Crosspost - Why you should work on TWTM skills - narration, dictation, outlining, etc

[Nan in Mass]

Why you should work on TWTM skills - copywork, narration, dictation, outlining, etc.

A recent thread made me realize that if I could do one thing over again homeschooling (other than sending my oldest to community college instead of public high school) it would be to do more of TWTM language arts skills - copywork, dictation, narration, outlining, grammar, spelling, vocabulary, memory work, and logic. I didn't know why these were important (guess I didn't read TWTM carefully enough - sigh) so I tended to skip the ones that were hard for us, when in fact, those were the very ones we needed to work on more. I thought I'd just post this as a separate thread in case it helps even one person from making the same mistake I made.

 

Caution: This might not have been true if I had had a child with strong learning style differences or slownesses, but mine were just engineering-bright/language-arts-dim or wired just a bit differently; they were not drastically different. Aquiring academic skills so they can learn something by academic means is more difficult than for most children, but not an unreasonable goal. TWTM is the key to that for us. It specifically teaches the skills that the more academically gifted children are just naturally good at. And that means that we needed to work on the ones that my children are not good at. I wish I had known this earlier.

 

You may need to back way, way up to work on these. Follow the progression laid out in TWTM, and work through the progression. Don't just give up on the skill because your child is so far behind. And if your child is good at a skill, good enough that you decide you don't need to practise it, it is really important to keep checking every year and make sure that your child can still do that skill at the new, higher level. That is the mistake I made with one of mine with narration.

 

The whys of doing TWTM skills even though they are hard, boring, and miserable:

 

I think the key to being able to write well is to read tons of well-written material (like great books), to have the physical part down so you don't have to think about it (handwriting and typing), to have something to write about (good knowledge base and good research skills), to have a system of taking the mishmash of thought and putting them together in an organized way (find a method of putting them down in an unorganized way, organize them, organize that into a linear structure (outlining), and then rewrite - a word processor is nice for this). You need to work on narration and logic for organization, vocabulary and grammar for style. Copywork and dictation deal with the mechanics of spelling and punctuation in a whole-to-parts way and spelling books and grammar books deal with it in a parts-to-whole way. You need to do the narration and the dicatation in order to put the pieces together and apply them.

I think the key to being able to read well (once the phonics part is out of the way) is grammar (so you can understand non-standard word order - think Shakespeare and poetry) and vocabulary. That is the parts-to-whole part. And then I think you need to do tons of reading and narrating and discussing. That is the whole-to-parts, applying what you learned, part.

I think the key to being able to learn the content subjects is study skills, and those depend on dictation (think note-taking), outlining (picking out the main points from the details), narration (summarizing), being able to read well at a variety of speeds from skimming to sentence-by-sentence reinterpreting (grammar helps with this), and being able to memorize (memory work).

I think the key to being able to teach yourself things as an adult or the key to being able to survive college is reading well, writing well, test taking skills, some sort of knowledge base, good study skills, and good organizational skills - keeping an assignment book, keeping track of one's materials, efficiency (resisiting the temptation of the internet, games, cell phones, and whatever else one does for escape and socializing), prioritizing (skimp on this because that is more important), and dividing large projects into little ones. One also needs to understand the system, how to pay attention to what this particular prof wants, and how to get help if you don't understand something. That last is more important and harder than one might think so I recommend finding opportunities to practise approaching strangers and asking for help. Truly - this is one of those things that seems obvious and easy to grownups but turns out to be a practically insurmountable obsticle to young adults, one that causes them to flunk courses. Sigh.

 

The advantage of this system is that if you get these academic skills down, high school content subjects are hard work but straight forward. (Some of the logic stage works this way also.) For any subject, you pick a spine (doesn't have to be a textbook - it can be any sort of overview), study it (read, outline, summarize it), figure out what skills are involved and learn them (laboratory skills if it is a science), figure out which bits need to be memorized and memorize them, and then pick areas that are particularly interesting to you and investigate them further by doing research - reading and writing about them and doing experiments. This is the pattern that adults follow when they learn anything using an academic way. This method encourages love of learning because the choice of what to investigate further is left to the student. Remember the old Kingfisher directions? Read a spread. Outline it. Pick a few things to put on the timeline. Pick something on the page that interested you and research it and write a short report about it. The recent threads about the tiger mom are a reminder that people often are inclined to like to do things that they are good at and that aren't too hard. If academic work is a struggle because you don't have the foundational skills, you are unlikely to enjoy learning things in an academic way.

