Where to Read Children Books Online (in English)

I have started teaching my little girl English when she was 1 year old (we're Romanian, living in Ro). I have started slowly, talking for a few minutes, introducing vocabulary, listening to children nursery rhymes in English each day. And then, over the next months, I gradually increased the daily 'dose' of English, with the target to be able to use only English during our morning together (until lunchtime). And then, around 2 years old and a half, she began to enjoy longer reading sessions together before sleeping time, so I've decided to read to her exclusively in English.
 I didn't have access to buy enough books, so I've searched over the internet to see if I can find free books online, either simple, or read-out. From what I've found, here's what I liked best and used a lot with my daughter:

• Our favorite, by far, is We Give Books. You will find so many nice books to read online, for free!

• Free children books on Amazon.com. More details, in this blog post.

• Reading is Fundamental has read-aloud books, games and music. There are resources in English and Spanish, too!

• My daughter loved the short animated stories and games from Online Stories.

• We also loved the stores read by their authors at Barnes&Noble - Online Storytime

• Lots of animated stories and other English-learning resources on British Council - LearnEnglishKids - Stories. Our favorite: Goldilocks.

[Romanian version]
Cu engleza am inceput cu I. cand ea avea 1 an. Am inceput incet, vorbindu-i cate un pic in engleza, ascultand muzica in engleza, etc. Apoi, in urmatoarele luni am crescut 'doza' de engleza zilnica, tinta fiind ca in final diminetile noastre petrecute impreuna sa se intample in limba engleza. De pe la doi ani si jumatate, de cand a inceput sa stea mai mult timp sa asculte povesti, i-am citit numai in engleza.

Mi-a fost mereu teama ca nu va avea un vocabular suficient de mare in engleza, si stii ca prin citit de dezvolta atat de mult vocabularul, am cautat mereu carti noi, diverse, prin care sa i se largeasca vocabularul.
Nu am avut foarte multe resurse (carti, materiale, etc) si nici nu stiam pe atunci ca se pot comanda online, direct de la edituri din strainatate, etc. Si atunci am cautat si pe internet daca se gasesc carti de citit, gratuite. I-a placut mult sa citeasca, si a invatat enorm de multa engleza prin lectura.

• Site-ul meu preferat unde se pot citi carti online este, de departe, We Give Books. Am scris mai multe desre ei in acest blog post. Frunzariti un pic site-ul, sunt multe carti. Trebuie sa va inregistrati, dar e gratuit!

• Carti pentru copii, care se pot descarca de data asta, gasiti pe Amazon.com. Am scris in acest blog post mai multe detalii despre cum se poate face asta.

• Pe site-ul Reading is Fundamental gasiti povesti citite online, sunt forma de scurte filmulete, pentru prescolari, cat si pentru cei mai mici. Site-ul este disponibil atat in engleza cat si in spaniola, si contine si cantecele si joculete simple, folositoare pentru language learning.

• Noi am folosit mult si cu succes povestioarele scurte animate si jocurile de pe Online Stories.

•  Ne-au placut mult povestile online de la Barnes&Noble - Online Storytime - sunt carti citite de catre autorii lor, carti noi, carti de succes.

• Povesti online si mult alte resurse pe site-ul British Council - LearnEnglishKids - Stories. Preferata noastra, Goldilocks.

Voi ati mai gasit si alte locuri unde puteti citi / sau sunt citite online carti in limba engleza pentru copii?

Reading, Languages & Music - About Readeez and more (School Wrap-Up)

I. is now 4 yrs and almost 5 weeks old.
I. are acum 4 ani si 5 saptamani.

Our schedule was thrown off this week, so we took it lightly, as school was concerned. We read a lot, both in English and French - apparently, we took the habit of reading in French before naptime and then in English in the evening.

And we listened to a lot of music. We always listen to music. We have used children songs with great effect to learn both English and French. Music is fun and through repetition, children acquire foreign languages easy through music and movement.
And since my little girl loves music, so another recent habit of ours is to listen to French children music while having breakfast. For Spanish, we continued with Speekee - lots of music and songs there, too!

I showed my little girl the Readeez videos for the first time this week. I have seen them on the 1+1+1=1 blog first, and then when our friend Andrea from Our Beautiful Childhood had only great things to share about the videos, I've decided it was time we tried them, too, the free ones. This is their official Youtube channel and this is the website. Please read Andrea's post for a detailed description of the program and what stands behind it. We both loved the videos, I selected a few of free ones and put them on a list for us to use.
What makes these videos different is that the text of the songs appears onscreen as it's being sung, split into syllables, which I think it's a great option to the traditional flashcards system, meant to help teach children read.
I also see these videos very good to help teach children English as a second language in a fun way.
My daughter's favorites are The Duck Song:

and the All The Pretty Little Horses!

Some great collections I may be linking to:

Reading & Foreign Languages (School Wrap-up, Week 6)

I. is now 4 yrs and 1 month old.
I. are acum 4 ani si 1 luna.

Here's a glipmse at our week, in pictures:
Iata o parte din activitatile din aceasta saptamana:

Fall & Halloween Theme
We continued the fall & halloween activities from last week. I gathered all the activities into a busy bag so we could have it handy. (Printables from Homeschool Creations, 2 Teaching Mommies and Creative Learning Fun)

iPad Halloween Play
Little girl loved the Pocket Charts! Halloween Matching Game app from the Good Neighbor Press. that went free last week

Also played with the First Words Halloween app from Learning Touch.

