I’m rereading The Well-Trained Mind.
I am getting back on track and realizing the importance of a classical education. I still love some aspects of other methods and we occasionally incorporate those into our lessons, but I am a classical mama at heart.
Making improvements to our schedule and organization will make our schooling easier and more productive.
Classical English/Language Arts is spelling, grammar, reading, and writing.
Spelling:
I ordered Spelling Workout B for the girls since we don’t have a formal program and I remember that Liz loved it.
I hear great things about All About Spelling too.
And Kate loves her new spelling workbook. I have to distract her from completing the whole thing on her own when I turn away!
Tori cried all the way through the first lesson. I don’t think it’s too challenging for her.
I just think she was overwhelmed by something new – that pointed out she needs more help than Kate does.
I encouraged her to read the directions to me and we did the exercises together.
She admitted that it wasn’t too hard after the ordeal was all over.
And now that we’ve completed vision therapy, she’s much more confident with all aspects of her life and school.
Classical Mama reading material!
Grammar:
We’ve almost completed First Language Lessons 1. My book is an older edition and it has both level 1 and 2 in a single book. Liz completed that in 1 year! I also teach mini-lessons as needed that come up in our writing and other studies. I love grammar and the girls also get lots of grammar education in Spanish and Latin. We also plan to completely go through Logic of English beginning this fall since All About Reading Level 3 isn’t out yet.
Reading:
We read a lot. I mean, seriously, a lot. Kate tries to sneak books upstairs at bedtime and I’ve taken to having to almost strip search her or she’ll stay up reading and won’t go to sleep until 10:30!
Tori reads to Alex every night before bed. It’s the sweetest thing. He’s a great audience for her. Liz sneaks off to read instead of doing chores. Can’t get too angry at her, lol.
Our school reading does follow the history cycles with Story of the World and Tapestry of Grace. We love historical fiction! We also have units each month for the littles.
Narration:
We’re really good at narration. As an English teacher, it comes naturally to me to ask questions about our reading and the kids are more than happy to oblige, even Alex! They give me the greatest details and I love hearing what they each remember. Sometimes it’s not something that I paid special attention to in our reading and it’s fun to hear what they thought was important. I am pleased at their comprehension.
Notebooking:
We love notebooking. Liz has done well transferring her narration to paper. We’re working on the girls. They do better with freedom to write and draw about what they’re learning. They always exceed my expectations.
Penmanship:
We’re also reviewing a fun cursive program – Prescripts. The little girls really love it. Tori loves copywork and I try to make sure she has enough, but not too much. Liz doesn’t care for copywork, but I try to give her some for Bible or history to help with her memorization. Alex is beginning to actually write letters instead of tracing and it’s so exciting!
Writing:
We also reviewed IEW (for Liz). It has completely changed the way I homeschool. It is an amazing program and the methods are cross-curricular and I am so pleased by the improvements! I am even teaching the girls how to write with the info I learned in TWSS. Alex is already narrating to me or his sisters! We incorporated some of the methods, but we don’t formally utilize the writing program.
Organization:
I am organizing notebooks for our “new” school year. And I plan to be more proactive about having the girls put their own papers in their notebooks each week.
Recommended resources in The Well-Trained Mind…
Writing Strands: I really loathed the style of these snarky little books.
Rod&Staff: boring and too textbook-y.
A Beka: not advanced enough and expensive for workbooks and boring little readers.
Handwriting Without Tears never worked for us, but apparently it’s great for most everyone else. Go figure.
We all love D’Nealian.
