ELTL with multiple grades

[ThursdayNext]

My kids love ELTL, so we don't want to switch.

 

But how do you do it with multiple ages? It seems like a big chunk of time with each student. I'd love to hear how parents with more than one kid in ELTL are making it work. In 2019, I'd be doing 3 different levels if we stick with it.

 

Can anyone give me a very detailed description of the ELTL part of your day?

[silver]

Audiobooks can be very helpful; I'm pretty sure all the ELTL literature titles are available on Libravox. I know some moms with kids in multiple levels just read the poetry from one of the levels (you could alternate which book to read the poetry from, or just pick one and stick with it). Older kids can do it independently, if need be. 

[ThursdayNext]

I could do librivox for the books, and just pick my own longer read alouds to do all together. I've sometimes had the kids read the poem aloud to get that practice in. Maybe I should do that every time. I'd have them read the Aesop's fable aloud, but there are too many ... ahem... Roosters if you know what I mean.

 

I have thought about using ELTL for literature and copywork, but switching to something more workbook style for grammar. My oldest doesn't have an easy time of it, and I wonder if a workbook would be more her style.

 

I'd still love to hear from any who use ELTL about how you do it.

[terrikuns]

I'm facing this same conundrum for next year. I've used ELTL 1&2 with my oldest (8yo, will be a 3rd grader next year), and now my second child is starting 1st next year. Thus far, we have done all the literature as family read alouds (I also have a 3.5yo who loves to listen in, and a 1yo who does not), and then I do the book stuff 1:1 with my oldest. 

I considered multiple options, including getting separate grammar programs, picking my own lit, separate copywork, dictation (for the older), writing (for the older - ELTL3 introduces the progym), etc. etc., but when I had all these books lined up and went through them, I just really like ELTL better. I think it's a great program, and I really like ELTL3 after comparing it directly to FLL3, IEW writing, and CAP's Writing and Rhetoric program. I also love how ELTL1 is structured and includes Aesop and all of that, and I really love the copywork coming from their literature.

So, my plan for next year is to do Level 3 (C, now that it's renamed) as written with my oldest and read those books aloud as our family readalouds, and follow the sequence in there for our picture study. For my 1st grader, I'm going to do ELTL1, and revisit about 2/3 of the literature mostly as audio books/stories in the car. I decided that it would be great if my kids did Beatrix Potter (read paper books), Kipling (audio), The Velveteen Rabbit (read paper book), and maybe (depending on time) Pinocchio every other year for their elementary years. I'm skipping Five Children and It and Five Little Peppers. I am going to get the Memoria Press copywork book to pull out during the lessons when we are not reading the book, but still do the Aesop and poetry with him. 

Take this with a grain of salt, since I haven't actually executed this plan yet, but I think it will be a pretty solid way of integrating ELTL1. Not sure what I will do the year following, but at that point I may spin off my 4th grader to read the literature independently or something. 

Looking forward to hearing other ideas. We really love our family readalouds, and I don't want to give that up.

 

(PS My signature is really old. I need to figure out how to change it, but my kids are 8, 6, 3.5, and 1.)

Edited March 13, 2018 by terrikuns

[Holly]

I used it one year with 3 grades. A ways into the year, I realized levels 4 and 5 were very similar, so I started combining them for some things. My third child used Librivox for many of the readings when I didn’t have time to read aloud to her. My older DC read their own books. I pre-printed handwriting pages for my youngest one as well, so she didn’t have to copy from the book. We also did the poems together. We had a great year and I credit their grammar knowledge to this program. We just got back into sentence diagramming (more than 2 years later) and my oldest two remember so much of it!

[ThursdayNext]

I feel bad shortchanging the third child. By that point I’ll be tired of most of the stories and not want to read them aloud. Except Five Children and It. We’ve read that aloud 3 times in our family and I still love it.

 

And I won’t read Peter Pan aloud even once. Not a fan.

[HomeAgain]

You know what, I'm not sure I would do separate ELTL with 3 different children.  If I had all the books I'd make a list of skills taught each day in each level.  Then I'd pick ONE book and ONE short story and ONE poem to use in place of it all, giving each child work from the story/chapter that corresponded to the leveled work. In short, I'd create a version of ELTL that can be used at any level.  If we read more it would be either a breakfast read-aloud from one of the other levels or a bedtime read-aloud.  I'd introduce the Elson Readers for reading/short story practice, and have the kids use the comprehension questions in the back of levels 3 and up to take the place of the short stories in ELTL.

 

 

[Coco_Clark]

I'm doing three levels of ELTL this year :)

 

I use audio books heavily, so they all come to the lesson having listened to the selection. The older kids read the Fable and poem solo too, so I just jump in at the end for grammar.

 

That being said, yes it's a lot!! And I actually decided to pull my oldest out of ELTL for 5th grade next year partly because it's so much and partly because I'm supplementing the writing portion so heavily it's not worth it anymore.

 

I think it's an **amazing** program through 3rd or 4th grade (ELTL 3 or C if you have the new ones) and then it's an easy transition to more advanced writing instruction and a new diagramming based grammar program.

Edited March 15, 2018 by Coco_Clark