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Writing program for dyslexic students...? Among other things...


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Susan Barton recommends IEW after level 4 as a writing program that works well with dyslexic students.  And that is what I will probably use.  But I hear that the Classical Academy Press Writing and Rhetoric program allows for more creativity and some parents seem to really love it.  DD and DS do better with narrative and DD is writing a short story already.  I am trying to find a program that gives systematic instruction and review that won't kill their creative abilities and love of narrative.  Has anyone tried both?  Or either?  Specifically with dyslexic students but even if not dyslexic then with a child that has delayed reading/writing skills...?

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I use IEW to teach co-op classes, and several of my students have had dyslexia. It's great for them--but it requires a lot of time and effort. They usually thrive with the structure, but they (and their parents) have to learn to accept the fact that IEW takes a lot of thinking time. When students first begin, I warn parents that they need to allow an hour per paragraph.

 

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I kind of figured it would be pretty intense to implement.  Although I didn't realize it might be THAT intense. So if I am just using it with two kids, but kids of very different personalities, would it be better to teach them separately or do you think I could implement it with both at the same time?

 

The below is just brainstorming really, but if anyone has a comment/observation, etc.  please feel free to chime in.

 

I've been looking at adding an on-line history course for each of the kids, maybe through Veritas Press Self-Paced (haven't seen the content yet, though) so that they each have something additional they can do independently since so much of what we do is teacher intense.  They are at the age now where they really don't want to be dependent on Mom for all of their instruction.  Are these history courses pretty independent?

 

Trying to figure out what to do about a literature study that wouldn't interfere with the IEW writing instruction (or CAP or whatever we end up going with) or could be gently paired with it.  DS and DD need exposure to more literature but I don't know if we should do more formalized studies or just let them read and give me some verbal discussion.  DS prefers questions and answers that he can get a grade on, though.  He even has me write grades on his dry erase board work and take a picture.  And he has specifically requested a literature study.  But he has dysgraphia and does not like the physical act of writing or the mental act of organizing his thoughts into a coherent form.  He is stream of consciousness all the way.  :)  Hopefully, systematic, formal instruction in writing will help.  But until that time I am uncertain about a literature study....

 

Thanks for the response, by the way, Momofeat.

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We've only used thematic IEW units.  I decided to prioritize our writing goals through high school graduation.  My kiddo is a work in progress.  Coherent, organized paragraphs are my first goals followed up by the five paragraph essay and close reading/literary analysis writing through essay.  My child needs guided practice through the writing process and a system to help order his thoughts.  

 

For 8th grade lit, we went through the Teaching the Classics dvds, which teaches story analysis of content, structure, and style using short stories and Socratic questioning.  Once TC was completed, DS reads literature books and writes story charts.  DS also writes summaries for history and outlines/note takes for science.  Our number one priority at the moment is IEW.  I should mention that DS studies grammar and classical roots vocab. 

 

 

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We've only used thematic IEW units.  I decided to prioritize our writing goals through high school graduation.  My kiddo is a work in progress.  Coherent, organized paragraphs are my first goals followed up by the five paragraph essay and close reading/literary analysis writing through essay.  My child needs guided practice through the writing process and a system to help order his thoughts.  

 

For 8th grade lit, we went through the Teaching the Classics dvds, which teaches story analysis of content, structure, and style using short stories and Socratic questioning.  Once TC was completed, DS reads literature books and writes story charts.  DS also writes summaries for history and outlines/note takes for science.  Our number one priority at the moment is IEW.  I should mention that DS studies grammar and classical roots vocab. 

This is very interesting to me.  Thanks so much for the response.  

 

i have not seen the Teaching the Classics DVDs.  I will look into those.  How is your ds studying grammar?  Classical root vocab will be covered in Barton but not for a few levels.  DD will be closer to 9th grade by the time we get there.  DS will possibly be in 6th...  I do wonder if I should be doing more with grammar right now.  As I understand it, grammar is covered in the main IEW program if you incorporate the Fix It part?  Are you using that?

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I use IEW to teach co-op classes, and several of my students have had dyslexia. It's great for them--but it requires a lot of time and effort. They usually thrive with the structure, but they (and their parents) have to learn to accept the fact that IEW takes a lot of thinking time. When students first begin, I warn parents that they need to allow an hour per paragraph.

 

 

This has been our exact experience. It takes ds A LOT of time and has been so very teacher intensive, I am tempted to let him work through Diana Hanbury King's workbooks on his own.  :tongue_smilie:

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This is very interesting to me.  Thanks so much for the response.  

