Review Detail

LEARN BY STICKER: BEGINNING PHONICS is a clever workbook that encourages early reading skills. The book includes 10 monster images that can be created by filling in shapes with stickers. The stickers are labeled by the way that children fill in the blanks of words, beginning with simple 3-letter words (accompanied by drawings of the item) and moving on to slightly more complex ones from short vowels to blending sounds.

What I loved: This was an absolute delight to do along with my almost-kindergartener. Children can really get into creating these adorable monster pictures and exploring words and sounds. The stickers are labeled with the whole word created by filling in the blanks, which allows for some help as they recognize sounds and letters, even if they are not independently reading yet. For instance, a blank on a page might be something like "__ __ ide" with an image of a slide. The sticker for that shape is then labeled with the word "slide." This also helps with allowing children to do word and letter recognition as they can find the letters they know on the sticker page, and it makes it work for even young children (5+ is recommend, and this seems accurate). That being said, elementary school aged children who enjoy learning and puzzles can also get into this!

The back of each sticker creation also includes word games to extend the fun, such as word scrambles, riddles, and rhyming games (with answer keys at the bottom of the pages). This makes for plenty of educational activities that children can really play around with. The book is fully in color, which has a lot of appeal for little ones, and definitely feels more like fun than the traditional workbook.

The sticker paintings themselves are also really fantastic! They make for a mess-free, on-the-go activity. The pages are perforated so that the sticker sheets can be torn out of the back of the book for ease of working with the design. The designs are also perforated and can easily be removed from the book for display.

Final verdict: LEARN BY STICKER: BEGINNING PHONICS is an absolutely delightful way to extend learning at home to build reading skills and make fantastic art! Highly recommend picking this up for elementary school aged children who love being creative, puzzles, and learning.