Smart Start in Language Arts - Home Education Edition

NEW in 2011: Smart Start Workbooks for Home Education



A Complete Program of Language Arts Instruction for Grades 1 & 2




Smart Start Home Education Edition was written specifically for homeschoolers.


*The child is guided by a workbook that introduces reading, writing and spelling skills in a sequential order. These are applied in the lessons and reviewed until mastery is obtained.


*Parents discover a simple, effective method of teaching reading and writing using a teacher's manual. Lesson plans and answer keys are presented in a simple, straightforward manner.




1. The binder contains two reproducible workbooks and four DVDs. The workbook material can be used with all the children in ONE family, because it can be photocopied. If you have only one child, you can use the pages in the binder as a consumable workbook.


2. The first workbook is for grade one and the second workbook for grade two. A tab divider separates the two workbooks.


3. Behind the second workbook is a colored page indicating a final section which contains a short summary of reading and comprehension strategies. These are supported by research.


4. The first DVD contains thirteen I SPY photographs for the alphabet lessons, and printable sight word and phonics games (lotto and bingo) for reading instruction fun. The other three DVDs have thirty-five puppet shows which introduce letter sounds, long vowel words with silent e and long vowel words with two vowels together.


4. Lesson plans and detailed instructions are located in the grade one and grade two teacher's manuals.





Through fun, systematic, sequential lessons your child will learn:


1. Reading Instruction:


a. Decoding Skills


*alphabet sight/sound correspondence


*blending three letter words


*consonant blends


*silent e words


*y at the end of one & two beat words


*long vowel words with 2 vowels together


*word keys (th, sh, ch, wh, qu, ar, er, ir, or, ur, ue, ui, ew,


oo, oi, oy, ay, ou, ow, au, aw, ce, ci, cy, ge, gi, gy, wr, kn, ph)


*word families (rhyming word groups such as: ight)


*word endings (s, es, ed, ing)


*suffixes (tion, ly)


*compound words


*word analysis (missing piece of most phonics instruction)


*decodable text stories


b. Fluency


*repeated reading sight word book


*increases reading speed


*solidifies sight word memorization


c. Comprehension


*answering questions from stories


(who, what, where, when, why, how)


*learning to ask questions


*listening to stories and finding a character's motive which drives story action


*sequencing events of a story


*mastering prepositions




2. Writing Instruction


a. Printing Practice


*forming letters with ease & developing fine motor skills


*jokes & riddles (builds comprehension skills as the child stretches to grasp the meaning of puns, double meanings and word play)


b. Spelling


*letter sounds, phonics rules, word keys, word families and fixing misspelled words


c. Sentence Writing


*different sentence starters


*building strong verb vocabulary


*applying capital letters and punctuation marks


d. Punctuation & Capitalization Skills


*learning when and where to use capital letters and punctuation marks


e. Six Creative Writing Stories


*using a series of three pictures to write a story


*writing with sentence by sentence support for success


*applying character motive to story writing


*developing a strong vocabulary