At least she's writing, right?

[SeekingSimplicity]

My 4th grader hates writing, always has. One of the reasons I chose WT for her is that I thought it would be an enjoyable way for her to learn to write. She's enjoying the stories and the games. The worksheets are fine. The writing part is still like pulling teeth. It's torture!

 

Today she was supposed to write a rough draft of Julius Caesar. She was supposed to strictly retell the story, in her own words. She handed me the rough draft and as I read through it, I realized I neglected to tell her not to add creative flourishes. She had Julius going off to war, finding kittens and a puppy that he brought home to take care of. Then he had a party for them. :001_huh: She said, " you told me to tell the story in my own words."

 

I said oh well. At least she wrote something, she followed grammar and punctuation rules, and she was happy with what she wrote. So it's all good. Right?

[SeekingSimplicity]

Kid's are so funny sometimes. :)

[Dawn in OH]

I said oh well. At least she wrote something, she followed grammar and punctuation rules, and she was happy with what she wrote. So it's all good. Right?

 

Isn't that all that matters?

 

Seriously, before we started actually homeschooling, I had much higher standards of what was going to be acceptable. Now that we are actually doing it, and see what you can get out of a child or not, I've had to adjust my standards a bit.

 

She wrote something. She used proper grammar and punctuation. That was really the point of the exercise.

[BMW]

LOL!:lol::lol:

Thanks! I really needed a laugh about now!

[MamaSheep]

Sounds like your daughter and mine are cut from the same cloth. We read The Gingerbread Man the other day and I asked her to draw a picture and write a sentence about the story. It started out ok. She drew the river, the fox swimming across the river, and the gingerbread man sticking halfway out of the fox's mouth looking alarmed. For effect, she added extra large fox teeth and cookie crumbs. Lots of cookie crumbs. It became necessary for the cookie crumbs to be shown under the water, there were so many of them and obviously the ones that flew out first were going to be farther down than the more recent additions. And if there are cookie crumbs in the water, then the little fishes are going to eat them, right? So we must draw the little fishes. But if there's a swarm of little fishes it's going to attract some big fishes that will eat the little fishes. And of course that would bring in the sharks. By the time she was done there was this whole food chain feeding frenzy going on and the poor little gingerbread man's plight was pretty much buried. I think her sentence said something like, "Fish eat crumbs." Which is hardly a summary of the story. But she had a good time, and she did write something about her picture without complaining or getting distracted, which is a fairly big accomplishment for her. So...

[Happy]

My 4th grader hates writing, always has. One of the reasons I chose WT for her is that I thought it would be an enjoyable way for her to learn to write. She's enjoying the stories and the games. The worksheets are fine. The writing part is still like pulling teeth. It's torture!

 

Today she was supposed to write a rough draft of Julius Caesar. She was supposed to strictly retell the story, in her own words. She handed me the rough draft and as I read through it, I realized I neglected to tell her not to add creative flourishes. She had Julius going off to war, finding kittens and a puppy that he brought home to take care of. Then he had a party for them. :001_huh: She said, " you told me to tell the story in my own words."

 

I said oh well. At least she wrote something, she followed grammar and punctuation rules, and she was happy with what she wrote. So it's all good. Right?

 

It's all good!!!!!!!!!!

 

If you want a specific outcome, YOU have to structure the assignment to get what you want. ;) Been there, done that. I hope you encourage her to keep on using her imagination!

[Melissa in Australia]

Sounds like your daughter and mine are cut from the same cloth. We read The Gingerbread Man the other day and I asked her to draw a picture and write a sentence about the story. It started out ok. She drew the river, the fox swimming across the river, and the gingerbread man sticking halfway out of the fox's mouth looking alarmed. For effect, she added extra large fox teeth and cookie crumbs. Lots of cookie crumbs. It became necessary for the cookie crumbs to be shown under the water, there were so many of them and obviously the ones that flew out first were going to be farther down than the more recent additions. And if there are cookie crumbs in the water, then the little fishes are going to eat them, right? So we must draw the little fishes. But if there's a swarm of little fishes it's going to attract some big fishes that will eat the little fishes. And of course that would bring in the sharks. By the time she was done there was this whole food chain feeding frenzy going on and the poor little gingerbread man's plight was pretty much buried. I think her sentence said something like, "Fish eat crumbs." Which is hardly a summary of the story. But she had a good time, and she did write something about her picture without complaining or getting distracted, which is a fairly big accomplishment for her. So...

:lol::lol::lol:

[Terabith]

That's the hardest I've laughed all week! Thanks!

[SeekingSimplicity]

Sounds like your daughter and mine are cut from the same cloth. We read The Gingerbread Man the other day and I asked her to draw a picture and write a sentence about the story. It started out ok. She drew the river, the fox swimming across the river, and the gingerbread man sticking halfway out of the fox's mouth looking alarmed. For effect, she added extra large fox teeth and cookie crumbs. Lots of cookie crumbs. It became necessary for the cookie crumbs to be shown under the water, there were so many of them and obviously the ones that flew out first were going to be farther down than the more recent additions. And if there are cookie crumbs in the water, then the little fishes are going to eat them, right? So we must draw the little fishes. But if there's a swarm of little fishes it's going to attract some big fishes that will eat the little fishes. And of course that would bring in the sharks. By the time she was done there was this whole food chain feeding frenzy going on and the poor little gingerbread man's plight was pretty much buried. I think her sentence said something like, "Fish eat crumbs." Which is hardly a summary of the story. But she had a good time, and she did write something about her picture without complaining or getting distracted, which is a fairly big accomplishment for her. So...

 

I love this! :lol::lol::lol: