Three decades interacting with young children as they learned to read has been a great source of information and inspiration. The greatest lesson was to trust the minds inside those little bodies. Give the basic tools of print - letters in association with their most common sounds - early and incrementally, and see what a difference it makes in a child's relationship with the environment. Souns places specifically designed prototypes of print in the hands of infants and toddlers to explore and manipulate. This practice is deceptively simple, but the results are measurable and clearly indicate potential in a wide range of applications. Learning the alphabetic code (phonemes) between 0 to 3 years of age is far easier than having to crack the code later.
The following information is the result of a survey from 33 families who volunteered to share their experiences with Souns. The families ordered Souns online and are from different parts of the USA and the UK.
100% say that Souns is easy to implement, with 94% of respondents indicating that they followed the program as directed.
100% say that Souns is helping their child to learn letter-sound asociations.
93% of children that have been working with Souns for at least one month voluntarily identify the letter-sounds they have been introduced to in the environment.
>70% of children that have been working with Souns for at least one year are attempting to write them on paper, with this occuring at an average age of of 29 months.
At an average age of 35 months old, these children begin to sound out phonetic words independently.
Souns children begin expressing themselves by phonetically writing words and sentences at an average age of 43 months.
100% believe that Souns is contributing to their child's interest and confidence in language.
100% believe that Souns is contributing to their child's future success in reading and writing.
Comments from participating Souns families:
Souns is one of my son's favorite things....I love it, totally believe in it....
He looks for words and letters in every environment and talks about them to everyone.
She can read anything in front of her and has no fear of trying to sound out any words.
....I don't see why anyone would want to do it any other way.
We love the Souns program.
She loves "m" and "o" and carries them around the house with her.
This is an amazing tool and now that I have seen how well they are working I will continue to tell my friends about them.
Thank you for creating such a wonderful tool. They are not only a great teaching tool for me, the girls love to play with them while learning which only adds to the enjoyment.
I can see eyes light up when he has figured out a word on his own. This makes him want to continue to work to sound out the next word. My child has delay in fine motor skills and eye tracking. Without this program I believe my child would be a lot farther behind than he is because he would not have the foundation to build on.
Within three days of starting Souns we passed a McDonalds and she started saying mmmm!! mmmmm!! We still call it the Mmmm Store. You can see how proud she is when she shows off her Souns knowledge.
As a mother of 25-week-old preemies, Souns gave me the hope, courage, and confidence I needed to help our daughters begin to understand the language we speak, read, and write - the world we live in. It helped them to eventually make some sense of it all. What a blessing Souns has been to us.
My son was diagnosed with high functioning autism at age three - he struggles with fine motor skills and still finds it difficult to write with a pen. However, cognitively, he is able to write well-formed sentences using a keyboard.
He already shows so much interest and competence with language and language skills. Many people remark on his mature use of languge and his clear articulation and speaking skills. Playing with Souns is fun for him and he seems so proud f himself when he knows his sounds, validating the effort he has put into learning the sound-symbol. It will be amazing to watch him apply what he has learned, both in "decoding" the written word and in "encoding" his own stories and self-expression through writing, and I can't say enough good things about the materials and the program.
The fact that she can pick them up and feel them and bring them along to places with her and the fact that they are extremely durable is wonderful. They have been our Christmas tree decorations, friends we take to bed and things that we play hide-and-seek with. I have spent quite a bit of money on toys and educational toys for my daughter and this purchase of our Souns set is something I am so happy I spent the money on... a wonderful resource for us to have in our home.
A Research Option- The main value of the Souns program is that it matches beautifully how the brain learns naturally. I strongly endorse the program and am anxious for a formal research study which I am certain will match what we have seen in informal settings (Wolfe).
Wolfe, Pat. Letter to author. 12 June 2006. TS.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
A Question About Order of Introduction
We received our Souns about a month ago and right away gave our son the o. He now has the o, m, s, t and p and is loving them. Just today we were driving around and he was pointing out sounds on signs - and s in the Safeway grocery store sign, an m in another sign... it is so amazing to see him learn and recognize the sounds.
We do have a question, and that is what the proper order of introduction is. We've been going by the order of the pronunciation list in the booklet, but have noticed that the order of the children pronouncing them on the video is different.
Thanks so much for such a great learning tool!
We do have a question, and that is what the proper order of introduction is. We've been going by the order of the pronunciation list in the booklet, but have noticed that the order of the children pronouncing them on the video is different.
Thanks so much for such a great learning tool!
Four-year-old Asa Emails
asa: monstrs eet uthr monmstrs.
me: i am not a monster. today i am a butterfly.
asa: im a rabt.
me: i am a bird today. what are you?
asa: im a bee.
(Several days went by.)
asa: im a brd tooda.
me: i am not a monster. today i am a butterfly.
asa: im a rabt.
me: i am a bird today. what are you?
asa: im a bee.
(Several days went by.)
asa: im a brd tooda.
Keeping In Touch With J
I haven't had a chance to try some of your suggestions yet, but I have been using the Souns letters during play again lately. My daughter remembers the first 7 and I am going to introduce the next letter soon. I'll keep you posted on her progress.
I am interested to see if she will be an above average reader. She also shows more interest in books than my son, and she crawled for 6 months before she walked. They say there is a connection between kids who crawl for a long time and higher reading levels. Between her crawling, interest in books and Souns, I am guessing she will be a great reader!
J
I am interested to see if she will be an above average reader. She also shows more interest in books than my son, and she crawled for 6 months before she walked. They say there is a connection between kids who crawl for a long time and higher reading levels. Between her crawling, interest in books and Souns, I am guessing she will be a great reader!
J
A Response to J's Question
Thank you so much for writing in with your questions. We really appreciate any feedback from parents and your questions are familiar ones. We are so happy that you are doing this with your daughter and are so proactive.
