Homeschooling preschooler--- what letter books to use?

[mamacita]

**I’m looking for ideas for homeschooling my preschooler. My oldest son used some really neat ABC letter books by Macmillan/Macgraw-Hill when he was in pre-K and they worked so well. However the set is out of print but I found them on Amazon for the price of $95!! (kinda steep for us) So my question is what do you all recommend as far as ABC letter books for a new beginner? I looked at CHC’s site and wondered if any of you have used theirs and if so would you recommend them? We purchased Seton’s pre-K book and it is not at all what I expected.

Thanks for any help/suggestions that you might have. **

 

[Red_Meg]

I guess I’m not totally clear on what you mean by “letter” books. I’m not homeschooling anymore, but my favorite books to teach reading to pre-schoolers, from a sound-it-out, phonics-based approach are the super-silly “Bob” books.

For learning to write (and not just learning-- I used this package for all my handwriting kids, all grades, print and cursive) we used a $40 software package called %between%StartWrite. I really liked using it because it allowed me to incorporate handwriting work into another subject-- I could type up a short Bible verse, or virtue definition, or passage from a book we were reading. It has some nice features, also, for kids just learning to form their letters…

Hope this helps? It’s a little more “do-it-yourself” than you were looking for, perhaps…

Margaret

 

[mamacita]

**We have the whole Bob Books set. I was looking more for books that are individual alphabet books… such as each book is a separate letter where they learn the ‘sound’ of the letter and then print it in the same book, etc. I might just end up having to buy the ones on Amazon because I’m not seeing any others like it out there.

Thanks for your help! **

 

[ThyKingdomCome]

I guess it depends on what you want to acheive with the books. I really like the Explode the Code Primers (Get ready for the code, get set for the code, go for the code) for teaching consonant sounds. It moves slowly so they really do get the hang of it. I also like the School Zone books because they are colorful, simple, and fun. For writing, I use the Start Write program and make extra large letters for my young ones to trace. To be honest though, my preschoolers aren’t really ready for the fine motor detail that writing letters requires, and so whatever we do isn’t done very seriously.

 

[ThyKingdomCome]

Are you talking about CHC’s Little Folks Letter Practice? For me, they weren’t particularly helpful. I probably waited too long to use them, but by the time my dd was ready to do the writing that it required, she already was beginning to read, and was beyond just saying the sounds of the letters. I prefer something that doesn’t have as much of a focus on letter formation, since that ability comes later than the child’s ability to read the letters.