Bingo Game

I spent quite some time making a bingo game to go with Book 1 from the Fun Family Phonics Story Books. "The Fun Family Book". It was fun doing it but fairly time consuming. I wanted it to look sort of professional so I used a purchased Bingo game to work with. ( I decided that the purchased game had way more bingo cards than I would ever use anyway.) I cut out the word "Bingo" and glued it on a new card that I had put the new words on. I then make a set of calling cards and I am set.

tv ad -great results.

Our local TV station has a community announcement forum that I mentioned in an earlier posting. This is a free advertisement. I'm not sure what the requirements are but I guess they liked what I was offering to the community. I have never seen it myself but I am certainly impressed with it. I asked them about a month ago if they would advertise my free phonics camp. This ad. seems to take the form a wheel and I have had a lot of people call and say they saw my ad on the "wheel". After at least a month, they are still running my ad. Today another lady called and said " I saw your ad. on the "wheel".
I now have 11 kids signed up and their deposit paid.

Muriel is coming to visit

I am so excited that Muriel is coming to my house and is going to stay overnight. That is Muriel as in Muriel Endersby author of Fun Family Phonics.
What a wonderful lady she is and she is so helpful and interested in how things are going for new tutors like me.
I can't wait to show her my set up and get her in put on my plans.

Wishful thinking

I published on my face book the other day that I had 10 students. I was gleefully counting up my monthly income and the fact that I could now quit my job and stay home to work on phonics only.
I was lying in bed trying to get to sleep the next night, after I had given my resignation notice at work and I realized that I had fallen for a trap that I had been determined not to fall into.
I had believed people were phoning back and I had put them on the permanent list. I had said from the start that they would only get on that list if I had a $50. deposit. I was so sure that one person was calling back and I had the perfect spot the the child so I had pencilled in the name. The other boy was in a late spot and I had decided to ask the mom if I could move him to an early spot in the day, so I penciled his name in there. I left his name in the first spot so I wouldn't forget what I had given him. Not remembering all of this, I counted up the names and said that I was so close to my goal of 12 students that I could relax my efforts. Now I am back to 8 students and am thinking maybe I should put another ad in the paper but I wonder is it is right to advertise a camp that is already full. I am telling people that call that I am taking a wait list but they aren't nearly so eager to come and see me. I would hate to have to do another free camp, that would be a lot of work.

The eyeball

I was sitting on my deck the other day when I noticed something that looked like an eyeball on the ground. On closer examination I saw that it was an eyeball. I carefully nudged it with my finger to realize that it was a bouncy ball. The kind that dentists give out from their treasure box.
I remember that one the children that were checking out fun family phonics was trying to tell his mother and me that he had lost his ball in our back yard. His mom was convinced it was in their vehicle so we gave up a search very quickly. I will have to save it for when he comes back. Meanwhile I wonder if I can give anyone else a start with this eyeball appearing at odd places.

Me teach a lawyer to read!

A mother came over last night to see what this program is all about. She got so excited about it and she kept saying that her husband had problems reading. I guess she meant in the past but it sounded like the present to me. Then she said " I just wish my husband could be in on this". I said " Do you mean you want me to teach your husband to read". She just laughed and said no she was wanting him to come and see what they were going to put their boys in. Later in the conversation I found out the he is a lawyer. - Was my face red!!

Reading by Color by Helen Irlen

I have recently been introduced to a book called Reading by the Colors by Helen Irlen. She is presenting an idea that I have never heard of, that some children have difficulty reading because of the way that they preceive the written page. It is not a vision problem, it is a perceptual problem.
Some children get frustrated when they read for more that 5 minutes, they can never seem to get comfortable, they wiggle and try to get diff. positions. Reading becomes something they would rather avoid and this affects so many others things. Since they can't read, they may try music to the same end, they can't see the music score. Or, they may try sports but if it involves catching a ball they would probably miss it.
Helen Irlen has discovered that some children have double vision, dyslexia and other reading disabilites. For some the words move around on the page or look double or run like rivers. She has discovered that if the children look through an overlay of a certain colour. (different for all) the page becomes clear to them.
One of my students that will be coming to tutoring is going to be wearing a green filter pair of glasses. I will keep you posted how it turns out.