A Review of Hooked on Phonics Learn to Read Pre-K Edition

My son is four years old and loves this reading program. Hooked on Phonics is a learning system that focuses on teaching children the relationship between letters and sound in order to teach them how to read. The Pre-K Edition is designed for children 3 to 4 years old and covers uppercase letters, lowercase letters, and letter sounds. It employs a variety of learning tools to this end, which I'll discuss here. I have the 2007 Edition. It's possible that there is now an updated edition with different components.

Workbooks. This HOK program has three levels to complete, and each level has its own workbook. The yellow level workbook teaches uppercase letters and features a variety of coloring pages, activities and card games. The red level workbook teaches lowercase letters and the blue level workbook teaches letter sounds, also making use of coloring pages and games. When my son was three years old, the workbooks were difficult because he did not have much of an interest in coloring, and he did not understand the card games that the workbook suggested. At four years old, he will now color and can grasp the objective of the card games. Take into account your own child's interest in the material as well as their ability to understand the activities in order to gauge the usefulness of the program at a given time. If it seems too early, there's nothing wrong with putting the program away for a later time.

Interactive CD-ROMs. Also included are two CD-ROMS. One combines the red and yellow levels, and the other covers the blue level. Each features a variety of games that either focus on an individual letter, a group of letters, or a rhyming game. These are animated games that are hosted by a cast of talking animal characters. The CD-ROM games are my son's favorite part of the whole Hooked on Phonics Pre-K program, which is great but I do have a few bones to pick with it. For one thing, it's ridiculously slow. I have a MacBook Pro that I bought just a year ago, so while it's not the absolute newest system available, it's still up to date so I know it's not the problem. Seriously, the CD-ROM runs on 800x600 resolution, it uses a simple cartoon interface and it's not like it needs more than a handful of scripts to operate. There is no excuse for it being so slow. Also, the little animal characters just don't shut up. While they're saying things that are meant to help the child understand, they are nonetheless repetitive and make it difficult for me to explain things to my son. I usually end up muting the computer while I talk. My last complaint is with the rhyming game; not the game per se, but the fact that the program includes rhyming at all. I don't really understand why a 3 or 4 year old needs to understand the concept of rhyming right now, or how that skill even contributes to what is being learned in the program. The little character in the rhyming game tell your child that "a rhyme is a word that ends with the same sound." Well, if your child is learning letter sounds, and the sounds that the words end with (i.e., cat and hat both end with "at") don't correspond to any particular letter, of course he's going to be confused. The rhyming game is frustrating for both me and my son, so we usually just skip it.

Cards. The HOK program also includes several sets of cards to use for the games that are suggested in the workbooks. These cards either have upper or lowercase letters on them, and there are picture cards as well. The letter cards focus on letter recognition, while the picture cards focus on letter sounds. For example, a picture card of an apple will prompt your child to think of what letter apple begins with. The card games were something that my son showed little interest in until this year, and they were difficult for him to understand as well. Each child is different; your child may take a shorter or longer time than mine did to be able to use the cards.

Storybook. I will say that I'm guilty of never having read this entire book to my son at all. We tried a few times, but he simply lost interest in it. Either the pictures are not engaging enough or the story itself bores him; he keeps trying to turn the page before I'm finished reading it. I know this isn't due to a lack of interest in books in general because my son loves being read to when it's a book that he likes. In summary, the book features several of the same characters that are in the CD-ROM, who go out to town and pinpoint various objects beginning with letters in the order of the alphabet. Perhaps this is another part of the program that my son will show interest in at a later time.

Progress posters and stickers. Each level also has a corresponding progress poster. Each progress poster displays a winding path like the one in the Candy Land game, and each block on the path represents a letter your child has learned or an activity he has completed. There are also three sheets of stickers that your child can put on the poster as he completes each milestone. My son loves stickers so he really likes this part of the learning process. I like it too; it's added value. My only complaint is the fact that the workbook instructs you to help your child put his name on the poster, but there was no crayon, marker or pencil I could find that was able to make a visible mark on the glossy poster material! I suppose that a sharpie could do it, but do you really want to put a sharpie in the hands of your small child?

My son and I haven't completed the entire program, but so far it does seem like a a fun and useful way to introduce your child to letters and letter sounds. Try it out for yourself and see. Hooked on Phonics programs are available in libraries as well as on the company website, www.hookedonphonics.com.