 

i have not seen the Teaching the Classics DVDs.  I will look into those.  How is your ds studying grammar?  Classical root vocab will be covered in Barton but not for a few levels.  DD will be closer to 9th grade by the time we get there.  DS will possibly be in 6th...  I do wonder if I should be doing more with grammar right now.  As I understand it, grammar is covered in the main IEW program if you incorporate the Fix It part?  Are you using that?

I have never seen Fix It grammar. We use Winston Advanced and EG Ultimate Grade 8 two to three days per week.  Grammar is relatively painless, and DS enjoys it.

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DS9 began Barton Level one Nov 2013. He began IEW at age 7. The bottom of this long winded reply shows how we inched into doing IEW assignment with dress-ups. He's still not doing many of the dress-ups required for each IEW-A assignment, just whatever it takes to keep him happy and practicing new skills.

 

I've been homeschooling for 15 years. I begin each summer with grandiose dreams for homeschool planning/research. I do my planning/research in the camper, at sports practices, at the park - it usually adds up to 5-10 hours of week, spread out into 30 minute sessions

 

I have so many ideas for Summer 2014:

-Dragon Speak (they have a $30 tutorial for the bells and whistles part of Dragon)

-IEW Teaching the Classics DVDs (I ordered it for me to watch this summer and kids to use 12 months from now)

-One Note or Evernote

-MathPad Plus (figure out what it is and how it works)

-Dynamo Math

-Hands On Equations (I know nothing, maybe that will be an hours work?)

-Ronit Bird

-Chalk Dust (should be a breeze for non-LD kid and just quick organization for me)

-BJU Distance Learning 6th Grade Science DVD Option (should be quick organization for me, increased work load for non-LD kid)

-TOG Year 2 (my second year using it so it won't take nearly as much time as last year)

-enter all subjects into Homeschool Tracker Online (probably 20 hours thanks to my not asking kiddos to do own TOG lesson plans)

-watch Barton Level 4 DVDs over and over until I am comfortable with it (I hear it's a tough level for mom to master)

-check out EnableMart (assistive technology for LD kiddo)

 

Summer 2013: TOG (first year we used it)

-I went into TOG knowing we'd do 10% of what's offered, and that strategy has worked well

-2013/2014 ruptured appendix, and tons of family sickness made me glad the prep was done

-watched all the optional "how to videos"

-read everything in the loom

-filled each kiddo's tote with 36 weeks of organized assignments

-bought/organized the Bookshelf Central books

-learned how to use TOG on the iPad so I can read teacher's notes "on the go"

-read ahead a month's worth of teacher's notes (wasn't necessary but I found it fascinating)

 

Sumer 2013: Homeschool Tracker Online

-I'd never used lesson plans but combining TOG and IEW with a LD kiddo used up MY working memory

-I'm not technologically minded so it took me 50 hours to learn and input all subjects for an entire school year

-TOG took the majority of that time, but now the lessons plans are saved and reusable in the coming years

 

Summer 2012: Singapore Math

-Friends warned me it would be difficult to switch for 3rd and 4th grade and boy were they right

-I read the optional "how to do word problem" books that Singapore Math sells

-I read the 1st through 4th grade HIG books

-I'm glad I did it, but it's embarrassing how H-A-R-D it was for me even after homeschooling one child through Trig (poor child!)

 

Summer 2011: IEW

-I watched all the TWSS DVDs

 

-I watched all the SICC-A DVDs (kids asked me to play them while they played board games in the camper)

 

-Each week I added the SICC-A's new info to the kids IEW "Cheats, Charts and Checklist" binder This is just a binder I made to accommodate LD kid. Now non-LD son and I totally rely on this binder to do anything in IEW :)

 

-We spent the next year doing only KWO and a single rough draft per unit, without ANY required dress-ups

 

-Kiddos had fun watching DVD and learning dress-ups

 

-It took entire school year for LD kiddo to learn to stick to the KWO and not rabbit trail into a 500 paragraph story

 

-Once a day "testing KWO" which means looking at your outline to give a "speech" to family (kids loved this)

 

-I never told kids they were supposed to write an assignment for every one of those KWOs! Instead we saved that for later years

 

-We did maybe 10 rough drafts that year, we call them "vomit sessions", no pressure, just get thoughts onto paper in organized manner

 

-We spent more time discussing source text than we did creating KWOs, testing KWOs or "vomiting" a rough draft (great memories)

 

-LD son was 7 and now that he's 9 I'm still scribing for his KWO and vomit/rough drafts, but he LOVES IEW

 

-LD son does maybe 10% of assignment dress-ups, and non-LD-DS11 now does all of them and is moving to level B next year

 

-We are 3 semester into non-LD kid doing the level online IEW-A classes, LD watches and absorbs a lot

 

-Non-LD sons Online IEW classes use Fix-it, LD kid does one sentence a week, finding 10% of what is assigned I write on dry erase board. But he now knows more grammar than gifted sister did at his age.

