Best reading programs for babies

6 Best Programs for Teaching Children to Read

One of the earliest ways we educate our young children is by teaching them how to read. Reading is the most fundamental area of education. Teaching a child to read will set them up for a lifetime of learning. Many of us don’t feel fully equipped to handle such an important task, however, and can use all the resources we can get! If you are a parent looking to help your child learn to read, these six programs are some of the best (and most successful) you can use.

1. Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons

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Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons is a complete, step-by-step program showing parents how to teach their children to read. It’s a sensible, easy-to-follow, and enjoyable way to help your child gain the essential skills of reading. This program contains one hundred lessons. It is fully illustrated and color-coded for clarity. Twenty minutes a day will give your child the basic and more advanced skills needed to become a good reader.

2. Reading Eggs

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Reading Eggs is an online program that makes learning to read fun, interactive, and highly rewarding. It is intended for ages 2–13. Reading Eggs was created by a highly experienced team of elementary school teachers, writers, and developers to help children become fluent and proficient readers. The multi-award-winning early learning resource supports your child’s reading journey with carefully designed online reading games and activities that are easy to follow, self-paced, and highly engaging for young learners.

3. Teach Your Monster to Read

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Teach Your Monster to Read is an award-winning series of online games that’s helped millions of children learn to read. The game is for children in the first stages of learning to read or for older children who need a bit more practice. Teach Your Monster to Read takes children on a magical journey, meeting colorful characters along the way, and collecting fantastic rewards. As they progress, they rehearse a range of essential reading skills, including matching letters to sounds, blending, and segmenting. They’ll also learn tricky words and to read full sentences. The game runs on any standard laptop or desktop computer (including Apple Macs), and the app works on iPhone, iPad, Android, and Kindle tablets.

4. The Reading Lesson

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The Reading Lesson is a bestselling program that teaches young children to read in 20 easy lessons. It is designed as a step-by-step course for parents who want to teach their young children to read at home. The teaching method is based on phonics and word recognition. With its innovative and guided approach, the lessons provide an easy-to-follow recipe for teaching children to read. This program has also been used successfully for children with disabilities.

5. Bob Books

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Bob Books is a true first-reader series. It is designed to make helping your child learn to read simple and straightforward. The clean layout, short words, and simple phonics make learning to read a fun and natural step for a child that knows the alphabet. Bob Books was designed to give young children the tools to go from learning letters to reading words. The beginning reader book sets start slowly. They progress from books with three-letter words to books with more than one sentence per page.

6. Phonics Pathways

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Phonics Pathways is a best-selling book that teaches reading using sounds and spelling patterns. These sounds and patterns are introduced one at a time and slowly built into words, syllables, phrases, and sentences. Simple step-by-step directions begin every lesson. Additionally, wise and humorous proverbs encourage virtues such as patience, perseverance, honesty, kindness, compassion, courage, and loyalty.

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The 5 Best Programs to Teach Your Child to Read

Reading Program Reviews of The 5 Best Programs to Teach Your Child to Read: Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons, Reading Eggs, Teach Your Monster to Read, and Hooked on Phonics

1) Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons

2) Reading Eggs

If your child is between the ages of 3 and 6 (or even older if your child is struggling with reading), you might want to consider Teach Your Child to Read™. Our program was designed for short attention spans and busy parents (lessons are only 5 minutes), and the program guides you step-by-step through the process of teaching your child to read. It's so easy to use, all you need is a few minutes to review lesson one, and you'll be ready to get started.

We particularly like the last one, only 6 STEPS. Many of the other programs are somewhat complicated to figure out what to do, what's been learned, and where to go next. Our program takes a sequential approach, so you'll always know what's been covered and where you are. And because the program is so linear, your child will get to the reading part fairly quickly. (In STEP 2, your child will actually start sounding out beginning words.)

It's pretty exciting to see how quickly your child learns to read!

On the flip side, some parents are concerned about 'pushing' their children into learning too early or too fast. Even though our program works quickly for most children, we think it's important to be judicious about how quickly you introduce reading concepts to your child.

Children learn best at their own pace, and some will naturally move faster than others. Our program is designed to offer a time of shared closeness between you and your child—just a few minutes a day—so your child never feels pushed into learning. If your child wants to buzz straight through in a few months, great! But if he or she needs to take more time, that's okay, too.

By introducing reading concepts in 5-minute micro-lessons, you'll be able to tune in to how your child is progressing at all times. You'll easily be able to identify when you can keep up your pace or slow down—even take an extended break—so your child will never feel rushed.

It's hard to grasp how a program works until you actually try it, which is why a free trial is so important. And I encourage you to try them all! Reading Eggs and Teach Your Child to Read™ have free trials, and Hooked on Phonics allows you to try the program for 30 days for $1. You can even 'test drive' Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons by reviewing the sample pages on Amazon. And of course, Teach Your Monster to Read is completely free.

While there are a lot of tremendous resources out there, I feel that none of them is as simple and easy to use as Teach Your Child to Read™. But regardless of which program you choose, I applaud you for going on this learning journey with your child. Please reach out to us and tell us how it goes!

Since the ages 5-7 offer a sweet spot for teaching children to read, the programs reviewed here are reading programs for kindergartners, 1st graders, and struggling readers up to age 8 and beyond. Some of these reading programs can be used with preschool children as well, especially if it's clear your 3 or 4-year-old child is ready to learn. (Age ranges are simply suggestions; you know your child better than anyone else!)

When working with a much older child (or even an adult), if your student is willing to engage with remedial tools, the programs in this review can be effective for anyone who wishes to learn to read or improve their reading skills.