My biggest fear about homeschooling was teaching my kids to read. I was afraid that if I messed it up, they would forever be dumb and hate learning.  Reading has always been such an important part of my life that I was very nervous about goofing it up for my children.

Drum roll please...Joey is reading.  Ok not reading chapter books or anything but reading nontheless.  He's known all his letters and many sounds since he was 3 or so, last year we sort of did "Teaching your child to read in 100 easy lessons".  I say "sort of" because I just don't follow directions well.  Anyway, we got what we needed to from the book...well, at least through lesson 32, and then I just branched out.   We still use the book to learn what sound should come next, make word lists, etc.  

Anyway, this all took place the year that Joey was 4.  I knew he "Got it" as far as sounding the letters and recognizing that they made words... the problem was in his "want to".  So I bribed him.  I told him that soon he would be 5 and 5 was a big boy and if he was 5 and could read, he could get a library card.  That worked to motivate him and he really was putting forth an effort, but now the problem was making it interesting.  

Recently I had a lightbulb moment.  I found a packet of blank word cards (poster stock with the writing lines printed on them) at the $1.00 store.  I bought them and a sharpie marker (also $1) and brought them home.  I went through our 100 lessons book and copied all the words that i knew that he knew, and threw a few new ones in as well.  I then cut apart the strips and divided them into piles that roughly correspond with subject, verb, direct object, etc.  I told the kids to pick one card from each pile and then I made a sentence.  Of course I have to quietly adjust some of the combinations that come up, but for the most part, it works.  Joey thinks that he is just the funniest guy in town for making all these nonsense sentences. Jessi gets to help pick cards and she does a bang up job of sounding out the letters and i know that soon it's all going to click for her too.

Joey turned 5 in January of this year and he is doing really well with our cards and when I read aloud to him in books i have in try quite a few words.

Some of the funny sentences we have had are:

The mud is not a rock.

That ram is a sick cat.

This mom sees a fat Joey.

and so on.