 

Sorry for the "vomit" post, I've got a headache and am just getting thoughts out of my head and onto "paper". :)

Wow, Timberly, I am impressed.  Not sure I would have been as clear trying to cover all of that in a post while dealing with a headache.  Thanks!

 

I worry about DD13 the most.  She will be in 8th grade this next year.  She is only now really reading at grade level but only for pleasure reading.  She is still not able to really do fact based or text book type material with any fluency.  We are just at Level 4 Lesson 6 of Barton, though.  We have a long way to go in Barton, in math, in science, and certainly in writing, too.  And yet High School is just around the corner.  If everything goes well, I anticipate she will be done with Barton by mid-9th grade if we work through this summer and next summer.  And it should give her good prep for High School level material.  But IEW will obviously take a lot of time and prep, just like Barton.  And she needs a LOT of scaffolding still with math.  She wants to go back to TT after Dynamo math but I know she will need a lot of additional review, different approaches, etc.  She has improved a great deal but I think math will always be something of an issue.  I guess something structured like IEW, and teacher intense, is really the only way to really help her improve her writing, though.  I don't think it will miraculously come to her through osmosis (although if a magic fairy offered this option ...:)    It.just kind of makes me weary thinking about next year.  If she were younger it wouldn't be such an issue.  But she really, really wants to graduate on time.  Oh, well.  I guess I will buy IEW now, watch the DVDs over the summer, and plan to start in September.  

 

So in rereading everything, would you recommend just the main IEW program to start?  Or the Teaching the Classics DVDs?  Or try doing both?  And would the kids work together?  Or do I need to keep instruction separate, as with Barton? 

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Teaching the Classics is not a writing program and involves close reading.  It teaches the student and parent to analyze literary works using short stories and incorporating Socratic questions.  Onestep, your DD may not be ready for TC.  Most of the local moms with dyslexic kiddos that I know use SMARR for lit study.  I think SMARR lit covers vocabulary and comprehension questions, which may be entirely appropriate for your DD at this time.  You could also explore Lightening Lit and back up a couple of grade levels.  Many dyslexic students start formal writing in high school and move on to college.  

 

When DS was 5th/6th grade, lit study centered around hands-on projects, character webs, poster type projects, and three sentence narrations describing every two to three chapters of his book..  I also used comprehension guides. ( ETA:  You could use comp guides with your DD too.)  For writing, we used a booklet put out by Scholastic title Paragraph Made Easy.   

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We are having incredible success with Lego Education Build to Express for literary analysis. That might work better for your ds. I don't know how much writing you are looking to have him do, but it would be easy to extend the activities into written narrations or reports after the discussion. We also like the Junior Great Books program and have had great experiences in a book club using those materials. Another option we are trying this semester is writing classes with Minecraft Homeschool. The students have to study a style of poetry, write a poem in that style, take a quiz on it, and then they receive a Minecraft-related challenge. For late elementary, I think it is an interesting take to get writing going.

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TTC does not use thick books. :-) Instead, it uses short stories that are all read aloud to the students on the DVDs. It is not a writing program, though. It is literary analysis only, and it could all be done orally if answering questions on the worksheets was too difficult. If your dd is capable of understanding characters, setting, plot, conflict, etc. orally through discussion, then she can handle TTC.

 

It's very short, only 6 weeks long, and can be used in conjunction with a writing program. I love it, because it's very relaxed and leads to fun discussions. My dd(14) and I now discuss literature & movies through the lens of literary analysis almost every day--for fun, lol! You should have heard our "Frozen" discussions. I know, we're not normal.... :lol:

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Wow, everyone.  Thanks so much for the responses.  My eyes are giving out on me and it is getting hard to separate the letters enough to read so I will have to quit for a bit.  I know I have additional questions but will have to post later.  Thankfully lack of vision doesn't actually prevent me from typing.  You are all awesome!

