Reading words of the week 1

Already more than two years ago I got it into my head that I could start teaching J to read. That was a mistake, as I write about in my article. But now he is quite ready and willing. He has long since learned all his letters (upper-case very well, lower-case less so) and is just beginning to sound words out of his own accord.

I'm going to begin by adopting a very simple but elegant and low-stress technique suggested by a colleague of mine and fellow German-kiddie-playgroup dad, Jeremy Reynolds. Every morning at breakfast he gives his children a piece of paper with a German word on it, and they try to sound it out. 

I'm going to modify this slightly. If the word is a noun, then in the morning I'm going to write the singular form, and in the evening add the plural form (articles included). If it's a verb, then the infinitive comes in the morning, the past participle in the evening. Also, after J sounds the word out, he will write it down on the card, and I will leave a blank card after each word in anticipation of a later stage when he will practice writing the word after having seen it but while not currently looking right at it. 

I got a index card notebook for the purpose, 

5 X 8 so there's enough room for singular and plural forms of longer words and space for J to write them. 

The first word of the day is der Hund. Here's the morning exercise:

J was able to sound it out independently, but probably partly or mostly because he knew since last night what the word was going to be. I think I'll do this for awhile, then stop telling him ahead of time. 

Here's the evening excercise:

(At this point he was about to drop, exhausted from a birthday party in an indoor jungle room!) 

I'll do these entries by week. As for the choice of words, I'm just going to start simple and follow my nose, keeping some letters and letter combinations constant while changing others.

1.1 der Hund, die Hunde
1.2 die Hand, die Hände
1.3 der Mund, die Münder
1.4 das Band, die Bänder
1.5 das Land, die Länder
1.6 der Sand, die Sande
1.7 die Wand, die Wände