Targhee Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 (edited) ...blah blah blah. Title is too long. For those of you who use it for memory work, HOW do you use it? I see there are some recommended options (EOPEOD, etc), but I'd love to hear how real homeschoolers are implementing (or improvising with) this program. Independent listening? Over the car stereo? How do you do recitation? Ages using it (and their success or frustration)? One other important question I would love to hear with your answers: WHY do you use it (what educational goals are you hoping to reach by using it)? TIA! :lurk5: Edited January 13, 2011 by Targhee spelling, my achilles heal Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom0012 Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 This is our 3rd year using the program. The first year, I played the level 1 poems cd in the car and had my kids each memorize a poem a week if it was short and a poem in two weeks if it was longer. We played the cd a lot. When they think they have mastered a poem, they recite it to me and I sign off next to it. (I've made copies of the book so they each have their own poetry book.) In the second year, we've just continued that pattern, though some of the poems are quite long and I don't really push them to get them memorized in an allotted amount of time. One of my children isn't quite finished with level 2 even though this is our 3rd school year doing this. Our pattern for review at this point has been to listen and recite the level 1 poems in the car one day a week and then do the same with the level 2 on another day. Why are we doing it? I think memory work is beneficial. We did the CC memory work for a number of years but I got tired of it and didn't have an efficient, independent way for my kids to review it, especially after we had completed all the cycles. My children really enjoy memorizing the poetry. They are proud and I often actually have to tell them not to recite their poems to everyone they come across. I think memorizing poetry is great for vocabulary building as well as putting patterns of language in their head. And most of all, anyone who asks my daughter what her favorite subject is, will surely hear her exclaim "POETRY!" followed by a recitation of "Rebecca, Who Slammed Doors for Fun and Perished Miserably".:) Lisa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ladydusk Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 We just started our second year doing IEW Poetry and I love it. We do poetry during Circle Time which is when we do most of our memory work from hymns, to Bible, to poetry, to other fun things. We use the Simply Charlotte Mason memory system for almost all of our memory work, I use notebooks, though. I generally have my kids memorize one stanza a week. (IOW, I don't use Pudewa's system, not because I think it bad, simply the other works well for us) I don't use the CD often, but my children like it when I do. Sometimes our phrasing is different from his and we can discuss the differences in meaning and language usage. We do memory work to exercise the memory, put interesting phrasing and language into our common family language, and to prepare our students. Last summer I read Leigh Bortins' The Core and one of my major take aways is that memory work gives students content to work with ... giving them something to think logically about and then to expound upon. We want to prepare our children to be clear communicators and clear thinkers; memory work is a foundational tool in this preparation. It is a Classical tool. We have in the past, and hope to re-institute a time of Recitation on Saturdays where the children (and Mommy!) recite our memory work for my husband. This accomplishes several objectives for us from public speaking (to a very supportive audience) to giving me a tool to make it important for the children. We also prepare some of our work for presentation. The eventual goal is to have an end-of-year open house for family and close friends to see the work the children have been accomplishing ... and they would recite there too. Our children are small: 6, recently-turned 5, and 3.5. The 6 and 5 year old are moving steadily through stage 1, the 3.5 year old is stuck on "After the Party." My only real concern is whether the poems selected by IEW truly are the best quality, but I believe that may improve through the different levels. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beth in SW WA Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 We play the poems on our ipods often -- during breakfast, lunch, at night, in the car, etc. Dds love Andrew Pudewa. I don't take it too seriously. They are delightful poems. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Targhee Posted January 14, 2011 Author Share Posted January 14, 2011 Very helpful info - thank you! Hearing the way others use it helps me to know if it will work for my needs. I'm thinking of using it next year for 4th, 1st, and preK kids. My objectives are 3 fold: develop memory, hear and use beautiful language, develop public speaking skills. This is just background to our main curricular pursuits, so I don't want anything that is complicated/time consuming/hands-on. I'm wondering at this point if the program is worth the money. I think it would take a LONG time to compile poems and record them, and get them in digital format so that I can load them onto mp3 players. Thoughts on value??? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom0012 Posted January 14, 2011 Share Posted January 14, 2011 It's been worth every penny for us. I kind of cringed at the price and I think I wound up buying the cds used, but even if I had paid the $60, we have really gotten our money's worth after using it 3 years with 2 kids. Also, I really love his poetry selections. They are so fun for the kids and some of them really make me smile. You could always buy the book and then record the poems yourself onto a cd if you know how to do that. It's the cds that are so expensive. Lisa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hs4ze Posted January 14, 2011 Share Posted January 14, 2011 Poems Every Child Should Know edited by Mary E. Burt free download at librovox.org Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strawberry Posted January 14, 2011 Share Posted January 14, 2011 Is there anyone who knows poetry and the idea behind "linguistic development" better than I who could compare using IEW's program to the amazing link from librivox? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strawberry Posted January 14, 2011 Share Posted January 14, 2011 In case you wanted to see the titles from each: IEWs sample poetry list and Mary E. Burt's list: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gratia271 Posted January 14, 2011 Share Posted January 14, 2011 We use the program for diction exercises. There are many free things available that will accomplish the same goal. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AmyinMD Posted January 14, 2011 Share Posted January 14, 2011 If you do get it I'd recommend getting the CD. I only got the book and we have used it very sporadically I think my follow through would be better if we had the CD. IEW doesn't seem to sell the CD separately either. Their customer service seems pretty good though I should probably call and see if they'd sell just the CD. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoveBaby Posted January 14, 2011 Share Posted January 14, 2011 Poems Every Child Should Knowedited by Mary E. Burt free download at librovox.org Yay!! I love free! I've been eyeing IEW Poetry for quite some time but the price kept holding me back. This looks awesome! The e-text is available on gutenberg.org in the Kindle edition as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NancyNellen Posted January 15, 2011 Share Posted January 15, 2011 This is our 6th year of using the IEW poetry program. The children have a list of poems to review each day during their morning memory work. At lunch we listen to the last three completed poems and then listen to our current poem three times. I then spend 10 minutes or so running through the new section of the poem we are learning in a listen/repeat manner. Every Friday we do dictation as follows: I have typed up all the poems from the program and cut them out on small slips of paper. We have a small Rubbermaid container labeled "Poetry Recitation", with all the poems we have memorized to date inside. Each child picks one and we practice recitation and being a good audience. We usually go around 2-3 times. We keep all of the recited poems in a separate baggie until all poems have been recited, then we add them all back into the box and start again. Why do we use it? Because we love language, and a unique turn of phrase. Memorizing the poems stretches our brains, improves our vocabulary, and is a fun thing to do all together, regardless of level. My 7 year old is just as capable of memorizing Casey's Revenge as is my 13 year old. We broke down The Embarassing Episode of Little Miss Muffet and acted it out as a family for my husband and parents. It cracked us up. It was a wonderful opportunity to make a lasting memory. Yes, the program is expensive. Too expensive. But it gets done. Consistently. And that makes it worth it to me. The CD makes it uber-easy to implement. The poem selections are a great combination of silly, serious, delightful, and witty. With five children I foresee myself using this program for a total of 15 years or so. That breaks down to $4.33 a year. I'm okay with that. :001_smile: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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