Looking for a Program to Teach My 3 Yr Old to Read.

Try the "Bob Books", they are amazing and simple but a great way to start. They are produced by scholastic but available online and in bookstores.

Zoo-phonics is what they use at daycare - but don't push it. Most kids aren't ready to actually read until they start loosing teeth and if you force it now, you may make him hate it for the rest of his life.

J.

Buy a little book called "The Three R's" by Ruth Beechick and use her ideas.

Research shows that LATER readers are better readers overall. You might want to do a little research in that area.

But Beechick's book will help you begin, know the signs that indicate it's time to push forward, etc, if you want to begin.

"Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" Both of my boys did this program and were reading at age 4. My oldest only got through 20 lessons and read his first book. My youngest is 4 1/2 and is reading alot of easy words and starting on the level one readers. So much fun to see the little lightbulbs pop on above their heads! Enjoy!

My 4 1/2 year old and my 2 year old both love the Leap Frog DVD's. The 1st one is Letter Factory and it teaching the letter sounds. I think there are a total of 4 DVD's but we just got the boys the last 2 for Christmas, so I don't know how much my boys will like them. But right now they are watching the Talking Word Factory while they eat. My 2 year old knows the sounds of the letters better then the ABC song (letter names) soooooo.... any age that they are exposed to fun stuff they will learn. Good luck, you are your child's BEST teacher -- never stop teaching them.

We homeschooled for many years...I encourage you to take it easy, regardless of if traditional homeschooling is in your future. Keep doing all those things you are already doing in your normal "family" day - kids are like sponges and soak up so much. I also recommend reading reading and more reading; have to recommend "The Read Aloud Handbook" by Jim Trelease - awesome book, an oldie but a goodie! Take trips to the library with your kids too.

My 3 year old also uses Starfall.com. It is just a fun site that slips in teaching phonics! I agree with the other posters that you don't have to push it, I just let him go to the site and play and he picks it up naturally :) have fun!

I found the BEST learning tool! My daughter is now 5, but I started her at 2 1/2 on the computer, believe it or not! There is a great Computer program from Knowledge Adventure called Jump Start World. You can get them in all ages, Preschool, Kindergarten, etc. Maddie's been working on 1st Grade for about 9 months now. She loves it!!!!! I would recommend it to everyone! It's both fun and educational, not only does it teach reading, but math, art, how to use a computer, obviously, and all sorts of different skills. It never gets boring or repeats the same stuff! You can learn on it for years, realistically! I bought it at Office Max ( I think)! It is worth every penny!

Try it, I know you'll be happy you did!
S. K

Here is a link to a useful site many homeschoolers use:
http://homeschoolreviews.com/reviews/curriculum/default.a...
This might help you to see what others thought of programs and what age groups they are good for.
I do want to add my one friend used the Headsprout program and loved it so check it out in the reviews.

Check out yourbabycanread.com
I have never used it personally, but heard great things about it!

HI S.,
I am a WAHM of 4 and I am also a HS mom ... I must tell you, what is right for one isn't for the other. With that being said, we have had tremendous results with learn to read in 100 easy lessons. It is a great book, while 3 and a Boy might be young. My experience has been boys take longer to read then girls.
That could be with girls sit better, or even might show more of an interest, but that is with my own children and most I have observed through the years.

You will know what is best for your own son and if you would like, I can give you a good curriculum supplier that has most everything from A-Z. I have found with reading, the above book worked very well and has my daughter reading above grade level.

Best of luck to you.

if you do hooked on phonics go to the library, my daughter liked it when she was 4 but it didn't last long, she and i get frustrated and i can't teach her anything ( now she is in kindergarten and reads well, thanks to her teachers)

Hi S.,

The best way to teach your kids to read is to read a lot to them. They become familiar with the shapes and sounds just learning from you. The human voice with it's inflections and real-time reactions is best for your child.

We did use a Leapad from Leapster to help reinforce what we where doing at home. It came with lots of activities that encouraged reading, whether it was letter recognition (sight & sound) or word recognition. It was easy enough to bring in the car and entertained them a lot.

Most of the toys that use music are not helpful tools. Just like the human voice, the music needs to be real to be effective. Just putting on your favorite CD's or singing while you do activities is much more beneficial for the learning process.

If you are looking for a music program I teach Kindermusik and we have a great program for kids from birth through 7 years. The Imagine That program for 3-5 year olds is specifically designed with age-appropriate activities that encourage self-expression and language development. The majority of kids who go through our program are advanced in written, aural and verbal skills than most of their peers. Social skills, too. You are welcome to attend a class at no charge if you'd like - just let me know.

Here are two ideas. One is free...starfall.com. It has great games, activities, etc that are related to learning letters, sounds, to read, etc. My daughter enjoyed it when she was younger.

Another program is called Headsprout. You can go to headsprout.com to check it out. It's really a great program and has very high success rate with teaching even young children to read.

Have fun, but don't push him too much.

The easiest and cheapest thing you can do to get your 3 year old to start reading is read to him every night. My husband and I read to our 3 year old and 20 month old almost every night. Start out with little cardboard books, my son loves "Three Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed" and is able to "read" along with it ... I think it's memorization, but once he memorizes what a word looks like, he's able to find that word in other stories. He watched my husband and I play Scrabble the other day and one of the words on the board was truck and he pointed right to it and correctly labeled what the word was. Good luck and have fun!

Hello, When I was homeschooling my boys, I used these books called " BOB-BOOKS" You can find them at your library. They are fabulous! Give them a try. good luck with your little sweeties.. A.

Our school uses a program called ZooPhonics. It teaches an animal character linked with each letter/sound, there is a hand signal and a whole song and dance that teaches phonics. (For every type of learner.) My son and daughter both did very well with it and when they were first sounding out words I could give a hand signal or say the character name to help them get the right sound if they were struggling.

Good luck. I think you're right to give him the boost, but not to push.

C.