 

And actually, Heathermomster, I am still working on history and science for next year.  DS has requested the Veritas Press Greek and Roman Self-Paced course and will start that tomorrow.  He plans to use it through the summer and into next year.  But he wants to continue with the World Wars and Erwin Rommell as well, so I am trying to find more resources for that era.

 

Based on a previous thread regarding DD and history I have many ideas but have not solidified anything yet for her.  

 

Science is a conundrum.  They both want more advanced science.  And they definitely need structure and some sort of systematic approach or nothing really sticks terribly well.  But I do not have a strong grasp of ANY science.  They get frustrated with me because I cannot answer their questions effectively.  And they cannot read Middle School science material independently yet.  And they are not yet advanced enough in math to do any sort of math based science.  

 

We had considered Supercharged Science but the e-science actually ends up being terribly expensive over time.  And when we had it we rarely used it.  The Mastery programs end up being cheaper if you stay with it for more than a couple of years, it can cover science through High School apparently,  and it comes with DVDs and nearly all the material so I think we would be more likely to get it done.  But it is definitely costly...  

 

I wish there was a local co-op that taught science classes.  There are some in other cities sort of near us.  There is one that even offers a science class with extremely limited in-class reading and writing.  Just mainly lots of discussions, experiments, group projects, etc.  All of the reading and writing can be done at home in case some kids have special needs.  It would be great for the kids.  But we don't live close enough to drive there every week.

 

DD has just started using Uzinggo for a science supplement.  We got it on sale.  So far I am not convinced it was the best choice but at least she seems mildly interested right now.

 

Open to suggestions on science...

 

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I tried IEW-- and may someday give it a try again. I thought it would be wonderful for ds--and what he did do with it was well done...   but, at the cost of tears.

 

I would say almost a week per paragraph.   Day 1 to read sample and do an outline. Day 2 to speak from the outline. Day 3 to write it down. Day 4 to revise it.

 

Needing to work from the outline is extremely intense on memory work ... and if that is a weak point may link that to writing in such a way as to cause tears is what I think was the problem for ds.  Although he also thought All Things Fun and Fascinating was boring and below his level for knowledge, while too hard for the tasks...  Reminded me of when trying to learn to read and the problem with finding something High interest/low level. The SWI materials were slightly more interesting to him than ATFF, but only barely so. But I think the bigger problem was the memory aspect to the system.

 

If it did work for your children, I think you could use it for both at once--in fact it might be better and more fun that way.

 

I am not personally familiar with CAP.  Diana Hansbury King is used for a lot of dyslexics, but was again not a good fit for my ds. 

 

The first program that worked well for my ds was Bravewriter which better fits his thinking and working style.

 

Lately we have been doing writing that is often just one sentence per day, working on sentences that have some complexity or feeling or descriptive power to them, and will continue that through the summer for just 15 or so minutes per day.

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Lately we have been doing writing that is often just one sentence per day, working on sentences that have some complexity or feeling or descriptive power to them, and will continue that through the summer for just 15 or so minutes per day.

This...I started to insist that DS answer questions across all subjects using complete sentences and minimal use of pronouns.

 

 

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Well, I ran out of "likes" so consider yourself "liked" everyone.  

 

Pen, I think the one sentence per day plan, incorporating some meat to them sounds great.  I will look again at Bravewriter.  I looked at it when we first started and did not go with it but I honestly don't remember why.  I really need something pretty clearly laid out these days.  My working memory seems to be on overload and my creativity has kind of tanked.  Is it fairly clearly laid out?

 

Fair Prospects, I had not heard of the Lego or Minecraft programs.  They sound very interesting for DS.  I will look into those.  I have not spent a ton of time looking at the Junior Great books but DS was in a summer program through a school for dyslexics two summers ago and he LOVED the class they had on Junior Great Books. Sadly, we don't live anywhere near that school or he would be back in that program again this year.  It was a fluke we were there at all.  I tried starting a book club for him but no takers.  I also tried starting a Latin club for him.  Again, no interest.  Just too few homeschoolers in the area (very, very few DS's age) and the ps kids are too busy.  Heavy sigh...

 

I have a ton more things to say and some questions but I need to go be teacher/mommy/veterinarian/maid....be back later.  :)  Thanks everyone!

