Dr. John's Candies - A Review

I've been trying to reduce the presence of sugar in my life. Which is great for health, but otherwise rather sad. I intensely dislike the taste and aftertaste of artificial sweeteners which eliminates the option of replacing sodas and candies with diet products or products aimed at diabetics. One of the things I mourned most was the loss of my tea because I just can't drink it unsweetened and I dislike it with the usual suspects of artificial sweeteners.

Then I discovered the sugar alcohols xylitol and erythritol. These are natural, low or zero calorie sugar alternatives that are low-glycemic and do not contribute to cavities. Xylitol actually fights cavities. And they taste pretty great with no aftertaste. Now I find I like the flavor of xylitol and erythritol mixed together at about a 1:1 ratio. Some people experience... gastric distress if they consume too much xylitol and so some people I've converted to xylitol and erythritol choose to consume erythritol straight over xylitol. Xylitol's is slightly better for the teeth. They also have slightly different tastes. Experiment and choose for yourself. I have been unable to find them locally and so I've been buying them on Amazon for over a year now. I use them just for sweetening tea and I haven't tried using them as substitutions for baking, so I have no comments on how they work in that capacity, but I don't use sugar at all in tea any more.

I recently discovered Dr. John's Candies. These are xylitol candies. Xylitol has 75% fewer calories than sugar. It also inhibits the growth of cavity causing bacteria in the mouth. It does not raise blood glucose levels. And they taste great. The children are just as delighted to have a Dr. John's lollipop as they are to have a regular one. I adore their hard candies. They taste great. Seriously. I've tried the butterscotch, strawberry cheesecake, mango, natural cafe caramel, and natural double dutch fudge hard candies and I really like them all. Ok. I've also tried a yet to be released cream soda flavor which is my absolute favorite because they happened to include it in the sampler I ordered. When I couldn't find one that looked like it on the website I called their customer service to ask about it and discovered it isn't available yet on their website. I'll be making another order as soon as it appears. My son enjoyed a chocolate caramel from the sampler and claimed to like it even more than the lollipops. I wasn't as impressed with the caramel that I tried, but I'm not a huge fan of caramels in general.

I just wanted to let you guys know that there is a candy out there that you can feel good about giving to your kids that tastes really great, doesn't contain sugar or artificial sweeteners, and is actually good for the teeth. You can also enjoy them guilt free yourself. I find that a couple of Dr. John's hard candies will help curb a sugar craving.

The company also has some chocolates that I would love to try given how good their hard candies are, but the price is just a little too high. You can't get them in a sample size, and at nearly $20 per box, I just can't justify trying something I might not like. If anyone out there has tried their chocolates and wants to let me know what they thought, please leave a comment!

Happiness is...

We put the children to bed, turn off the lights, sing a couple of songs, and sneak out of their rooms. Ava is younger, and is almost always asleep by the time we finish the process and stays that way. Michael, on the other hand, often will pop back up after we leave and play a while. I don't have a huge problem with that. He plays completely independently and puts himself back down when he's done. His room is a disaster in the morning, with legos and playmobil everywhere, but I feel that's a small price to pay for the independence. We look to see if his light is still on when we go to sleep. If it is, we just go in and shut it off.

At about 9:30 one night recently we heard the tell tale thumping of his feet through the living room ceiling (his room is above the living room). So we knew he was up and moving about. It was a little late and he had been up and playing for a hour and a half so my husband went up to settle him. This time, instead of finding him absorbed in legos or playmobile, he found Michael in his bed surrounded by books. He was reading a Mr. Putter and Tabby book to himself. He looked up at my husband and said, "I've been reading THOUSANDS of books!"

He's been reading remarkably well for a five year old just starting kindergarten for quite some time, but he didn't have the "bug" yet. He wasn't quite fluent or confident enough to just pick up a book and read it to himself for pleasure. A couple of weeks ago, when re-organizing his bookshelf I sorted them into two sections. On the left are books for adults to read to children. On the right are books for children to read to adults. All the books on the right are "Michael's books" - books he can read independently.

Seeing that half of the books are ones he can read on his own was powerful for him. Now, each night, he chooses a couple of books for me to read to him and he chooses one from his side of the shelf to read to me. I was pretty pleased at that progress. It was apparently the last little encouragement he needed. Now he's spending his free time reading - for fun. I am so very happy.

All About Reading - Level 2: Curriculum Review

All About Reading: Level 2 - A Homeschooling Parent's Review

Background

I am a certified Elementary and Early Childhood teacher and a certified Speech-Language Pathologist. I am homeschooling my kindergartener and preschooler. My son was always precocious where reading is concerned. He's reading independently at this point and I credit our experiences with All About Reading for much of that.

Even as a toddler, he was always interested in his letters. When we read Chicka Chicka Boom Boom to him as a toddler he was very interested in identifying all the letters at the beginning and end of the book. We fed that interest. He just loved to tune into letters and their sounds. So, a little over a year ago, when I began to think about homeschooling I decided to dip my toe into the water, so to speak, with a reading program. Michael loved letters. I loved reading. It seemed like a great place to start.

After researching many programs and trying the free sample materials for All About Reading Level 1, I decided that I wanted to go with the All About Reading curriculum. I wanted a phonics based program. Research supports a solid understanding of phonics as being essential to reading. I also knew I wanted a program that specifically addressed fluency. The fluency sheets in this program are well designed to practice single words, phrases, and sentences. The readers are exquisite and address phonics skills at the story level and reading comprehension at the same time. The flash cards teach sight words to mastery. The teacher's manual ties together all of these elements in an easy to teach way. I liked the design of the program. I liked it a lot. Also, they have a 100% satisfaction guarantee for a whole year. You have a full year to try the materials. If you are unhappy for any reason, just return the materials for a full refund.

