The Complete Writer--Susan Wise Bauer

Today was the first day of the online Schoolhouse Expo.  It has been a blessing already.  I didn't listen to all of them today, but my payment gives me MP3 copies off all the meetings.

The first meeting was The Complete Writer by Susan Wise Bauer.  If you'd like your own copy of the notes, she has them available on the website at Teaching K-12 Writing.

I'm just going to share a few of the things that made an impression on me. 

Writing is not a subject; it's a tool, but it needs a subject on which to use it.

There is actually two steps in the writing process: taking inarticulate ideas and putting them into words AND taking an idea in words and putting it on paper.

We assume that children can do this automatically because we've learned to this, but they are two separate things that need to be taught.

Three Elements two work on in elementary: Grammar, Spelling, Writing.

There are two aspects of writing at the elementary level:
1.  Copywork: Putting Words on Paper
Initially copy and eventually create a visual memory by dictation.
2.  Narration across the curriculum: Putting Ideas into Words
Initially narrate to parent, then narrate to parent and take dictation, teaches student to identify central elements, initially guided narration and then move away from guided narration.

Of course, elementary was my main focus, but I'll share a few things from middle and high.

Middle: additional goals in grammar is expertise in diagramming and outlining

A purpose of diagramming is to develop a way of checking sentences to see if they are good. 

My Review of First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind

First Language Lessons was written by Jessie Wise of Well-Trained Mind fame.  It comes from the classical education mindset which is demonstrated in memorization, narration, and grammar.  Go figure!

The Old Schoolhouse offers high praise for First Language Lessons while I've read some individuals say who feel that it's too slow and boring.  I'll just tell you what I think.

First as a mother of a 5 year old, first-grader, this book is perfect.  The lessons are short and offer a lot of review.  Each lesson is fully scripted which could be a benefit for those that might be a little afraid of teaching grammar. The lessons cover nouns, pronouns, verbs, sentences, poems, and more and offers copy work ideas as well.  I appreciate how it demostrates that "classical" education doesn't need to be difficult nor tedious.

Personally, I rarely use anything as is and this was no exception, but to me, flexibility is one of the best things about homeschooling.  I would often add more copywork than mentioned in the book.  I also would occasionally do additional activities to support learning, as well.  On the other hand, if I didn't think my dd another day discussing proper nouns, then I would skip that lesson.

Second, as a person who has taught "average age" first graders, as well, I have a slightly mixed opinion.  If the only thing I was using was First Language Lessons, then I would say there might be concerns.  The lessons as they stand would be enough to learn the "grammar", but I think being sensitive to the student would be required as well.  Again, supplement or cut as needed.  The lessons were not made to be exciting, but they are so short, they shouldn't be excessively boring either.  The main thing I would definitely increase would be recommended  copywork.

So, there you have it.  I have enjoyed using this book and will definitely plan to use it for second grade.  I haven't looked at the subsequent books, so I won't really comment on them.

Good bye to sugar cubes

See the message below for the details!

If you see any sugar cubes, grab them. I think they have headed the way of the dinosaur. Didn't find any in several stores. Oh, well. Oh, and my scanner isn't working right now, so you get photos.

Here are a few things that are thanks, in part, to classical education and The Well-Trained Mind. The book recommended (although I'm sure it's not original to them) to take photos of the projects you do. A photo/paper is much easier to save than a 3D project. That's why I didn't mind using blocks to make the pyramid since I knew I was going to take photo anyway.

Classical education encourages journaling of what is learned. So, under the picture of Micki and the pyramid is Micki's narration of what she learned about pyramids in history. Eventually she'll do all the writing.

Another classical education is copywork instead of just penmanship skill books. Once they gain penmanship skills, you use copywork to use those skills in away that also exposes them to literature, science, history, etc. Our example today is Micki's list of the four oceans (although, technically, they've added a 5th). She also cut out the map to add to it. She really does enjoy practicing her penmanship skills in real, practical ways when she doesn't even realize that's what she's working on!

My start at blogging about homeschool

With all the wonderful homeschool blogsites available, I choose instead to do mine on Blogger. Since I have other blogs on this site, I just assumed that it would be easier. Also, I feel "unworthy" to really blog about homeschool since I'm not an expert schooling 7 children at once while developing my own curriculum and working on my own website and speaking at homeschool conventions.

So, I blog here. I plan to share some of my good ideas and finds, some awesome articles I occasionally come across, and Micki stories, of course.

Micki is currently 4 1/2...well, more like 4 3/4. She will be doing 1st grade work this year. Having a 4 3/4 year old doing 1st grade work has it's challenges since she's socially & emotionally at one level and academically at another. Thankfully, in the state of Missouri, you are not required to keep track of hours until the child is 7, so this will free me up to accomplish things in bite-size pieces for her and still get a 1st grade quality education.

We are going to teach Micki using the Classical model of education. The Well-Trained Mind is our inspiration and basic guideline, but if you know me, you know that I'm more than willing to adapt, edit, enrich, etc. to anything I teach.

Micki currently has or will have this extra-curricular activities: Classical Conversations, piano, ballet, and gymnastics. Classical Conversations and piano are the only two activities that I'm going to need to work around, but I think it will work.