Sing, Spell, Read & Write

by Dina
(Rockville, MD)

Product: Sing, Spell, Read & Write
Subject:phonics
Levels Used: K, 1st Grade
Dates Used: 2007, 2008

Likes: This was a really effective phonics program for my daughter. She loved the songs and used them when she was finishing her workbooks to remember the phonics rules. She loved the games, though we didn't use them as often as recommended because they took up a lot of time.

The readers were colorful and interesting. And she enjoyed, for the most part, filling out the workbooks. She is still working in the first grade book, but at this point she's already a fairly independent reader. I plan to use this program with my son in the future because he seems to have an auditory learning style and has already picked up so much just from being around when my daughter was using it.

Dislikes: I didn't really like the handwriting part of this program. It was very repetitive, and I thought the scripting was a little awkward. We dropped that part in first grade and used Handwriting Without Tears which was more effective and more to my liking. Another thing I didn't love was that the first half of the 1st grade curriculum is basically the same as what was in the kindergarten books. If I had been more confident starting out, I probably would have skipped some of this since my daughter was already pretty comfortable with it. However, I suppose the review isn't a bad thing, just time-consuming and it got a little boring for her.