When I received them, the materials were amazing. The program is comprehensive and full-featured. The active online forums were helpful more than once. The customer service was prompt and went above and beyond to be helpful (they sent me out a free replacement CD-ROM that I had lost). After completing Level 1 with Michael I purchased Level 2 for Michael and the Pre-Reading Level for Ava. That is how happy I am with the reading programs by the All About Learning Press.

Program Overview - All About Reading: Level 2

The program is multi-faceted. You get two lovely hardback readers. The black & white line drawing illustrations are beautiful and Michael found the stories to be genuinely entertaining. The words used in each story are matched to highlight the new phonics concepts recently taught and review phonics already mastered. You have a box of index cards that lets you review sight words and phonograms (the sounds that are associated with each letter or letter combination). There are magnetic letter tiles that help you build words and practice blending and breaking words apart. The teacher's manual is well written and easy to follow along with. You are walked through exactly what to do and when. Lessons move along at a pace that introduce new concepts while still reviewing the old ones so that concepts are consistently practiced until mastered. The lessons are accompanied by fluency pages for essential practice and fun games and activities that my children absolutely adore. They even include a progress chart to keep track of lesson progress with stickers and a certificate of achievement for the end of the level.

For the most part, the lessons follow an A B pattern. In the first lesson you teach a new phonics concept, play a game or activity to reinforce using that concept to decode words, and read fluency sheets that feature words that use the new phonics concept. Then you practice flash cards with words that use the concept. Those cards are then intermixed with the other flash cards that are not yet mastered for review at the beginning of the next lesson. In the second lesson of each pair, you begin with a pre-reading worksheet that previews key words and phrases that will be in the story. The lesson plan walks you through some brief pre-reading conversation designed to activate prior knowledge and then the child reads the story from the reader to you. There is some kind of post-reading discussion or activity to be done after the reading of the story. I often begin the second lesson in each pair by having Michael choose one story from the reader that he has already read to re-read before we move on to the new material.

Organizing the Materials and Using the Program

Michael and I are 10 lessons away from finishing All About Reading: Level 2. We have loved going through the program and are anxiously awaiting the release of Level 3. When I received the program materials there was a lot of preparation. I spent at least a couple of hours - maybe more - getting all the materials organized. All of the flashcards are printed on full sheets and have to be torn apart along the perforated lines and then placed behind the appropriate index card dividers in the index box. I took all of the activities and fluency pages out of the student book (again along perforated lines) and 3-hole punched them and put them in a binder. I did the same with the lesson plans. That way I have everything I need in one binder. I keep all of the materials together in a single bin on a nearby bookshelf. When it is time for Michael's reading we simply have to grab the bin and go. (Here's a peek in our bin.)

Once the initial preparation is done, very little planning time is needed after that. At the end of each lesson I let Michael have a few minutes of free time (no more than 5 minutes usually) while I preview the next lesson. I highlight the sections of the lesson plan I need to focus on. I cut out the parts of the activity for the next day. I make a few notes about how the day's lesson went and what I want to remember for next time. That way, everything is absolutely ready to go for the next day.

Time Commitment

Once the initial setup is done, planning does not require more than 5-10 minutes (at most) per lesson. If you're happy to cut a few things out during a lesson rather than before, preparation time is even less. The program is designed to be done with a teacher. It is not the type of curriculum where you can set a child up and then let them work independently while you do something else. You need 30-60 minutes at least 3-5 days a week to devote to this.

Download Free Samples

You can download generously sized free samples of key program components like the teacher's manual, student activity book, and the first and second hardback readers. It isn't quite try before you buy, because the included lessons are not consecutive, but it is enough to get a good feel for how the program works. The teacher's manual includes the table of contents, introduction, and lessons 1, 4, 5, 27, 38. The student activity book samples include some sample games and activities and some sample fluency pages. The sample from the first reader includes 3 entire stories out of the 12 stories in the reader. The sample from the second reader also includes three full stories of the eleven in the reader, including Pumpkin and the Kitten. We just read this one last week. Michael was fascinated by the story and Ava abandoned her independent play to come over and follow along while he read it. When Pumpkin is jealous of the new kitten and verbalizes a plan to get rid of the kitten Michael's voice got very quiet and his sister and I had to strain to hear him. He obviously found the story to be quite powerful. Both children were delighted when Pumpkin learned to give the kitten a chance at the end of the story. The storybook samples are definitely worth checking out!

Which of the products I actually bought.

Absolutely necessary: You definitely need the teacher's manual and one student packet for each student you will be teaching with the program. You'll definitely need the two readers as well.

Very nice to have: I very much enjoy having the reading review box and the index divider cards. You could just as easily buy an inexpensive index card box and make your own divider cards though.

Depends on the child: The letter tiles and magnets for the letter tiles are considered to be a main part of the program. If you have a child who is tactile and learns best with manipulatives you'll want these. I bought them, but rarely use them. Instead I use a small dry erase board and dry erase markers for the sections of the program that are designed for the magnet tiles. I find it quicker and more space efficient and Michael simply doesn't need to move tiles around to get the phonics concepts. In fact, when I do get them out he's distracted and I spend more time keeping him on task.

Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. If you click on one of those links and make a purchase a portion of your purchase will go towards offsetting the costs of running this blog. I purchased all of the products I reviewed in this post on my own, long before I started using affiliate links and the opinions expressed are completely my own.