My INFORMAL Abeka 5 year old Kindergarten review

     Okay, let me stress to you that this in an INFORMAL review.  I'm getting nothing from Abeka by doing this, it's purely for informational purposes so that maybe some mom who is where I was 5 years ago, desperately trying to figure out what is going to work for her child, might get some insight.  I will give what I think are the pros and cons of this curriculum, but just as a disclaimer: your child and my children may be very different.  What works for me and my family may not work for you and your family, and vice versa.  So, here we go.....

     First of all, here is a link directly to the Abeka page that shows the different books I used for 5 year old kindergarten.  I used Abeka's K5 Manuscript kit for Motormouth and am currently using it for the Tweebs.  I used the child and parent K5 manuscript kit, Social Studies K, Readiness Skills K, and Art Projects K for Motormouth.  I only used the child and parent K5 Manuscript kit and the Social Studies K with the Tweebs.

      Abeka K5 Letters and Sounds has worked well for all three of my kids.  It's pretty straightforward, and has lots of colorful workbook pages, which my kids like.  They think plain old black and white pages are boring.  Sometimes the pictures can be a little distracting, especially for Thing 2, but he's distracted by a speck of dust floating past his face, so I wouldn't base your opinion on that!  Like I said, they take a very straightforward approach to phonics.  You start the year by learning each individual letter and letter sound (you learn the short vowels and consonants first, then they bring in the long vowels) with worksheets and flashcards.  Your standard "A says a as in Apple" stuff.  They learn a clue word and sentence for each letter, which my kids liked.  I know that some children have a hard time understanding that vowels have "long" and "short" sounds, considering you don't usually use those terms to describe a sound.  If you think that will be a problem for your child, I would suggest checking out Scaredy Cat Reading System.  I have not personally used it, but a close friend, who had previously tried teaching her kids to read with Abeka, said it worked much better for her kids.  I have three very different types of learners, and Abeka has worked well for all three when it came to teaching basic phonics.  But that doesn't mean it works for everyone.  After you learn basic letter sounds, you will then build on that to make sound blends, short vowel words, and then will progress to bigger words with more than one vowel.  We're at the end of our kindergarten year with the Tweebs, and they are learning the different "special sounds" that words make.  (Example: O says it's long sound when it's the only vowel at the end of a short word)  About halfway (or somewhere there abouts) through the year, your child will start reading practice.  If you purchase the kit, you get all the readers to go along with the curriculum.  The kids really enjoy them, because they have their own little "books" (they're pretty much just a few papers stapled together) that they can put their name on.  For added fun and a sense of accomplishment, I would stick a sticker on the front next to their name once they completed a book.  By the end of the year they will be reading simple books, recognizing and writing all their letters, and will know the proper way to write a sentence (capital letters, all sentences have a period, question mark, etc.).  I think that about covers it.  I kind of over simplifed what they learn, but I'm not going to list every rule they learn for reading, etc. here.  Feel free to comment with any questions if I left something important out that you would like to know!  All in all, I really don't have any complaints about Abeka's K5 Phonics/Reading program.  It's worked great for our family.

     Numbers Skills K is the K5 math with Abeka.  There is a Numbers Skills K workbook, and a Numbers writing tablet to practice writing numbers.  Like the Letters and Sounds book, it is colorful and fun to look at.  They start off learning to recognize patterns, alike/different, counting, and writing each number from 1-10.  Once they've gotten 1-10, you move on to the other "number families"...the teen family, twenty family, thirty family, and so on.  By the end of the year they will have learned how to recognize, count and write numbers 1-100, how to tell time by the hour, half hour and quarter hour, colors, shapes, basic addition and subtraction, and the basics of money (pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters..).  I think that about covers it.  We liked how it taught adding and subtracting by showing pictures of objects to count.  We also added in our own manipulatives, because who doesn't like playing with blocks??  Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with their kindergarten math curriculum.  Thing 2 HATES the numbers writing, along with the handwriting, because he gets bored.  But that's nothing wrong with the curriculum.  He just doesn't have a long attention span, and doesn't focus well.  But he still has to learn how to write, so we just try to break it down into short sessions so that he doesn't get too frustrated.