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OneStep, I'll give you a few thoughts and you can take them with a grain of salt, since I have no one formally diagnosed.  ;)

 

-Oral composition and discussion is the foundation of written.  You need to get SWB's audio recordings on teaching writing.  Even though there are some issues (really linear, stuck in one genre, might make you freaky about ages/quantities), the fact is she still delineates that connection of thought to word and word to written in a way that makes things click for people.  It's easy to want to jump to the thought to written stage without going adequately through thought to word.  It means if you have a student for whom getting it written is glitchy, you can spend a LOT more time on the thought to word stage with great benefit.  Do oral composition.  Analyze arguments and go through your points, with you writing on the whiteboard.  She sees that her thoughts and arguments have structure, but you don't get held up by the part that isn't working.  You want to take their THOUGHT PROCESS forward and not hold it back by limiting your expectations for analysis only to what they can write.  Oral narrations, oral outlines, oral debates.  When my dd was 7th/8th, we had this book of 50 controversial topics to debate.  I'd read the pros/cons for both sides and we'd argue.  Oral composition and argument.

 

-Don't make her do as original work things that are better done as copy work or dictation.  When your goal is skills, making it easier to get from word to paper, use ALL KINDS of methods.  Use the iPad and typing.  Use a whiteboard.  Use creative projects.  Use the Mrs. Renz book projects (love!).  Use typing instruction.  Use sneaky writing like having her compile a family cookbook.  It doesn't have to be original to be worthwhile, and if it is original it doesn't have to be limited to a particular form or genre.

 

-Don't let people intimidate you.  Know why you're doing what you're doing.  IEW is useful for kids who have issue with structure and organizing their thoughts.  Ok, I'm cool with that, but there are MORE ways to work on that.  As you say, imitation of models in a variety of genres can work.  You can use Inspiration.  IEW is just one way.  It's a good way, but it's just one way.  The other thing IEW tries to work on is style, and I guess that's something where I'm just going to have to eat crow, kwim?  My dd has issues with structure and word retrieval, yes, but thanks to lots of discussion and lots of good audiobooks and reading, she has no issues with sentence quality/style.  Make sure you're doing what the dc needs.  Isolate the issues in your mind and consider what components the dc needs.  Does she NEED the style instruction in IEW, or does she naturally have good variety?  Does the sentence variety and quality show up in her oral work but not yet in her written?  I think, and this is just my two cents, that with a *girl* it's particularly nice to do writing that makes them open up.  If IEW does that, fabulous.  If it doesn't, she might respond well to something more creative or context-driven.  (Writing Tales, cookbook project, progymnasta/imitation)

 

-Speaking in complete sentences??  That's in WTM in the K5 chapter.  This is not original, and absolutely it's an issue.  It goes back to my point that speech is oral composition.  

 

Crazy or ootb ideas?  Go back to foundations.  Oral narration transcribed onto paper.  Focus on structure.  Listen to lots of audiobooks.  Don't tie their learning to what they can read.  How bright are these kids?  For your 8th grader, are you thinking high school yet?  You'll notice I'm doing the GA PBS chemistry with my dd.  Learning science through a textbook is just not where we need to put our time and energy right now.  There's a time and place for everything.  Sometimes it's better to bypass the glitches and let them have the content other ways.  Reading comprehension is 80% prior knowledge, so the more you build that prior knowledge the easier it will be for them to pick up these textbooks.  Use videos and audiobooks and get out of the gotta be a textbook rutt.  

 

As far as the writing, if typing is really glitchy, how about using Dragon/Siri to get the text in, then print and have her type from that?  Outline in Inspiration before she writes her composition.  I ADORE Writing Tales 2 beyond measure.  WWS is turning out to be useful.  IEW would be fine.  I'd still use Inspiration with IEW, just because it's such a killer tool.  Writing Tales 2 includes grammar analysis that is much like IEW without being heavy-handed.  

 

I know I'm in for it with ds and not likely to have the (comparatively) easy ride I had with dd.  I've noticed that some kids have a tendency to go super tight on their writing and have a difference between what they get out with speech and what they write.  That's what I want to avoid.  I'd rather have delayed formal writing but more of those preparatory steps (creative projects, lots of dictation, audiobooks, discussion).  Structure is easier to teach when they're old enough that you can engage their brains.  Dd really GETS what she's doing with WWS.  I'm glad we're doing it later.  I've even seen posts from veterans on the board saying they waited till 16 on formal/structured writing and just did LOTS of this discussion, audiobooks, discussion, discussion, whiteboard arguments, contextualized writing, etc. until then.

 

Like I said, I could and very well may end up eating crow with ds, but there you go.  :) 

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You mentioned assignments.  With dd I've found it helpful to have a consistent plan, the same thing every week.  So a plan around that age might be:

 

-2 mind maps of non-fiction articles you read.  (We used Muse magazine, highly recommend.)

