Starting Phonics and Forgetting Whole Words

[Wolfwind]

My 19 month old and I have just started a phonics program, which she absolutely loves.  She requests it frequently and has started pointing out letters in books we're reading.  However, at about the same time it seems she's started forgetting the whole words she used to know.  We still flash words every day and use her retired flash cards to build sentances every day.  But if I have several words on the ground and she says she wants to make the sentance "Grandpa is playing," I'll ask her to get "playing," and she won't be able to tell it apart from "drinking."  She could do it a few months ago.  Has anyone else experienced this?  I'm not pushing it right now; if she loves phonics, she'll be able to read that way soon enough.  But it just seems odd and I wondered if anyone else had seen anything similar.

[bensenc]

Which program?

[Wolfwind]

"The Amazing Action Alphabet."  It was a shower gift from my aunt, who knows the creator, but I imagine it's online.  [Quick Google Search]  Yes, here's the link: http://seeheardocompany.com/  All we're doing is learning each letter's name and sound; it has a story and action for each one.  I'm not really sure how it transfers into sounding out words, but we'll work on that later.  We're only to M right now.

[bensenc]

i would use starfalls or readingbear.com. leapfrog, etc. teaching letters independently seems too boring for a 19 mos old and not really necessary. My 20mos old knows all her letters, letter sounds and words associated with them, she's known them for about 5-6 months now but we did it more so as a speech therapy to help her with vocalization, she picked up the alphabet from songs, I was trying to avoid teaching it to her since it's not necessary to know the name of the letter to read and spelling is far off.

[Wolfwind]

Well, the problem really is that she finds learning letters independently much MORE interesting than words.  I know, it seems really strange.  That's why I posted, wondering if anyone else had a child who liked letters and stopped looking at words once they knew letters.  I'm following her lead and doing a lot more with letters, since she loves it, and I know she'll learn to read just fine in the end.  But it's weird.

[Mandabplus3]

My oldest forgot all her words while she was learning to read with phonics but as she was older I doubt it compares to what you are experiencing. Also she did remember them all eventually..by sight without sounding them out that is.
Anyway I can offer some advice if you like. If she likes it keep going with it!  Enjoyment is very important. Also use the words she already knows to focus on beginning sounds. Go through your word cards and keep in only the words starting with the letters she knows the sounds of. Put the rest aside and add in later. So for Grandpa is playing, slowly say g..rrrr..an...d..p..aaaa and ask her to tell you the first sound. She may need to actually say it herself to get it. ( and yes GR is a blend so its a tricky starting point!) Focus on this for a while so she can have a link between her phonics and her whole word reading. Once she has this try ending sounds, and middle sound games.
Eventually ( which could be as soon as next week!) introduce sounding out CVC words ( consonant vowel consonant ) using letters she knows from the phonics. Fringe magnets are great for this stage, use lower case letters. If this is confusing reading bear shows you how to do it
I don't know the program you are using now but any phonics is good at the beginning just so long as you pronounce them accurately. ( b is b not buh) Also I wouldn't stop flashing the whole words, every little bit helps.

[Tanikit]

My DD (4.5) did not do this - I think she saw learning letters as learning words and then only discovered later that they were the building blocks of words (which is why I plan on teaching all the phonograms to my next DD just as if they themselves were sight words). However knowing a 19 month old, I would say this is probably just a phase - she'll fit it all together at some stage in a way that works for her. Definitely keep showing sight words and keep working on letters  and blending. And whatever you are doing keep it fun - maybe later she will go back to only wanting sight words or only wanting to blend - its the same when they learn to walk or talk - for a short period its all about that and then they fit it all together and can walk and talk (and read). Thanks for posting about this as it is interesting to know all the variations that children can show.

[bensenc]

I'm blending both with my daughter and going to be doing the same for my 6 week old. I don't say the letter A in the attached presentation but just ask her what sound does this make. I hope this helps.

[Wolfwind]

Thanks everyone!  I love this forum; it's so nice to know that I'm not alone and these things happen.  I will definitely try some of the suggestions, especially sounding out words (I'm hoping that'll be next week!).  I wish Reading Bear were downloadable; we don't have the internet at home, so I can't really use it, though I think she'd love it.  But I feel much happier knowing that it's probably just a stage and it's not too weird.  Thank you all so much!

[ReadingWhisperer]

You might find the free youtube clips about teaching pre-schoolers to read and spell useful  - Ive been posting on a thread 'Who has started to teach reading at 2.5' - lengthy but hopefully useful. You are being told by your child to focus on the right things!!! Listen to them.. And expand your understanding by focusing on speech sounds. The Shaping Reading Brains approach is not a program or method- its an approach that centres around speech sounds - so that learning print (phonics) is easy. You can follow us on facebook 'read australia' for free support and resources.

http://youtu.be/pVTHEePs9S0


Why your child is telling you to focus on speech sound pics and not whole words:-)

http://youtu.be/i7tnS58_G0I

Emma Hartnell-Baker BEd Hons MA Special Educational Needs

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