Sunnydays, Yes you are right! I mostly concentrated on science, so had modern science books, rather than literature. In the mean time, the children have been concentrating on maths, science, foreign language & art - their science narrations seem okay. However it's those type of books that worry me and the archaic language used, it seems to be testing my brain cells to the limit! Anyway, while narrating a section from FLL I found myself asking questions about sentence formation,- I can't believe I have forgotten my grammar! I should have known that the questions are supposed to help the in forming sentences, but I was still asking why they were there for. So, now Mummy also has a folder along with the kids. :) I am going to have to make more time to read & write up these narrations, before I set the lessons to the children BW

Why am I, as a mother, who, in my own childhood has been to school & college & passed exams etc, yet finding it so difficult to narrate and read classical texts? I was trying to teach my kids narration, but gave up, in the first pages in FLL!I came to mental block :smash: and could not motivate myself for weeks to pick up the book till now.... I can barely call that a burnout! :banghead: I suppose the fact that I have been unwell during the last couple of years and had personal issues, doesn't help, either! The FLL book itself is very useful & interesting, it's just that I find it hard getting used to writing. I think the fact that I have not written a structured piece for a long time, does not help, (exam essays were the last thing I remember writing). Not only do I find it difficult to narrate, but I also find information difficult to remember such as on the importance of narration, dictation etc. :confused1: I find myself having to constantly remind myself, by re-reading TWTM texts etc and although it is slowly sinking in, I feel overwhelmed about how much I need to teach my children, especially when I don't recall doing any of this at school. :confused1: I find it really amazing that Patrick Moore who recently died, was known to have spent much of his childhood educated at home (is he home educated?). His mother gave him a copy of GF Chambers' book called: The Story of the Solar System, which sparked his interest in astronomy. I don't know at what age he read this book and although I am interested in Science and studied science, I just took one look at this book online and I felt intimidated by the difficult, classical language. I could not grasp a single sentence or understand hardly anything about what the author was talking about. What kind knowledge & skill is needed to get to that level of reading?

Hi, I opened a similar thread here: http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1288491#post1288491 Perhaps these answers may also be useful to you. Best Wishes

Thanks Colleen! :) When I was unschooling I was finding difficulty in teaching my children how to summarise and write about various subjects. Hopefully, through these books we have the resources we now need. Organized freedom is the best term for it! Best Wishes

I agree Kalah, TWTM can be very confusing for beginners. I am not very confident in our unschooling path as I feel a little disorganized at present. I need something more for the children to learn from. Thank you Colleen and Tam for explaining it further. Colleen you put in a nutshell. I also like the freedom to apply our principles to our own reading but we could do with more practice and it seems that Susan has put in a lot of effort by adding narrations etc which may work out slightly more economical than getting the books. Plus by doing the narrations exercises etc my children will have a better idea of what type of books they really like to read. I'm grateful to all of you who have replied. Best Wishes

Hi thanks everyone for your feedback and for the welcome. It seems most of you are using the workbooks more than the text. I only have the text and can't figure out the difference between them. Do the workbooks have more practice in them as in more narrations etc? If everyone is using the workbooks then what is the main purpose of the WWESF text book? Any ideas? Best wishes

Hi, We were unschooling, but I got stuck when it came to my child learning grammar and writing etc, so we decided now that some structuring may be necessary. I have bought some of your books from Amazon, the WTM, First Language Lessons and Writing With Ease - Strong Fundamentals. I don't know if it is just me, but I am getting confused with all of this information and I really don't know where to start or organize reading and using the books with my children. It seems I need a lot of time just to read through each book then the resources in WTM are so many and different from what I can get in UK so I feel that I am getting stuck. .... Seems like I am panicking. I also don't know what the WWE workbooks 1-3 are for, or whether or not are necessary to purchase with the WWE fundamentals. I have seen the preview pages in Amazon, some of the narrations are similar (e.g from Laura Ingalls), but then you have others such as from Pinocchio and I am not understanding how to use these books correctly isolated, or together or what difference it would make either way. I hope you can give me some guidance as to the differences in approaches used in WTM, WWE and First Language Lessons for language and grammar, etc, and give a brief outline of the objectives/outcomes of using them. Regards