 

It is scary to concentrate so much on skills at the expense of content when you are homeschooling. What worked for us when the children were small was to do skills Mon-Thurs (along with reading aloud) and history and science on Friday (along with math and foreign languages, skills+content subjects that we couldn't skip or we forgot everything, and piano). It is important to apply the skills to the content areas, once you can do them a little, in order to improve and speed up, and in order to make the skills truly useful rather than just separate skills.

 

I hope this helps someone,

 

-Nan

 

(My credentials GRIN: two sons in college, one 16yo still homeschooling at home and taking community college classes for two and a half more years before going (hopefully) off to 4-year college)

 

PS - I did do some of these WTM skills. I just can see now, as I have two older children struggling their way through college, that they would have an easier time if their study skills were better, so I am trying to teach the youngest one better study skills and finding that those study skills depend on being able to narrate, outline, take dictation, etc.. Sigh.

 

PPS - I am editing this to add that a lot of the credit for figuring this out should go to Colleen in NS. If you do a search for posts by her with the word "outline" in them, you should be able to find some more information.

 

PPPS - Now that I see how many people have read this thread, I am having nightmares thinking that I have doomed some children to long boring days of drill. TWTM has lots of good ideas for making things less dry. TWTM says that what content you do should be allowed to go down bunny trails following your children's interests. Let the child, especially the older child and high schooler, choose what to add to the spine, which things to investigate further, what to write about. TWTM recommends heavily illustrated spines, ones that my family, at least, found interesting even when we thought we weren't interested in the material. All the reading-to-oneself is a pleasant chore once one has learned to escape into a book, and TWTM has lots of reading time built into it, both reading aloud and reading silently and listening to audio books. Reading is still one of those foundation skills. Those fairy tales and folk tales and myths lighten the load. The grammar and logic stage science recs are hands-on and active. Your day should have lots of nice parts, too. TWTM says the skills should be attacked in a "nibbled to death by ducks" manner, a little bit consistently over time. If you do something like Kalmia suggested and establish some sort of routine for working on the skills, then you can just plug through your routine and everyone will know that it isn't forever until a nicer part of the day comes, and nobody will have to think about it except when they are actually doing it. School is hard work, but it doesn't have all have to be hour upon hour of unpleasant drudgery at one thing. Think nibble nibble nibble, once the initial explanation is gone through. Cut the task down until it is not taking too long. Yllek says not more, but more consistently. That is a good thing to keep in mind. And Lisa (swimmermom) says to emphasize working hard, not being good at something. That is a good thing to keep in mind, too, if you want children who can rise to a challenge instead of being afraid to fail. : )

 

See PPPPS LLLLOL below.

Edited March 26, 2011 by Nan in Mass

[elegantlion]

Thank you, Nan. After spending two weeks solely on writing, I have a better picture of where my son is. It's a weird spot. I'm going to using my cloud gathering skills today :D and figure out exactly where that is. We didn't start NDC (Narration, dictation, and copywork) until a few years ago.

 

This kind of jumps off from the study skills part, I'm not sure if it will work. He's having trouble with pulling information from a source for outlines. What we're using may be too basic for him so I thought I'd try something different. It came to me while reading your post.

 

He works better with graphic organizers (like the spider diagrams) vs. straight outlining. What I thought I'd do is walk him through the process of notetaking. I'd read a section of history and tell him exactly what portion to write down using notebook paper. Then I'd have him highlight the main topics in one color and the subtopics in another. Then he could organize the information in whatever format he wanted. Then repeat the process several times slowly backing away from how much information I've giving. So sort of like WWE, but mixed up a little for his individual needs.

[swimmermom3]

Nan, I remember the first time I read one of your posts on skill development. Lightbulb moment. I find it so easy to get caught up in the content and to overlook the skills. I've written this before but planning and teaching content is glamorous, teaching and practicing skills is not. I heartily agree with your do-over regrets. Unfortunately, I wasn't homeschooling my oldest at the time things began to go downhill. Perhaps if I had been, I would have seen how desperately she needed organizational and test-taking skills.

