Product Review: Practice Time ABCs DVD

In Practice Time ABCs, host Rachel Coleman teaches you the alphabet in American Sign Language and quizzes you on what you've learned. Using clear, simple instruction, Rachel demonstrates each sign, and then sums up all of the letters in the Alphabet Song, so you can sing and sign along!

Once you’ve mastered the alphabet, Rachel leads you through a series of interactive fingerspelling exercises. Rachel fingerspells dozens of words and you get to practice “reading” what she’s signing. This exercise is an excellent way to reinforce early reading skills with young readers!

Next, Rachel will ask you to fingerspell the words you see on the screen. She then shows you the correct answer so you’ll know if you got it right! This exercise builds your signing confidence as you practice the essential skill of fingerspelling. Each practice segment is randomized so that each time you view the DVD it will be different from the last!

Practice Time can be used as a companion to the Signing Time videos or on their own. Created for all ages. Available only on DVD. Close-Captioned. Approximate run time: 30 minutes, plus special features. Practice Time ABCs features the Alphabet Song.

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We ordered this DVD for our 4 year old during the last $10 DVD sale. Addie has been signing since she was 18 months old and has a large sight word vocabulary from watching Signing Time DVDs, where a child is shown a picture, the sign, and the written word. She started reading independently a few months ago, but we are still focusing on individual letters and their sounds for Kindergarten next year.

We've watched it several times and we both really enjoy it. It's fun like all the other Signing Time DVDs, but also slightly more advanced. I love that Rachel signs as she talks--I'm learning new signs just by watching with Addie! The best feature for us is that the practice segments are random--Addie tends to memorize things watching them a couple of times, so this will help me accurately determine whether she knows a sign/letter being shown. It's definitely going to compliment the Signing Time ABCs DVD that her grandparents bought her for her birthday!