There are thousand of resources out there in teaching phonics to our early readers and it can be quite overwhelming seeing all these materials.

I am sharing a few resources that we used to teach Marya. It might or might not work for your child. You might need to go through a trial and error process in finding the suitable one. But whatever materials you choose, consistency is the key!

Make lots of Dua’ that Allah ease your child’s learning journey and that he/she enjoys every step of it inshaAllah.

1) This reading mama (www.thisreadingmama.com)

Becky Spence from This reading mama is a blogger,author and speaker who is very passionate of literacy and she homeschools her children. Most of Marya’s worksheets and printables were from her blog. Our favourite printable is definitely the word family books for short vowels.

These books are simple and fun to read with a very predictable structure. There are also sight words featured in every book.

I usually read with Marya for the first time. She will then try to sound out the words and read after a few reading aloud sessions together. Marya enjoys reading these books because they are easy and the best part is she can colour in the drawings. If you are not comfortable with images, simply do as we always do, cover the faces with dot stickers.

(Our copies are not so neat anymore because the kids always try to get their hand on the books and Adik enjoyed scribbling on the book behind my back

2) Progressive phonics (www.progressivephonics.com)

I love this program because it offers free printables! It is like a one stop reading program that is easy and fun

The phonics reading program is divided into 3 levels, beginner, intermediate and advanced levels.

We are in the beginner level, and this level has 5 phonics books!(each book is at least 60 pages).

Beginner level touches on the short vowels families. Most of the stories are funny with illustrations and easy to read.

We printed all 5 phonics books and bind it all in 3 huge ring-file binder.

If you do not wish to print, simply download it to your devices/tabs and you have a massive e-books collection for your kid.

3) Islam based phonics curriculum from an instagram account (unqualified teacher)

An amazing work by sister Amina from unqualified teacher. There are 10 learning packs in this curriculum which have the Al-Quran and Sunnah as reference.

Personally, I don’t use this with Marya because she has passed most of the lessons (except maybe the reading cards). Most of the hands on activities are used with Maryam, like the puzzles and alphabets flashcards. We are working on it slowly but there are no personal photos of Maryam using these resources because Maryam is the kind who would run away whenever I bring out the hp’s camera so, go to unqualified teacher to browse through her amazing resouces!

4) The helpful garden (www.thehelpfulgarden.com)

If you are following the montessori method, thehelpfulgarden is definitely a keepsake! A major resourceful blog which offers free printables for phonics reading using the montessori method.

I printed the blue reading series for Marya and we are halfway through it. There are word booklets, word strips, picture to sentence matching cards and many more.

She also documented on her blog on how to teach using her resources.

So yes, her blog is definitely worth subscribed to!

So that is about it, some resources that we used for now. Do you have any other resources worth sharing? Feel free to comment on this post! I would love to hear from you!