 

Things were different for my oldest son. I had him home for two of the three middle school years. His needs were more basic. I couldn't figure out what to do with him in math until his writing was at point where I could read it. His scores were consistently in the 40-50 percent. He could do the math very fast in his head, but it was completely lost in the translation to paper. He was so fast and careless. It took six months of having to correct the problems he got wrong and do an equal number of new problems for reinforcement for us to make progress. It was horrible. Then came the crushing news that I was backing him up in the math progression to solidify his skills in fractions, decimals, and percents. Sigh. The sad part is that he has a mind for math. Given a different start, I think he would find satisfaction and not frustration in the subject.

 

Nan, you always keep it real and I appreciate it.:grouphug:

[Nan in Mass]

I had to teach myself to take a spider and turn it into linear format - an outline. The translation isn't always obvious.

[Nan in Mass]

GRIN Well you were one of the ones who made me figure this all out, pulling me down out of the tree. Colleen in NC was the one who really did the hard work and then she explained it to me. I should have sited her when I wrote the posts. I'll go back and do it later.

-nan

[Wildiris]

Nan~

I keep circling around the idea of self-learning, but what you've described, and what the rest of us probably read in TWTM when we started our homeschool journey so long ago, is why TWTM approach to education effectively establishes the fundamentals of self-learning and life long learning.

 

 

What I've learned in my gyrations around this topic is not to underestimate the importance of copywork, narration, dictation, and outlining because these are the tools of independent learning.

 

I'd love to read Coleen in NC's post(s) Any possibility of a link?

 

Thanks for the inspired post.:001_smile:

[Nan in Mass]

Hmm... The part where she was explaining to me what she had figured out was done via emails, so there are no links. I remember her posting questions about how exactly outlining led to being able to write essays and research papers but I don't have links. It was somewhere between two and five years ago, I think? I could be wrong. I put a lot of the pieces together into chunks over the years. I just didn't put chunks together and arrive at the conclusion that dictation is the basis of being able to take notes from a college lecture and narration and outlining help with adult self-education until Jan, when my youngest was in Japan and it became apparent that he was becoming an adult right now (he grew up a lot in Japan) and I better finish up my part of teaching him skills by teaching him how to tackle a class and a textbook. That led to my researching study skills, and that led to me putting the chunks together. Sorry not to be more helpful. Maybe Colleen will chime in here?

-Nan

[ELaurie]

Here's my post:

Thank you again, Nan, for your wise and encouraging words.

 

As I said in my response to your post, I find myself reading TWTM over and over again in order to maintain my focus on the essential skills you reference in your post.

 

I attend every one of SWB's workshops, even if I've already heard them, at every conference I attend so that I can hear this message again.

 

This year, with a 5th grader and a 3rd grader, I am beginning the process of self education in earnest. I realize that what SWB says in her workshop on self education is true - if I don't read the classics now, I will be ill prepared to teach them when my dc are in HS. I don't have the foundation I'm attempting to provide for them myself; I'm learning the content at the same time that I'm learning how to teach the content.

 

As ds 11 enters the Logic Stage, I realize that the time is rapidly approaching when I will no longer be able to do this. I need time to think about this material before I can engage in a thoughtful discussion about it. I need to understand the "big picture" before I can understand the place of Plato, or Herodotus (fill in the blank) within the flow of history.

 

Right now I'm in the grammar / early logic stage myself.

 

So . . . I'm interested in learning how others are approaching self education.

 

For myself, I can tell you that my house is dusty, and the meals are boring :tongue_smilie:

 

I'm (finally) reading SWB's HOAW this year, along with DK's History: the Definitive Visual Guide. I'm taking notes, as SWB suggests in TWTM and TWEM. I'm summarizing the important people, places, dates and events in a notebook. I'm doing some of the assignments SWB recommends for HS in TWTM. I'm also reading ds 11's introductory logic text for next year.

 

It's tedious. Sometimes it's boring. Other things, including my children, need my attention.

 

But, I really feel like I need to continue to do this, if I am to equip myself to teach them in HS.

 

I'd love to learn from others who are doing this / BTDT :bigear:

 

And here's a link if you would like to reply :001_smile:

[Capt_Uhura]

ELaurie - We're almost twins! I have a 5th grader and a 2nd grader and a 4yr old. I'm in the exact same boat (I was going to say sinking boat but perhaps I'm bailing water out of it at the same rate water is going into it???) as you. I'd love to explore this further with you. I'll check out your other thread.