There are a couple of things that we thought of with your current situation. First of all, you have a very common situation of having an older sibling learning letter names at school. We get that question quite frequently. While letter names are inescapable, it is really your emphasis on the sounds that will draw your daughter back to the importance of them. You can talk to your son about the importance of sounds in reading and that your daughter is too young to understand both right now. Ask him to talk about the sounds instead of the letters with her. Re-emphasizing the sounds when he or she states the letter name will reinforce it. For example, if either see a letter and say it's name, such as a "M", you can respond, "Yes, that's mmmm".
The other thing you mentioned was that she was having trouble producing the /e/ and /'i/ differently. While your daughter may be producing the rest of the Souns she has learned, it isn't necessary that she be able to articulate them correctly, no matter what her age or developmental level until she is beginning to decode outloud. For now, it is entirely about her comprehension and differentiation of the different letters and their sounds. If you place emphasis on her identifying (showing you the object that you named) rather than her naming it outloud, you should be able to redirect her to more success and therefore encourage her continued play with Souns.
It is normal that children's interests will wane over time but if you continue to keep Souns in her life and environment, without it being a testing situation, and emphasize natural play situations, you will be able to continue reinforcing Souns. With my own children, if I feel like the interest is waning, I will sometimes just make sure the Souns got spilled and ask them to clean them up by stating, "Go get the sss under the chair" and "Can you bring the aahh to Mommy?" Even if she isn't interested in Souns per se, she will always be interested in your attention. And, of course, sounds are everywhere. There are many opportunities to talk about the letter's sounds when you see them on trucks on the road or napkins at a restaurant. Also, depending on your daughter's level, you can play sound games in the car or wherever, asking, "what sounds do you hear in "pop" etc.. or "what else starts with ssss?"
There are a couple of things that we thought of with your current situation. First of all, you have a very common situation of having an older sibling learning letter names at school. We get that question quite frequently. While letter names are inescapable, it is really your emphasis on the sounds that will draw your daughter back to the importance of them. You can talk to your son about the importance of sounds in reading and that your daughter is too young to understand both right now. Ask him to talk about the sounds instead of the letters with her. Re-emphasizing the sounds when he or she states the letter name will reinforce it. For example, if either see a letter and say it's name, such as a "M", you can respond, "Yes, that's mmmm".
The other thing you mentioned was that she was having trouble producing the /e/ and /'i/ differently. While your daughter may be producing the rest of the Souns she has learned, it isn't necessary that she be able to articulate them correctly, no matter what her age or developmental level until she is beginning to decode outloud. For now, it is entirely about her comprehension and differentiation of the different letters and their sounds. If you place emphasis on her identifying (showing you the object that you named) rather than her naming it outloud, you should be able to redirect her to more success and therefore encourage her continued play with Souns.
It is normal that children's interests will wane over time but if you continue to keep Souns in her life and environment, without it being a testing situation, and emphasize natural play situations, you will be able to continue reinforcing Souns. With my own children, if I feel like the interest is waning, I will sometimes just make sure the Souns got spilled and ask them to clean them up by stating, "Go get the sss under the chair" and "Can you bring the aahh to Mommy?" Even if she isn't interested in Souns per se, she will always be interested in your attention. And, of course, sounds are everywhere. There are many opportunities to talk about the letter's sounds when you see them on trucks on the road or napkins at a restaurant. Also, depending on your daughter's level, you can play sound games in the car or wherever, asking, "what sounds do you hear in "pop" etc.. or "what else starts with ssss?"
A Great Question
I purchased souns for my infant daughter when she was a few months old. She began making the sounds of the first letter almost immediately after introducing it (somewhere between 6 mos and 1 yr). I introduced a few more, and she said those as well. It was so amazing.
She had about 5 letter sounds down before the age of two. Funny thing is, she was speech delayed. Didn't say Mommy until about two years old (Said Daddy a little earlier).
I have an older son in kindergarten, so my daughter is exposed to a lot of books and videos with letters. Due to this, she will sometimes say the name of the letter instead of the sound. It has also become increasingly difficult to teach her the new sounds. The e is hard for her to say...it sound like the i. The i sounds like the e. Should I skip these and continue with other letters?
Now that she is mobile (didn't walk until almost 19 mos) and talking and able to play with a lot more stuff, she isn't really interested in her souns letters as much. I have to catch her in the right mood. Do you have any tips to keep this going?
J
She had about 5 letter sounds down before the age of two. Funny thing is, she was speech delayed. Didn't say Mommy until about two years old (Said Daddy a little earlier).
I have an older son in kindergarten, so my daughter is exposed to a lot of books and videos with letters. Due to this, she will sometimes say the name of the letter instead of the sound. It has also become increasingly difficult to teach her the new sounds. The e is hard for her to say...it sound like the i. The i sounds like the e. Should I skip these and continue with other letters?
Now that she is mobile (didn't walk until almost 19 mos) and talking and able to play with a lot more stuff, she isn't really interested in her souns letters as much. I have to catch her in the right mood. Do you have any tips to keep this going?
J
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
An Email Conversation With Asa (age 4)
asa: it snwd.
me: is it fun? did you play in it?
asa: i clmd a roc wl.
me: that is wonderful! tell me more.
asa: i clmd hi.
A few days later, Asa emailed again.
asa: sciz or gra.
me: hi asa! it is sunny. it is warm. is it cold at your house?
asa: it is nt cod.
me: is it fun? did you play in it?
asa: i clmd a roc wl.
me: that is wonderful! tell me more.
asa: i clmd hi.
A few days later, Asa emailed again.
asa: sciz or gra.
me: hi asa! it is sunny. it is warm. is it cold at your house?
asa: it is nt cod.
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