Our family has used Alpha-Phonics for many years. When the book fell apart at the seams, I inserted the pages into sheet protectors and put them in a large binder.
I would love to say we move through the book in a systematic fashion, but it isn't so. As each child's skills progress from reading books, Alpha Phonics sometimes gets neglected. Neglected but not forgotten, since I have a fear that my children will never learn to spell "gymnasium" if we fail to finish.
A few years ago we celebrated one son's completion of the book with a pizza and ice cream party, and a family ritual was born. Now our children cheer on each other as they near the end, because everyone wins when that final lesson is complete.
Celebrations like this are a wonderful way to develop family traditions and add some fun to your homeschooling. Does your family have any that you'd like to share?
Dawn is a homeschooling mother of eight who blogs about homeschooling, parenting, and photography at My Home Sweet Home.
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That's a great idea, Dawn. I know how important those celebrations can be for the kids. It can definitely spur them on when motivation wanes.
What a fun way to encourage the younger siblings. We like to do themes for history. We've done a toga day, dressed like aborigines, donned our chainmail for knights and castles… and soon we'll be having a pirate party in honor of finishing the 1600s and defeat of the Spanish armada.
it's silly… but the costumes really bring history to life!
This brings back sweet memories. I loved teaching my little ones to read. We used Sing, Spell, Read and Write, with a little AlphaPhonics on the side. This is my 20th year of homeschooling and our favorite tradition is one we established in our later years of homeschooling. Although we don't really follow the public school calendar, we always celebrate the first day of school together with a big breakfast at Cracker Barrel followed by rocking and talking on their front porch. I only have one student left at home, but my married daughters and my (homeschooled) granddaughters join us, too. It's probably our only tradition now, but we think it's a great one.
I love the memories that are connected to teaching a child to read. For us the celebrations at times are sporadic. One of my favorites was making the boys real Indian Clothes for our season of studying early American History. They really enjoyed that and so did I.
We use Alpha Phonics too! I don't hear of too many people using it. I've used S,S,R&W with my older two children, but #3 just wasn't enjoying it. He loves the simplicity of the lessons – the bells of whistles of S,S,R&W were just too distracting for him.
This year we are studying the continents and picking some major countries off of each one to focus on. When we finish one, we always have a celebration dinner with food from that region. We'll do decorations that we've made and any costumes that might be fitting. It's the children's favorite part of school!
that is actually a great idea. getting through that first year of phonics is hard and a big achievement.
We did the same kind of thing when our oldest finished Alpha Phonics! I made a cake and decorated it with letters, and we made a big deal out it with our little party. Now we are looking forward to our next oldest completing AP. Hmmm…a pizza and ice cream party sounds even better!
Maybe we'll have to change ours to pizza and cake. We frequently do a little party with cake/cupcakes to celebrate achievements.
To help encourage a more systematic progression this time around with Alpha Phonics, I made a simple table (kept in the book, marking our spot) with each of the lessons and, beside those, a block of space to mark the date so I know exactly how long the lessons have been…um, neglected. It's really kept me on track better!
Who wouldn't want pizza and ice cream celebration all their own.
I use Phonics Pathways, which is a simple, all in one program like Alpha Phonics. The party sounds like a wonderful reward. Beginning reading can be challenging and it is so nice to give the little ones something to look forward to!