Oh!  One thing I forgot to mention about the phonics and math.  There are sporadic "tests" throughout the books that are just reviews of what they've been learning.  I don't stress too much about those.  They take them, but I try to praise them no matter what the grade is, because I don't want to foster a sense of competition and being disappointed in one's self, especially at that young of an age.  In our state, the compulsory attendance age is 7-16.  So when they are 5 and 6 years old, I don't track "grades" persay.  I just watch to see what they miss on those periodic assesments so that we know what we're still needing some work on.  There are also reading tests that you can keep track of.  I did those with Motormouth, because he took to reading right off the bat, and has a very high reading level.  He liked to get a grade, because he thought it was fun to show off his "report card" to his dad.  With the Tweebs I have not done graded reading tests.  They're learning to read at a different pace than their brother, which is just fine.  All kids are different.  I've found with them though, that if they feel pressured by "testing" them on their reading, it just causes unneccessary stress, and actually causes them to trip up more.  I want to foster a lifetime love of reading and learning, and if they are constantly feeling like they're not good enough, they will want to give up.  So I just give lots of positive reinforcement, and we practice, practice, practice!  Just make sure that you check out whatever the homeschool laws are in your particular state though, because every state is different.  Some require much more record keeping, and some are even more lax about it than Missouri.  If you don't know the homeschool laws for your state, visit http://www.hslda.org/ for homeschool laws and other great info. 

     The thing that all three of my kids would list as their least favorite subject?  Writing.  Oh how they despise writing.  I chose Writing with Phonics Manuscript.  Abeka does give you the choice to start kindergarten with cursive, but I wanted my kids to learn how to print first.  I know that, as an adult, I tend to print more often than not, so I want to make sure they know how to form their letters properly in print first.  We moved on to cursive in second grade.  But do whatever feels right for your family.  Abeka's writing curriculum corresponds with what the kids are learning in the Phonics curriculum.  The letter they're learning the sound of at the time is also the letter they're learning to write.  The Writing with Phonics book is colorful just like all the other Abeka workbooks.  I don't have a ton to say about the writing, to be totally honest, but that's not saying it's a bad curriculum.  I actually have used Handwriting without Tears in 2nd grade for my oldest, and didn't care for it as much.  The way that Abeka teaches how to form your letters is the way I want my kids to learn it.  Some of the HWOT letters were formed differently, which then tripped up my oldest when it all changed in 2nd grade.  But that's for another review.  I guess what all this rambling means is that, between the two handwriting curriculums I've used with my kids, I prefer Abeka's.  Either way, all three of my kids pretty much despise writing and think it's totally boring and repetitive.  So, once again, I just try to keep the increments of time small when we work on it, so that there is as little frustration as possible. 

     In all of Abeka kindergarten's "core" subjects, they take a spiraling approach.  They take what you've already learned, review it, and then add a little more to the lesson to build on it.  Especially for kindergarten, I really like that about it.  It got frustrating for my oldest in first grade, which I will address in my review on Abeka 1st grade curriculum.  He has always caught on to things rather quick though, so too much repetitiveness annoys him.  It has worked very well for my younger two. 

     I've also used the Art Projects K and the Social Studies K.  They are both nicely put together just like the rest of Abeka's workbooks, I just really didn't use them that much.  It was all stuff that I could put together on my own without purchasing a workbook.  All of the art projects could pretty much be done with crayons, scissors and glue.  That's not bad, I just didn't want to spend the money a second time to get something I could do pretty easy.  But if you are someone who is short on time or creativity, and would rather just have it there to tear out and do, then you might really like it.  The Social Studies K focuses a lot on community and community helpers.....teaching the kids about their neighborhood, policemen, firemen, librarians, etc.  Once again, not a bad book, but it's just stuff I really can handle pretty easy with some free printables online. 

     So, you might be wondering.....do I not have ANYTHING I didn't like about Abeka?  The one thing that I don't just love is that Abeka seems to be Christian school curriculum that can also be used for homeschooling.  Which means, sometimes, (more so in the 1st grade than the K curriculum) there is "busy work" for the kids, so that the teacher can be working with other students while it's being completed.  Considering I only have 3 children at home with me, and one of them is basically self taught, I don't need the busy work.  But, if we get to something that seems to be repetitive just for the sake of giving the teacher time with other students, and I don't feel that we need it, we just skip over it.  But it definitely wouldn't keep me from recommending Abeka kindergarten curriculum to anyone looking.

     That is my ridiculously rambling review of Abeka K5 curriculum.  Hopefully in future reviews I will be able to sum things up a little better, and not write an entire encycopedia on why or why not I would recommend something!  Overall, Abeka K5 has really worked for our family, and the kids have done well with it and liked it.  Once again, if there are questions you have that I left unanswered, I would be more than happy to answer them to the best of my ability if you leave a comment below. 

Until next time!