Early Basic Skills 3: Blending Consonants using Queensland font (No. 468)

This book is third in a series of five in the Early Basic Skills series using Queensland handwriting font for children ages 4 to 7:

• #466 Early Basic Skills Single Sounds
• #467 Early Basic Skills Simple Words and Sentences
• #468 Early Basic Skills Blending Consonants
• #469 Early Basic Skills Using Digraphs
• #470 Early Basic Skills Written Text - Punctuation and Grammar

In this workbook the child is introduced to blending two consonant sounds together to make one smooth sound. The child is also introduced to more sight words via the Dolch List. The Dolch list of 200 words are words that occur so often in our reading that children need to be able to recognise them instantly as sight words (even though some can be sounded out). Knowing these words helps children to develop fluency when reading. Flash cards should be made for these words.

The Teachers' notes, on the top right of each left hand page, list words for an auditory discrimination activity. The Dolch words for flash cards are given at the bottom of some pages.

Children's activities are given in handwriting font. The left hand page introduces the consonant blend. Each dotted consonant blend should be traced over many times, each time in a different colour. This is called rainbow writing.

Some harder words (with pictures) are also given in this book. These should not be drilled, but just interesting words to build up the child's vocabulary.