometimes. For 30 to 40 percent of the English speaking world is does not. If you are a parent or a mentor buy this book. If you want to teach your emergent reader quickly and easily buy this book. Buy this book if the struggling reader in your life is not getting by with phonics. If a child is struggling he is at risk of becoming a functionally illiterate adult. For other reviewers who consider that this is just the same old repackaged phonics, shame on you!
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Summary: Amazing, no-nonsense approach that works.
Review: I am a special education teacher that had struggled to find a method to teach children how to decode; especially those children who were left behind by the "whole language" or "literature based" approach to reading. When it came right down to it, my students had never been taught how to decode the letter-sound code, which is what the English language is based upon. I came upon Reading Reflex after reading the book "Why Our Children Can't Read, and What We Can Do About it" by Dianne McGuiness, who is Geoffrey McGuiness' mother. That book convinced me that I needed to find away to teach children how to read, based upon (1) how children learn, and (2) teach them English the way English needs to be taught. Reading Reflex, along with a magnetic letter board which has the 37 common word families was a blessing. In one example, I had a 5th grade student that no one ever bothered to teach to read because he was a behavior problem. At the end of a week of drills using Reading Reflex, he was reading the simple stories in the book, which was a powerful motivator to persevere with me, and now he is reading Dr. Suess books. Research has shown that explicit, one on one phonics instruction; letter-to-sound correspondence instructions, works. If you are a teacher, or a parent of a student that has yet to "get it," try Reading Reflex. You will not be disappointed.
Rating:
Summary: Amazing, no-nonsense approach that works.
Review: I am a special education teacher that had struggled to find a method to teach children how to decode; especially those children who were left behind by the "whole language" or "literature based" approach to reading. When it came right down to it, my students had never been taught how to decode the letter-sound code, which is what the English language is based upon. I came upon Reading Reflex after reading the book "Why Our Children Can't Read, and What We Can Do About it" by Dianne McGuiness, who is Geoffrey McGuiness' mother. That book convinced me that I needed to find away to teach children how to read, based upon (1) how children learn, and (2) teach them English the way English needs to be taught. Reading Reflex, along with a magnetic letter board which has the 37 common word families was a blessing. In one example, I had a 5th grade student that no one ever bothered to teach to read because he was a behavior problem. At the end of a week of drills using Reading Reflex, he was reading the simple stories in the book, which was a powerful motivator to persevere with me, and now he is reading Dr. Suess books. Research has shown that explicit, one on one phonics instruction; letter-to-sound correspondence instructions, works. If you are a teacher, or a parent of a student that has yet to "get it," try Reading Reflex. You will not be disappointed.
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Summary: It works!
Review: I am in the process of using this method with my child who is in the first grade. We have completed the first three chapters and my child is making real progress--the improvement is amazing. The methods layed out in this book and the reasons behind them make sense to me. I strongly reccommend reading through at least chapters 1 through 3 before starting any of the lessons. I also went to the readamerica.net website and bought the lessons that go with the book so that I didn't have to cut them out of my book. I also bought a wipe-off board and dry erase markers which makes the word mapping a snap. I think it's a good idea to buy some stickers to reward your child's efforts. At first, I was a little confused about the order of the lessons, but I hadn't read through them completely. That is why it is so important to read before you do. It is also helpful to highlight and bookmark important points about the "how to" information. I write these points on notes to refer to while teaching the lesson. But, after awhile, you get the hang of it and it is very easy to do the lessons. My child looks forward to doing the lessons with me. It doesn't feel like "work" and my child is gaining self-confidence while learning how to read! I agree with some of the other comments about the stories being dull, but they are intended to reinforce the lessons that have been learned. The lessons enable your child to read the books they enjoy, and that is what is important to me. I am a single parent with a full-time job and do not find this to be difficult to do or too time consuming. I am very pleased so far and feel that this method works.
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