I’m back to share what I think has been so wonderful about AAR level 1:
1) Most of the lessons are short and can be completed in one session. There are ‘fluency practice’ pages that get quite long and my son does over two or even three days. These fluency lessons seemed too long to me when we first started but I see now how these long lessons really do build up his stamina which is needed in order to read a real book.
2) They have a page we display on the wall where the reader marks off each completed lesson. We’ve never had a tracking device like this and my son loves it. He loves to be able to mark off the work he has done. I have not transferred this to other subjects and I want the novelty and excitement to remain for his reading program.
3) They do have some worksheets. I’ve heard it is less than what is in the pre-level 1, but we never did that so I don’t know first hand. The worksheets are usually something to cut out and the reader moves around the words he needs to read or it is made into little flip books. There’s nothing special about them really, but my son likes them and it is just a different way to get the reader to read the new words of the lesson instead of just being on the fluency practice.
4) They have the words the reader needs to learn on index cards. They have a great system to put into an index card box to hold all the cards and a place to put ‘Future Lessons’, ‘Review’ and ‘Mastered’ cards. My son loves to see the cards move back to the Mastered section!
5) It is easy for the teacher. The only preparation needed is to cut out and assemble the worksheets as needed. The lessons are very straight forward and once you learn the routine it comes very naturally. My only other experience with a teacher manual is RightStart and this is MUCH easier to follow than RS.
6) Level 1 had three reader books. For the most part the stories are appealing and sweet. The art work is black and white drawings and also very sweet. The lessons alternate between the workbook/index card/fluency practice pages and reading a story. As you progress in the book they read more stories.
About my son: Unlike Phobo’s daughter who read early, my son was a late reader. We had tried Explode the Code, Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading, and Progressive Phonics with no success. I took him to a vision therapist who diagnosed him with tracking problems and said he needed a lot of therapy that would cost $6,000. (We did not do any of it. After watching the testing and understanding some faults in it and hearing the doctor express disbelief that my son was no longer in speech therapy because he still said ‘free’ for ‘three’, I decided I did not agree with his assessment.) Still, I had never had a child who had such difficulty in understanding letters, how they go together to form words, and the early reading phase. Even CVC words were really confusing for him. We discovered AAR in January soon after he turned 7yo. Now, three months later, he is reading with much greater ease and is about a week away from finishing AAR Level 1. One day recently he sat down with one of the reader books and read aloud to himself (while I was cooking) for an hour. He read the whole book! He had never done such a thing before.
My son is mature and very happy to do lessons. (As opposed to my other 7yo son is much more interested in riding his bike and playing imaginary games.) He has said dozens of times how much he LOVES AAR. I’m so happy we have found it.
Oh, we did not use the letter tiles. We borrowed the program and they kept the tiles to use with their child. About half-way into the program I got AAS Level 1 for my other son and thus, the letter tiles. I do not find them necessary and we rarely use them. We simply use a small whiteboard and dry erase marker. For us, the large magnetic white board with the letter tiles is too cumbersome and didn’t add value.
And compared to AAS, AAR’s lessons are more discrete which I find is helpful for the student. I’m doing AAS with my less-cooperative student so I’m not sure how much is the program vs the child, but AAS feels like there is too much repetition and the lessons are not laid out as clearly for the teacher. (It may be bc I am careful to give this child only as much as I feel he needs to know a concept, and not more, with worry he will get bored and resist the lessons. Or maybe others find this difference between the program also with their own children.)
I hope this helps. If you buy AAR from the company they do have a generous return policy.
Best,
Shannon