[ELaurie]

ELaurie - We're almost twins! I have a 5th grader and a 2nd grader and a 4yr old. I'm in the exact same boat (I was going to say sinking boat but perhaps I'm bailing water out of it at the same rate water is going into it???) as you. I'd love to explore this further with you. I'll check out your other thread.

 

I'd love to discuss this further too :001_smile:

[danybug]

Thank you for taking the time to detail your thoughts on all of this! It really got me thinking and inspired me. I am planning on following the WTM to a tee for my ds first logic year. It helps to put some perspective and experience behind some of the more tedious stuff.

 

I have avoided the narration and dictation work hitherto and I am going to need to back track a bit, but I now have my mind wrapped around it a little better with your wise words.

 

I was really good at studying and note taking etc in college and it came mostly from my organized efficient type personality. SO many of my friends REALLY struggled with all of that in college and especially boys it seemed. I want to make sure I am setting my kids up for success with this. Homeschooling limits their exposure to that aspect of a classroom setting with lectures, note taking and building a real strong study habit in a sense. I realize I need to make sure that I am equipping them to be able to ease right into the college lecture atmosphere.

[swimmermom3]

Wildiris, I will go through my subscribed threads and see if I can find a few of Colleen's posts along those lines. I know that usually when Nan comes down from her tree and turns her place over to me,:tongue_smilie: Colleen is there explaining it all over again. She is so patient and steadfast. I am such a slow learner that I feel like the proverbial hamster on the wheel, who is spinning so fast, that she gets flung off and does a face-plant into the wall. Then that idiot hamster jumps right back on that wheel just to have the pleasure of repeating a few more face-plants.

 

 

Hmm... The part where she was explaining to me what she had figured out was done via emails, so there are no links. I remember her posting questions about how exactly outlining led to being able to write essays and research papers but I don't have links. It was somewhere between two and five years ago, I think? I could be wrong. I put a lot of the pieces together into chunks over the years. I just didn't put chunks together and arrive at the conclusion that dictation is the basis of being able to take notes from a college lecture and narration and outlining help with adult self-education until Jan, when my youngest was in Japan and it became apparent that he was becoming an adult right now (he grew up a lot in Japan) and I better finish up my part of teaching him skills by teaching him how to tackle a class and a textbook. That led to my researching study skills, and that led to me putting the chunks together. Sorry not to be more helpful. Maybe Colleen will chime in here?

-Nan

 

Nan, I think it comes back to what you said about educating a moving target. If that target moves fast and moves sideways, backwards, and up and down and occasionally hurdles three steps in one leap, the process isn't going to be tidy. You as the teacher have to be able to weave, duck, roll, and side-step with the best of them. I am finding, to my chagrin, that the only way I can stay that flexible and maneuverable is to focus on the basics like copywork, dictation, and outlining. That leaves us the space and the ability to respond positively to the next learning opportunity.

 

I don't know if this is making sense. I just know that when I simplify our plans and focus on skills, we are able to do so much more with the content. It would be better if I had a solid plan for teaching those skills instead of the knee-jerk "find a gap, panic, research teaching the skill, and then teach the skill" process. I have nightmares that the boy will be able to manage calculus with ease as a senior, but will have no clue how to tie his shoes or some other basic skill.:001_huh:

[shanvan]

I have nightmares that the boy will be able to manage calculus with ease as a senior, but will have no clue how to tie his shoes or some other basic skill.:001_huh:

 

This really made me laugh! I hate to say it, but it's possible :tongue_smilie:. Along those lines, after backtracking and buckling down with DS (12) on many skill areas, I recently realized I was till tying his skates before skating lessons. I had to show him how to do it repeatedly and add 'practice tying skates' into his daily lessons. He put so much effort into, not tying his own laces, but arguing with me about why I do it better, complaining to me about the skates at the rink, etc! Finally, after a month, he is now tying his own laces. (sigh)

 

One of the instructors said, "I wondered if you were planning on continuing to tie his laces until he was 18 or something!"

 

Hummm...I just realized my DD (9) has only slip-on shoes. I don't think she knows how to tie laces of any kind. Yikes!

