ABC's and Sweet Tea: Reading Eggs ~ A Homeschool Crew Review

Every once in awhile we will do a review for a product that I didn't even realize we would use every single day. Gavin has had so much fun playing online learning games using Reading Eggs.

I'm always looking for anything that is educational, but also fun. Unfortunately Gavin isn't a big fan of reading, so I love to introduce programs to him that he can use to reinforce his reading, vocabulary, spelling, etc. Reading Eggs does all of this plus so much more. I thought Gavin would be too old for this program when I first read about it, even though it said that it went up to age 13. I was very wrong because each lesson that he has done has not been easy, but challenging for him!

Reading Eggs is available for ages 2 to 13. The levels are age appropriate with different engaging games, songs, and activities. In addition to the online activities they have just released their new program guides for grades K - 2nd grade that specifically support homeschoolers! These 36 week guides provide week by week detailed overviews so that you are able to track your child's learning. They can be found in the Parent Dashboard under the Bonus Material section.

The program is broken down as:

Reading Eggs Junior ~ This is what they call First Steps and it is for ages 2 to 4 years old. Games, videos and even books will help your toddler start building their pre-reading skills.

Reading Eggs 4-5 years ~ The skills here are geared for your child as they get ready to start school. It will include phonics, sight words, and essential reading skills that are age appropriate.

Reading Eggs 6-7 years ~ At this level your child will have lessons that focus on spelling, vocabulary, and comprehension.

Reading Eggspress for ages 7-13 ~ This is the level Gavin has been working on. Here they will have more structured comprehension lessons, spelling, and live games. We also LOVE the library that comes with it.

They even have an additional program called Mathseeds that they offer to reinforce your childs math skills! Mathseeds is geared for ages 3-9 and teaches your child the core principles of math using fun and interactive lessons.

How did we use this in our school?

Like I said, we have been using this every day. Gavin loves to do it and spends about 30 to 45 minutes on it a day. When we first started Reading Eggspress, I had Gav take the placement test, and it set him right up where he needed to be. He soon figured out that he had an avatar that he was going to be able to design and personalize. He loves doing this sort of thing so he dove right in. His avatar has an apartment that he can also design and personalize. The way it works is he will do his lessons for the day and he is rewarded with gold eggs. The gold eggs are used as currency to continue personalizing his apartment with decor, pets, furniture, and more! He LOVES this!

The dashboard that he starts with each day is brightly colored and easy to navigate. He can get to where he needs to be with the click of a button. As you can see he's already got 567 gold eggs saved up to buy some cool stuff at the mall!

He starts his day with the English Skills portion and right now he's working on spelling. The spelling takes him through different spelling rules such as homophones, plurals, vowels, and more. He's a decent speller, but has definitely been challenged with some of these words!

Next he moves on to his lesson. Each lesson is broken down into parts talking about a main book in general. It will take him through all kinds of different skills. He may look up a word in a dictionary and learn what part of speech it is. He may read an excerpt from a book and then answer reading comprehension questions about it. When he's done with that day's lesson, he will continue on down the path until he gets to the end where he will take a quiz. After each section of the "map" he will get a reward of gold eggs. This of course is the part he loves!

When he's finished with all of the lessons on that "map" he moves on to the next one.

When he's done with his lesson for the day, he heads to the library. This feature is super cool! There are hundreds of books here that he can read to earn more gold eggs! They offer different genres such has comedy, adventure, myth, Earth Science and so much more. He can even start a book and if he doesn't finish, he can book mark it for the next time he comes back. They even give you suggestions for the Book of the Day!

When he's finished with everything, he can go to the mall and spend his eggs, or he can save them which is what he's doing now.

I have to say again, this is an absolute amazing program. It is not only completely educational, but also so much fun for your child. Reading Eggs challenges your student and will improve their reading skills with fun and adventure! Right now they are offering a FREE 4 week trial, so you can test it out yourself! We love Reading Eggs and I am so happy we have found it!