My First Phonics Book (My First (Big Books Dorling Kindersley)) [Hardcover]

DK Publishing (Author)

Book Description

Series: My First (Big Books Dorling Kindersley)

The complete preschool learning series to develop your child's vocabulary and early literacy skills. Here's an exciting new introduction to learning for preschool children. Carefully chosen elements focus on the first words critical to early language development. My First Phonics Book organizes the 44 sounds that make up the English language in simple, easy-to-locate alphabetical order, with a page devoted to each sound. Each sound page includes a carefully devised selection of colorful pictures, all with word labels that feature color-coded- sound patterns..

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Kindergarten-Grade 3-This slightly oversized volume presents 42 sounds (vowels, consonants, and blends) from the English language. Each page introduces numerous examples of a particular sound and its spelling variations (e.g., yawn, ball, haunt) highlighted in red for easy identification. In addition, a paragraph of whimsical text or verse reinforces the various spellings. Glossy captioned photographs featuring children will entice readers. Youngsters will also enjoy solving the riddles posed at the bottom of each page. A lively, fun addition.
Kim Donius, Alfred-Almond Central School, Almond, NY
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 48 pages
• Publisher: DK Preschool (October 4, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0789447371
• ISBN-13: 978-0789447371
• Product Dimensions: 13.2 x 10.2 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #280,112 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great PRONOUNCIATION guide, January 11, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: My First Phonics Book (My First (Big Books Dorling Kindersley)) (Hardcover)

Someone did make a mistake on the age for this book. It is DEFINITELY for children who are starting to read AND spell. This book goes through ALL the spellings of sounds of letters in alphabetical order. For example, one of the sounds is "ee" as in "street". The book also lists "ea" as in "treat", "e" as in "me", and others. It does have pictures of items, but that helps the child to distinguish which way to say the word. It is not meant to be a reading teacher, but it is a fantastic guide on pronouncing words and spelling variations. Many letter combinations have more than 1 way to pronounce them. For example, "ea" can be "treat" or "bread". My 7 year old daughter received this book when she was 5. She hated to read at that point and was a bit too young. We picked it up again 6-months later and she didn't want to stop. It has helped her reading and spelling tremendously.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good for Kindergarteners and older learning to read, November 21, 2000

By 

A Mom Who Loves Children's Books (Beaumont, Texas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: My First Phonics Book (My First (Big Books Dorling Kindersley)) (Hardcover)

Mistakenly labeled for the 0 - 3 aged child, this book is NOT a picture book, and NOT for children under age 5. I'm going to use this book to supplement/challenge my emergent reader daughter who is in Kindergarten and an "older" age 5 (she'll be 6 in February). My daughter is at the reading stage where the lightbulb is going off: she is stringing sounds together and "reading" words like Fred, red, Ted etc. (she also knows many words by sight learned from school, eg. colors, months, classmates' names, and the high frequency words: a, the, is, that, you, of, in, and, it, too, when, then, etc.) In the next 2 to 6 months, she'll be able to read the pages in My First Phonics Book that show the different spellings of words that sound the same (homonymns). I expect this, because last year when my 6 year old nephew (who turns 7 this month) started reading, the time elapsed from "barely reading" to "really reading" was very short, about a month -- it was incredible. If your child likes to practice his/her reading, then My First Phonics Book should be helpful as your emerging reader advances to more challenging words/books.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Works for a variety of ages, July 8, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: My First Phonics Book (My First (Big Books Dorling Kindersley)) (Hardcover)

This book will work for a whole range of ages, if you use it correctly. For the younger child, use it as a picture book and just have fun identifying all the items. At really early ages you might do better to get the ABC or Word book in the board format, but this one will also serve the same purpose if you keep the pages out of little hands!

Once your child starts learning letters and their sounds, stick to the pages in this book that cover those sounds. Obviously some children begin that process sooner than others, but waiting until kindergarten should not be necessary for most.

For the older child, the pages with the blended sounds will be useful.

All of these instructions are included in the front of the book, so I'm a bit mystified by the negative comments that don't take the various ways of using the book into account. My daughter is 2-1/2, and we're enjoying the book. We aren't using the blended sounds yet; we're just focusing on the basic letter sounds right now. I don't see any problem with the assigned age range.