 

Shannon

[Nan in Mass]

LOL - or why we started community college with a drawing class and a speech class, not something like chemistry. The prof had to remind my son to put his name on the paper and explain how to "map" a concept, among other things. Sigh.

 

You are right. It helps to remember I am trying to adapt to a moving target. I forgot that you always say that.

And I, too, have noticed things go better when we concentrate on skills. I recently taught my son how to write an abstract and after the first few abstracts of articles in Science News (already abstracts LOL so it seems funny to abstract them but it seems to be working), he said, "If I did this every day I would learn so much science!" Sigh.

 

-Nan

[Nan in Mass]

If you do an advance search for posts by Colleen in NS with the keyword "outline" in them, quite a few posts show up. Or you could post and ask her directly. : ) She would probably be glad to talk to you.

-Nan

[swimmermom3]

LOL - or why we started community college with a drawing class and a speech class, not something like chemistry. The prof had to remind my son to put his name on the paper and explain how to "map" a concept, among other things. Sigh.

 

You are right. It helps to remember I am trying to adapt to a moving target. I forgot that you always say that.

And I, too, have noticed things go better when we concentrate on skills. I recently taught my son how to write an abstract and after the first few abstracts of articles in Science News (already abstracts LOL so it seems funny to abstract them but it seems to be working), he said, "If I did this every day I would learn so much science!" Sigh.

 

-Nan

 

Oh, yes. We are a year into practicing that skill and my usually competent son has yet to master the concept. Also, did you know that there are thousands of students (mostly boys) out there who do all of their homework and put it into their backpacks only to fail to ever turn it in?

 

For those members who do not make their kids put their names on their paper, do it from now on. No name, no credit. Such a small thing with big repercussions.

 

If you score math papers, be sure to have your kids figure out their own percentages. They will get lots of practice in converting fractions and they will have a far more realistic idea of how many questions they can miss and still get the desired grade. Then there is the "this is how a zero affects your grade average" exercise. Do it several times throughout middle and high school. Your children probably have no clue how long it takes to recover your grade if you fail to turn an assignment in.

 

Nan, I hope we aren't the only people who have to cover these skills.:tongue_smilie:

[Mommyfaithe]

The prof had to remind my son to put his name on the paper and explain how to "map" a concept, among other things. Sigh.

 

-Nan

 

We had this same experience. i make my younger kids write their name and the date on EVERYTHING they do...overkill...but maybe, just maybe...they will remember. :D

 

Faithe

[Nan in Mass]

I don't test and I don't grade, but I made my sons figure the percentage of math they were getting right quite frequently. It kept them from thinking they were doing fine when they got two out of three correct. I also made them figure a zero into a list of four percentages and then a 50% into the same list and see how drastically it changed things, then we did it with a list of eight. I remind all three of mine of this experiment from time to time and urge them to turn something, anything in rather than nothing, and to show up for the exams even if they aren't prepared.

And I completely believe you about those un-turned-in assignments. Sigh.

 

Good point!

-Nan

[Capt_Uhura]

Something to add to the list....put names on papers. Actually, my boys will sometimes put their first names on their papers, especially spelling quizzes etc but I suppose I should train them to also put their last name.

[Kuovonne]

i make my younger kids write their name and the date on EVERYTHING they do...overkill...but maybe, just maybe...they will remember.

 

I've been telling my DD that she needs to put her name and date on every piece of school paper for *three years.* She still forgets half the time.

 

I suppose I should train them to also put their last name.

 

Ack! When is it appropriate to insist on last names? Our last name is really long.

 

I already insist that they include the year when writing the date.

[HootyTooty]

This really made me laugh! I hate to say it, but it's possible :tongue_smilie:. Along those lines, after backtracking and buckling down with DS (12) on many skill areas, I recently realized I was till tying his skates before skating lessons. I had to show him how to do it repeatedly and add 'practice tying skates' into his daily lessons. He put so much effort into, not tying his own laces, but arguing with me about why I do it better, complaining to me about the skates at the rink, etc! Finally, after a month, he is now tying his own laces. (sigh)

 

One of the instructors said, "I wondered if you were planning on continuing to tie his laces until he was 18 or something!"

 

Hummm...I just realized my DD (9) has only slip-on shoes. I don't think she knows how to tie laces of any kind. Yikes!

