My Rating: 5 Stars *****
1. Let’s Get Ready for Kindergarten! (Let’s Get Ready Series) (Let’s Get Ready Series)
2. Let’s Get Ready for First Grade! (Let’s Get Ready Series) (Let’s Get Ready Series)

About The Book:
The pages are high gloss, non-stick and dry erase. That means you can use it again and again. The illustrations are colorful and lively. Each book features a teacher and a classroom of multicultural children known as the Cedar Valley Kids. You can meet them at http://www.cedarvalleypublishing.com. You can also view pages of the books at their webpage. They also have an impressive list of awards attesting to the brilliance of these books. The books cover reading, spelling, math and science.

Here is a quick look at what the books cover.
Let’s Get Ready for Kindergarten:

  • Learning the alphabets
  • Initial sounds
  • Colors
  • Shapes
  • Left & Right, Names of the fingers
  • Counting to 100
  • Skip Counting
  • Money
  • Opposites
  • The Seasons
  • Rhyme
  • Positional Words
  • Body Parts
  • Five Senses
  • High Frequency Words
  • Telling time
  • Learning the Months and Days
  • Learning to write their name, address and telephone number

Let’s Get Ready For First Grade:

  • Vowels and Consonants
  • Long and Short Vowel Sounds
  • Word Families
  • Prefixes and Suffixes
  • Contractions and Compound Words
  • Capitalization and Punctuation
  • Plural
  • How to Measure
  • Geometric Shapes
  • Even and Odd Numbers
  • Skip counting and Ordinals
  • Addition and Subtraction
  • Fractions
  • Graph
  • Food Groups
  • Internal Organs
  • Counting Money
  • Day and Night
  • Solar System
  • High Frequency Words
  • Reading Comprehension
  • Telling Time and Making a Calendar
  • Primary and Secondary Colors
  • The US Government

My Review:
What can I say? I’m totally impressed by these two books. As a mother who does home-preschooling, I sometimes ask myself the question “what else do I need to teach?” Then there is also the fear that I’ve forgotten or missed out a skill. Now with these two books, I can check myself. The books cover all the basics needed for each level. You could say that it provides a ’syllabus’ for me to follow.

Each lesson is only a page long. There are questions and tips at the bottom of the page to help parents make the lessons interactive and interesting. So learning is made simple and fun.

This book makes learning flexible. If you don’t have much time or have a little waiting time, you can whip out this book and have a quick, short lessons. If you want to have a proper lesson, this book serves as a good opening exercise. Sort of like an appetizer before the main meal. Use your own imagination on how you can expand on the lesson.

The last page of the books highlight tips for parents and caregivers. The author shares some really good advise.

I highly recommend this book. Not only for it’s educational value, but also because it encourages parents to play a more active role in teaching their children. Whether children are homeschooled or attending regular school, parents are still their no.1 teacher. These books will help you inject some fun into learning. Happy Teaching!