Learning to read
Avoid these mistakes with the Pink Series
The reason we decided to make our own pink series work was because there is a proliferation of incorrect material.
More is not better when it comes to teaching reading.
Our pink series listings will provide you the guidelines for making your own, if you wish to do so. If you have neat handwriting, you can make it without a printer. Back in the day, we all made our own reading material and cards. You can make all the printed material with cardstock, watercolors, a pencil, and a ruler.
Pink series exercises are deliberately minimal because the focus is on the child making these beginning words with the movable alphabet.
No mix and match.
No guessing what an object is called.
No guessing the missing letters.
No word scramble. In our pink series, I have a sheet for parents to practice unscrambling words in French. It teaches nothing but frustration. That’s why many adults don’t like studying foreign language, btw.
No guessing which word goes with which object.
No capital letters
No mixing numbers and letters in a single sheet
No 2-lined paper!!! Seriously, the 2-lined paper is a big problem. The top, middle, and bottom of letters need 3 lines. Teachers create writing problems at school by using this 2-lined paper. It does not need to migrate to homeschooling parents.
I have 3-lined paper templates, so I will convert them into graphics to post for all of you. If you got our print material, this paper is on your gift CD. We used to make this paper by hand with a ruler. It does not need to be pre-prepared.
Perhaps I am overwrought today. Another pile of 8-year-olds who cannot read just landed in my email. This has been happening regularly for some time, but the last two years have been the worst.
Montessori has gone through phases of popularity. Right now, it is popular, so everyone is jumping online to sell random stuff with a “montessori” label.
The problem is that an authentic Montessori environment is sparsely populated with high-quality material. There isn’t that much to sell. One needs the basic Montessori equipment (none of the “extras” that even Nienhuis is selling), some of which can be printed from digital works. We only sell the work that is appropriate to print at home.
Montessori seems like it is harder on the teacher and easier on the child than "standard" education. And the learning is more enduring. The "standard" way is like cramming for a test and then forgetting most of it next semester. One thing humans a really-really wired for is learning language. If they don't have one they will make a new one, a creole. And it is the children who make it. I do not read letters, I read words. I think (and Mercy will know whether I am right or not) that learning the letters has to be in the context of words and fit with what they already learned.