 

Shannon

We should start a club, while my son could tie his shoes when he was 5, I realized a few months ago he had problem tying knots on things. I also realized his scissor skills were lacking.

[C_l_e_0..Q_c]

Ok, tell me, how does one 'map a concept'?

 

There's so many things I'm not teaching my kids. I never learned how to outline, so I don't teach it. I never needed it (yes, I have a bachelor degree, and a partial Masters which I quit cause I got a job I just had to take).

 

Sometimes I wonder about study skills. I don't think I never needed any. Maybe they were developped slowly over years of schooling. But I never did anything like outlining or mapping concepts...

[C_l_e_0..Q_c]

Sometimes I wonder about study skills.

 

Ok, pray tell, how does one teach the kiddos to stop playing with the dog while working on Spanish??

[Nan in Mass]

Grin - One puts the dog outside and keeps the children inside.

 

"Mapping a concept" turned out to be what we call making a spider. You put the main concept in the middle of the paper and put details about that concept around it, connecting them with lines. Then you put details around the details and connect them. Then you draw lines connecting anything else that is connected. It is best if you write the relationship along the lines. There might have been a certain way the teacher wanted it done, like circling the concepts and boxing the details, or using different colours for different types of things, but that is the general idea.

 

I learned outlining in 4th grade, found it easy, and then seldom used it after that. I have my own way of taking notes, a much less linear way. I find it difficult to generate ideas when writing an outline to write a paper, also. I do better writing the paper and then writing an outline from it, and then rewriting the paper.

-Nan

[C_l_e_0..Q_c]

Grin - One puts the dog outside and keeps the children inside.

 

<snip>

 

I do better writing the paper and then writing an outline from it, and then rewriting the paper.

-Nan

 

As for the dog outside, it's not quite appropriate in our weather... Poor dog would freeze to death, and then I'd have crying kids on my hands.

 

And I did the same for writing papers. In fact, in high school, I was known for handing in my first draft, and scoring over 90%. And I was in a strong private school. I just never saw the need for writing drafts and re-writing all the time. In colllege, I went into sciences, so there was less paper writing and more exam taking.

[Nan in Mass]

I forgot that some dogs don't have as much fur as ours. Ours only wants to come in briefly to warm up and then go out again, even when it is far below freezing and blowing hard. She loves the snow. Her problem is overheating in the summer. She digs a nice cool hole in the shade and lies in it, and when the sun moves around or her body heat warms up, she digs another nice cool hole. She is very considerate and doesn't do this anywhere we ever walk or stand - that leaves my garden.

-Nan

[swimmermom3]

Ok, tell me, how does one 'map a concept'?

 

There's so many things I'm not teaching my kids. I never learned how to outline, so I don't teach it. I never needed it (yes, I have a bachelor degree, and a partial Masters which I quit cause I got a job I just had to take).

 

Sometimes I wonder about study skills. I don't think I never needed any. Maybe they were developped slowly over years of schooling. But I never did anything like outlining or mapping concepts...

 

You were fortunate. From personal experience, it is not a path I would recommend. A student that has not learned age-appropriate study skills is at risk for more than a failing grade. Even more important than the basic study skills, teach your kids to work hard, really hard. Don't discuss "talent" and "gifts." Discuss patience and fortitude and ...hard work.

[Nan in Mass]

I've been worrying, so I added a PPPS onto my original post. : )

[Nan in Mass]

This is very good advice.

[creekmom]

deleted post and started a new thread

Edited March 21, 2011 by creekmom

[swimmermom3]

 

PPPS - Now that I see how many people have read this thread, I am having nightmares thinking that I have doomed some children to long boring days of drill. TWTM has lots of good ideas for making things less dry. TWTM says that what content you do should be allowed to go down bunny trails following your children's interests. TWTM recommends heavily illustrated spines, ones that my family, at least, found interesting even when we thought we weren't interested in the material. All the reading-to-oneself is a pleasant chore once one has learned to escape into a book, and TWTM has lots of reading time built into it, both reading aloud and reading silently and listening to audio books. Reading is still one of those foundation skills. Those fairy tales and folk tales and myths lighten the load. The grammar and logic stage science recs are hands-on and active. Your day should have lots of nice parts, too. TWTM says the skills should be attacked in a "nibbled to death by ducks" manner, a little bit consistently over time. If you do something like Kalmia suggested and establish some sort of routine for working on the skills, then you can just plug through your routine and everyone will know that it isn't forever until a nicer part of the day comes, and nobody has to think about it except when they are actually doing it. School is hard work, but it doesn't have all have to be hour upon hour of unpleasant drudgery at one thing. Think nibble nibble nibble, once the initial explanation is gone through. Cut the task down until it is taking too long. : )