Reading - Phonics and the 'AT' Word Family
We continued to use the Pink Series for free from the Helpful Garden blog and our moveable alphabet. 

Matching words to images

Making words with the moveable alphabet

We use our iPad for school almost daily. We used the Pocket Charts: Spelling 3-Letter Words from Good Neighbor Press for the first time this week and little girl could complete it by herself with minimal help from me (she needs help on the words: eye, ape, etc.). You need to add the last letter to the words.

We started learning about the 'AT' word family using cards, worksheets, the iPad, and the Starfall website. I printed some worksheets and cards from the 'at' word family pack from 3Dinosaurs, they are just what we needed! I also used some Bob books printables from the Homeschool Den.

Worksheet from 3Dinosaurs

We played the AbiTalk Phonics Vowels app on the iPad, insisting more on the 'at' words family section.

French Learning
Little girl chose French a lot over this week - she requested a lot of French music (during breakfast or dinner), we read lots of books and spoke a lot in French.
Here's a recording of her from a couple nights ago, when she chose to 'read' two books to me, 'Le vilain petit canard' and 'Poucette' - if you have the patience to listed through the first story, the second part is really nice, I like it a lot the way she told the story of Poucette. (You cannot see too much, it was darker in the room, sorry about that!)

Spanish Learning  
Little girl is still in love with the Spanish language, so she watched a few lessons from Speekee this week and some other cartoons on youtube. She loved to practice saying out loud the words she knows - here she is in the video below - we were flipping through an easy picture book in English and I asked her if she knows the words in Spanish, too:

Some great collections I may be linking to:

Weekly School Wrap-up (Week 5)

I. is now 4 yrs and almost 1 month old.
I. are acum 4 ani si 1 luna.

Our week, in pictures:
Iata o parte din activitatile din aceasta saptamana:

Autumn Theme (from Homeschool Creations, 2 Teaching Mommies and Creative Learning Fun)
Our theme for the week: Autumn with a touch of Halloween. We'll probably continue this theme over the next week, too. Here are some pictures: 

Placing a coin on the words that begin with 'P'

Counting and clipping

Counting and arranging bears by size

More counting!

And counting again!

Autumn themed books that we read this week: 

Reading - Phonics and Sight Words
We started successfully using the Pink Series that we purchased from the Montessori Print Shop. You can download a free document that is part of the series. And, if you're looking for something free, the Helpful Garden blog has an excellent Pink Series for free! We have used some of their printables, too. 

I've made more mini-books for her to read (details in this post) and also used the books we have to practice reading on. I pulled out the baby books that have only images and big words next to it and I would cover the image and let her sound out the word - then show her the image to check. She liked that - later she would cover the image herself and read the word.

As more reading practice - before naptime and bedtime, when I read to her - I stop at a word I know she would be able to decode and let her read it. I chose a few easy readers among other bed time books, so she can easily decode a word here and there. (We have the Barbie books from our friend Raluca, thank you so much for them, little girl loves them!)

I've also introduced sight words this week. I've taught her some sight words about 6 months ago, but since she wasn't yet able to read with phonics by herself at that time, I postponed it for a later time. Now, I've decided it's a good moment to reintroduce them.
In the box: 'You can read' printables from 1+1+1=1, our set of flashcards, easy readers.

And we played sort of a lotto game:

French Learning
We were so happy when we found the We're Going on a Bear Hunt book in French at the French Cultural Center's Library!! The other books are ours, I purchased them at the used books fair at the Cultural Center.

The green ones - such as Poucette - are from Eli Publishing, you can buy them from here- they are excellent for language learning - they have little text and also a few pages with words only, such as below. The books are available in several languages: English, French, Spanish etc. I highly recommend them! They also have a CD included with the story read-aloud.

Spanish Learning
We took a break from Spanish for the last couple of weeks, but a few days ago my daughter started to ask for Spanish again, so we listened to songs and watched a couple videos from our  Spanish Learning page.
Here's a short video of my little girl - she has lots of fun learning Spanish - I'm not pushing her by any means, it's her fourth language - she's the one asking to learn more!

The good news is that we were given access to a month of Speekee for review and we are very happy with it, so far. Lots of music, repetition and just lots of fun!

Fine Motor Activities

We tried mixing colors in a non-messy way this week and loved it.
And she made a bracelet - beads on a pipecleaner - she usually doesn't have the patience to complete it all, but this time she did!

 

Linking to:

Mixing Colors (no mess)

This is an activity I've been waiting for a long time to do it - until I've finally bought the needed ziploc bags (envelopes). I've put fingerpaint inside, zipped it and then taped it to the table. It was a success!

Am vazut pe mai multe bloguri o idee pe care am reusit sa o punem in aplicare doar recent, cand am gasit cele necesare - si anume plicuri mari, transparent cu fermoar (in Auchan).
Am pus inauntru vopsea pentru pictat cu degetele (fingerpaint) si am inchis punga. E o idee buna sa lipiti plicul de masa cu scotch pentru a sta fix in timpul activitatii.

The main point was to learn about color mixing in a non-messy way

Mixing colors, applying pressure - practicing fine motor skills!

Mom, we need more paint!

Drawing lines, circles etc.

Drawing a monster with the pencil eraser!

Since everything turned blue in the end, and looked like an ocean, I gave her a boat-shaped suction mat and marbes to place on it.

Totul a devenit albastru, asa ca un ocean, asa ca am terminat activitatea cu asezarea unor bilute pe o barcuta (e suport pentru baie, luat recent din Kaufland).

All is blue (ocean-like, right?), so I gave her a boat suction mat and marbles