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Implementing BW The Wand


RebeccaKes
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I just bought BW's the Wand, for my 7yo reader and my 5.5yo eager-to-start. I anticipate having to adapt for each of them, but I figure I almost always end up doing that with curriculum anyway, and the BW approach is very friendly to customization. (For my 5.5yo I plan to expand on the lessons in Hop On Pop, using all the sections that focus on short vowel phonetic words, until she has a firm grasp (we are currently reading one Bob Book at a time). For my 7yo I am going to move a bit faster. He's reading fluently but lacks confidence, so we are going to make a LA notebook to review the phonics work and grammar he knows before we move into Arrows.)

 

My question is about implementing the program as written (at least as a base to start with). It's wordy and not set up in an open-and-go way, which I anticipated. But does anyone have experience putting together a schedule and/or progression of the program?

What do your lessons look like?

What does a week look like?

What materials do you use and how do you put them together (notebook, binder, folders as suggested)?

 

Thank you!!!

 

 

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Yes, I mapped out a weekly schedule of sorts... We did the first lesson this past week and my DD5 loved it. She loved learning to read from a "real" book. It will be worth the effort of mapping the rest out. I think I'm going to camp out in Hop On Pop for a month or so and explore all the phonetic families in it. 

 

As for my DS7, I'm adapting the technique to our subject reading. Monday we'll use a passage from Write Through History, Tuesday: CLP Nature Reader, Wednesday: Religion/Catechism, Thursday: current chapter book (ELTL), Friday: weekly reading comp from K12reader.com

 

I already have ELTL for grammar and will use copywork from that when needed, so the one passage per day should work since we will just work on phonics rules and handwriting. We'll also use word sorts and ladders and make a notebook to record the phonics rules as we learn/review them.

 

That feels pretty thorough to me... We'll see!

 

I do have to say that since I need to see the forest and the trees, it's hard to go lesson by lesson with this. I'm reading all of it and making notes on what is learned and when. It's probably totally unnecessary but I hate the feeling of just following along, being a facilitator instead of teacher.

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I used the wand last year. We school 4 days per week, so Monday and Tuesday I would do the phonics, spelling lessons with writing practice from HWOT, Wednesday we would do free write and copybook and review spelling, Thursday we did dictation. We would read the books a bit every day, and when they were done, I would supplement with other similar books by the same author. I liked the program. The books were great. It did not have enough spelling/phonics practice for my child. And it was most definitely not open and go, especially at first.

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