It has such a gimmicky title, doesn’t it?

Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons by Siegfried Engelmann. And if you read the reviews, it’s a love-it-or-hate-it book….we love it! Our two oldest kids have completed it so far. We started each of them the day after their fifth birthdays, and it took about 6 months to complete. It should be titled Teach Your Child to Read in About 150 Llloooonnngggg, Repetitive Lessons. The first 75ish lessons are written in a unique orthography, which eventually changes to a regular script for the last 25 lessons.  The introduction is worth reading (for the parent); after that, each lesson is scripted and easy to open-and-go with no prep. The first few lessons are quick–about 10 minutes. The middle lessons get longer and longer until we start splitting them into 2 or even 3 days (otherwise, they would take over an hour to finish). Then the last 20 or so get shorter (about half an hour). There’s also a writing section included in each lesson, but we use this book only for reading instruction, and have never used the writing.

I love that there is no prep for me, and there are no booklets or charts or anything to get lost–it’s all contained in one big book. I also love that the girls have both been able to actually read stories within the first few lessons instead of spending months learning charts of sounds and blends. It is a stand-alone resource, but I would recommend following it with something to fill in some of the phonetic gaps, and for more practice. At the end of the book, there’s a section of suggestions for the parent.

So what do we do after 100 EZ Lessons? Kid Uno immediately started reading aloud a couple little phonics books and picture books. Then she went through the McGuffey Primer and First Reader. And then she discovered the Little House books and became a voracious reader 🙂 I also went through The Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading (helpful but horribly boring) between McGuffey’s First and Second Reader. I plan to have her continue reading aloud through the McGuffey series, and other books.

Kid Dos just finished 100 EZ Lessons so she is starting with some Dr. Suess, picture books, and easy readers. My plan is the same for her, but I’m looking for a replacement for the OPGTR.

My rating for Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons : Buy it, use it, keep it. Unless you hate it…then maybe you’d prefer something else 🙂