A Stable Beginning: Reading Eggs ~ a TOS review

Wednesday, October 18, 2017

Reading Eggs ~ a TOS review

Over the course of the nine years we have been homeschooling, I have learned that what works for one child, may not necessarily work for another. And vice versa. We are no stranger to the world of Reading Eggs, the online learning site, having used it when Montana was younger. We have been working with the program over the last few weeks with McKenzie and Micah who both love the fun online learning games and activities in Reading Eggs.

If you need a little bit of fun to spice up learning to read for your children, look no further than Reading Eggs! Reading Eggs provides a fun and interactive way to get kids to learn how to read. They accomplish this by introducing beginner readers to the world of reading through interactive stories and games with fun characters.

With four distinct components to the Reading Eggs program including:

~ Reading Eggs Junior for children aged 2-4 years

~ Reading Eggs for children aged 4-7 years

~ Reading Eggspress for children aged 7-13

~ Mathseeds for children aged 3-9 years

Reading Eggs Junior is the perfect amount of stimulation for your young toddler who is just beginning their learning journey. With a huge library of read-aloud books, songs, alphabet games, and the all-important phonemic awareness activities your toddler will be engaged from day one.

With Reading Eggs your children aged 4-7 will learn everything from letter recognition, phonics, to reading early readers while using this program. To capture and hold a young child’s attention and make the reading experience multi-sensory there are also puzzles, games, and songs to make the process F-U-N! Not to mention the chance to win golden eggs and rewards to help the child progress toward the end goal and feel proud of themselves.

Do you have an older child or want to continue on the reading journey? No problem! Reading Eggspress {a sister part of the Reading Eggs World} is geared towards older children, aged 7-13, to encourage fluent reading. Using real books for reading this program is jam packed with hundreds of interactive reading activities and games to encourage fluent reading!

Mathseeds teaches kids 3-9 the core math and problem solving skills needed to be successful. Through highly interactive lessons, Mathseeds keeps kids interested in completing math skills. Mathseeds is also available to play on a tablet so you can take the learning on the go if you have internet connection.

Getting started is as easy as signing up for a FREE 4 week trial of the program! When you first sign your child into Reading Eggs, the first step is for them to take an assessment test. This “test” consists of 40 questions multiple choice questions. Once your child has missed 3 questions, the test is over and your child will be placed in the appropriate level.

There are three levels of play with 4 learning boards in each level. Level 1: Lessons 1- 40 Starting Out for the beginner; Level 2: Lessons 41-80 Beginning to Read for the emerging reader; Level 3: Lessons 81-120 Building Confidence for Early Readers. No need to worry about your child skipping ahead lessons as they are locked so you follow the natural progression of the program. As your child progresses through the different levels you can track her progress on the map from the family dashboard.

So, you are probably wondering how much this great program costs, right? Well, there are a few different ways to purchase a Reading Eggs subscription. For one child a 12 month subscription is available for $59.00 and includes access the Reading Eggs suite (Junior & Eggspress) and Mathseeds. For one child, a 6 month subscription is $49.95 and only includes access to the Reading Eggs suite. If you prefer monthly payments, you can also choose the monthly payment option at $9.95 a month. If you have multiple children then the Family Bonus Discount – is perfect for you! You will save 50% on the full price subscription when you purchase the SAME subscription for your additional children in ONE transaction. For our family, the 12-month subscription would only cost $88.50 for the year which is just right for my budget. This offer cannot be used in conjunction with any other offer. There is also a Family Package deal for homeschoolers, just call the customer service team to inquire about pricing.

New this year is the addition of the Homeschool Guides. These colorful and detailed week-by-week guides make it easy for you to comprehensively cover and track essential learning outcomes for kids in Kindergarten through 2nd Grade. Each printable guide provides a 36-weeks of lesson plans for language Arts, Mathematics, Science and Social Studies. Best of all, each guide lists reference books in the Reading Eggspress library to complement online learning, and help you expand new ideas and concepts.

To coincide with the levels of the program, Reading Eggs also offers book packs. Reading Eggs Mega Book Pack includes all the level 1 and Level 2 books that match the first 80 lesson of Reading Eggs. For $110.00 this mega pack includes the 80 books, 400 stickers, 8 mini posters, 8 Activity books, and 2 packs of durable Flashcards with hands-on games. However, the book packs were not a part of this review. I am possibly thinking of purchasing these sets at the beginning of the year.

McKenzie (8-years-old) and Micah (3-years-old) had a blast using all the components of this program! Our primary focus for each of the kids was the Reading Eggs and Mathseeds portions. Micah did play around a bit in the Reading Eggs Junior section to review his letters and sounds but he preferred to be in the Reading Eggs site the most.

{lessons at the gym during homeschool break}

I was truly surprised after McKenzie took the placement test and it revealed her Reading Age to be 5.5 years old! Yes, she has struggled with reading from the beginning but I didn’t think it was that low, age wise, because she tested on her annual end of the year testing at 2.7 Grade Standard. But hey, age is just a number, right!

So we are pressing on and not letting it get either of us discouraged. McKenzie asks to “play” before doing her formal school work and even on the weekends! After completing the assessment, she was started on the 7th learning board on lesson 61. She has quickly progressed through the learning boards and loves collecting eggs. She has learned so much over the last few weeks and she always wants to be on the computer on the Reading Eggs site!

Who knew my newly turned 3-year-old could count to 36 and that he actually knows the individual numbers and letters! I always feel like he doesn’t get “enough” schooling each day with me because I am working with his big sisters. But with the help of Reading Eggs I must be doing something right! Micah’s favorite activity so far is the car driving game on both Reading Eggs and Mathseeds. Like many little boys he loves cars and loved racing around the racetrack.

We had a great time using the Reading Eggs program! All in all, we highly recommend Reading Eggs for anyone looking for a fun and exciting reading or math supplement. We received a 6 month subscription for the purpose of this review and have enjoyed it from the start. I actually will be canceling my subscription to another popular learning program and renewing Reading Eggs for 12 month subscription. My kids have preferred the Reading Eggs program over the other and have learned so much in such a short time period, it just makes sense to stick with what works!

Try it out for yourself with a 4 week FREE trial to the program and see if it is right for your child! But hurry! This offer expires on November 30, 2017. You can’t go wrong with that. And be sure to Check out what my CrewMates think about Reading Eggs by clicking the banner below!