 

-1/2 page of dictation written X 3

 

-one imitation of a model from WT2, CW, IEW, whatever

 

-one oral book narration using a plot map and a whiteboard or using a Mrs. Renz book report project

 

That's how I scheduled dd's writing and still do.  I pick tasks we can repeat every week like that to have structure.  Those are actual things I did with her around that age.  Notice the variety and how in a given week you're working on seeing structure (mind maps), thought to word (oral narrations), word to written without creativity (dictation), AND doing something to get out the full extent of her expression (imitation of a model).  To me that plan has 5 short tasks (2 mind maps, 3 dictation sessions) and two long projects.  That's not too much.  

 

Other interesting writing?  Do a grammar editing program and have her copy work the sentence after she corrects it.  Prompt writing from the Jump In journaling prompts in the tm.  We did this one year and they were fun.  

 

If she wants to do a project, say compiling a family cookbook, you figure out what aspect of writing the project is hitting (seeing structure, thought to word, word to written, or stretch to show full expression) and then replace the prior task with the cookbook writing for that time slot.  At least that's how I did it.   :)

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Well, I ran out of "likes" so consider yourself "liked" everyone.  

 

Pen, I think the one sentence per day plan, incorporating some meat to them sounds great.  I will look again at Bravewriter.  I looked at it when we first started and did not go with it but I honestly don't remember why.  I really need something pretty clearly laid out these days.  My working memory seems to be on overload and my creativity has kind of tanked.  Is it fairly clearly laid out?

 

 

 

 

 

1.Not really if trying from book only. 

 

2.You could have them do a computer class (that is how we started and it was a good jump start, a lot of work during the class, but could be a good thing for during summer) so that there would be a teacher to say what to do when--and also give feedback. If you could afford it, and can give it the time (to help the kids is needed even with teacher, but it puts you in role of helper/facilitator, not teacher), I'd say that would be the best option. Several people had more than one child participating when we did it.  I think a second child has a lower fee than the first, and if a few classes (nature study writing?) even no charge for additional child, but I think in main beginner's levels there is a charge for both. I think others had an oldest officially in class, but seemed to talk about doing the work with a group of children at once at home. With a class you do not need to use the book and can then follow the system for additional projects if it is one that worked for your dc...also it gives some idea of how to give their style of positive feedback to draw out more from the dc.

 

 

or

 

3.I could try to explain the gist over the phone.

(Less good option than class, but cheaper, and probably I can make it a lot more simple and clear than the book.)

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I typed all this just to say find a program that works for both mom and kid and then have a blast.  For me, finding the program is the painful part!

Yep, this is the issue.  Which way do i leap?  :)  But there have been so many great responses on here.  Love the LC board.  

 

Rereading everything.  Trying to make a list of overall goals for both kids this next year. One will be prepping for Middle School and one prepping for High School.  Lots to think about....

 

Thanks again everyone.  You all rock!!!

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IEW has a full return policy if you buy direct from IEW. That was one reason I did it as a first choice--though now I have the stuff, and though I found it did not work out well,  have still not made use of the return policy that hooked me in! I think ds and i will need to discuss if he wants to give it another try or if we should send it on back.

 

One thing would be to figure out if your child(ren) will work best from an outline versus working things out on paper and expanding, revising etc. as part of the process. And how much they need models to follow versus working on improving their own writing.  And whether you want them to learn a very standard academic style, versus developing their own voice.

 

There are a lot more options btw, than just the ones so far mentioned. Sopris West's Step Up or some such title geared to dyslexia etc., and many other programs that are not especially for kids with LD's but might work for your particular children.

 

We are using Nancy Dean's Discovering Voice right now, which is very painless at a daily sentence. It also could be used by 2 children at once (better since it says things like Talk about it or exchange papers with classmates, and with just one we cannot do those parts).

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Teaching any subject to LD kiddo is like teaching a mini-Jim Carey that just polished off a case of Monster Energy Drink.  It's 100% 1-on-1 sonic speed work that leaves me wiped.  But man the kid is fun, appreciative, and loves to learn - how do you say "Le'ts quit, Mom's tired" to that?

 

I have no idea what writing program will be best for him next year.  IEW checklists might stifle his creativity, but for now he loves it. 

 

I typed all this just to say find a program that works for both mom and kid and then have a blast.  For me, finding the program is the painful part!

Oh snort, that is SO funny and SO true!!!   :lol: 

 

You could use the IEW-style checklists with models that would interest him more.  

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