Our daughter seems ready to move forward. She is a Pre-K student at an exclusive all-girls school. They use a whole-language approach to reading. We want her to be more than ready for Kindergarten next year when school gets started. Are there other programs that she needs to get, or do I need to hire a private teacher to help us? We have been pleased with the results of our Phonics program so far, but we wonder if it’s the program that will take her further than basic reading. Thanks for your response.

There are many Phonics products that take children through a pretty solid first grade reading level. They have books that introduce the concepts that we’ve talked about, blends and digraphs. These books go to about a year-end first grade reading level or a beginning second grade reading level. I’m not sure if you have those sets or not. Whole language reading approaches focus quite a bit more on sight words and memorization of words. Obviously, English has many words that just have to be memorized, but we have many that we can sound out too. Giving your daughter a great phonetic foundation with the confidence to sound out new words as well as the learning sight words at school should be a great combination. Best of luck to you.