 

Wonderful pps, Nan. The drilling doesn't have to be boring, but yes, occasionally it is. I would also agree with making it part of a routine. One thing we started several years ago was to have the kids pick a poem to read out loud every morning before our read aloud. When I discovered MCT, we added a brief, and I mean brief, poetry lesson once or twice a week. Poetry has always been a painless topic here, but I believe that is because it is a routine and because it is followed by the much-loved read aloud. We read every morning because frankly we are all too stupid to start on math until our brains have woken up.:tongue_smilie:

[Matryoshka]

This really made me laugh! I hate to say it, but it's possible :tongue_smilie:. Along those lines, after backtracking and buckling down with DS (12) on many skill areas, I recently realized I was till tying his skates before skating lessons. I had to show him how to do it repeatedly and add 'practice tying skates' into his daily lessons. He put so much effort into, not tying his own laces, but arguing with me about why I do it better, complaining to me about the skates at the rink, etc! Finally, after a month, he is now tying his own laces. (sigh)

 

:blush: I'm still tying my dd12's skates. Perhaps we should work on that... :blush:

[swimmermom3]

:blush: I'm still tying my dd12's skates. Perhaps we should work on that... :blush:

 

I know 17yo elite swimmers who don't pack their own swim bags. Watching someone, who is nearly an adult, berate her mother because the mother forgot to pack her goggles is just appalling. Fortunately, since the age of 6, Swimmer Dude has been good friends with the youngest of 5 in a serious swim family. He is completely self-sufficient at swim meets. I wish I had known to do that with his sister.

[Nan in Mass]

I found I had to tie my son and most of his friends' skates at that age when they came over to skate on our lake. I bought a skate tightener because I got blisters on my fingers after the third one. In their defense, many of the boys hadn't skated that much and were in borrowed skates. They didn't even know to unlace them a bit to get their feet in. I was always amazed at how patiently they would sit on the edge of the dock, waiting for me to get to them, and how they shot around the ice playing cutthroat if inept hockey as soon as I got them set LOL. I just figured since they lived barefoot or in rubber boots, a whole row of laces was hard work. My husband still does mine up for me. : ) By about 16, they were managing themselves. These boys were normally pretty independent. They were touchingly grateful for the help.

 

What about detangling long hair and braiding it? I learned to braid it in two braids to go to summer camp, but she braided it down the back until I went to college. I did my teenaged boys' hair when it got particularly bad, remembering that my mother had helped with mine even when I was a teenager, and braided it when it needed to be out of the way. I was a bit worried about that until I was with some Native American men one time and realized that someone always brushed their hair and braided it for them. They were the most independent batch of people I have ever met, so I stopped worrying.

 

Is it just boys? And not having a lot of experience with fibers, sewing and knitting, etc.? My sons sewed and crotcheted, but not nearly as much as I did growing up.

 

-Nan

[swimmermom3]

I found I had to tie my son and most of his friends' skates at that age when they came over to skate on our lake. I bought a skate tightener because I got blisters on my fingers after the third one. In their defense, many of the boys hadn't skated that much and were in borrowed skates. They didn't even know to unlace them a bit to get their feet in. I was always amazed at how patiently they would sit on the edge of the dock, waiting for me to get to them, and how they shot around the ice playing cutthroat if inept hockey as soon as I got them set LOL. I just figured since they lived barefoot or in rubber boots, a whole row of laces was hard work. My husband still does mine up for me. : ) By about 16, they were managing themselves. These boys were normally pretty independent. They were touchingly grateful for the help.

 

What about detangling long hair and braiding it? I learned to braid it in two braids to go to summer camp, but she braided it down the back until I went to college. I did my teenaged boys' hair when it got particularly bad, remembering that my mother had helped with mine even when I was a teenager, and braided it when it needed to be out of the way. I was a bit worried about that until I was with some Native American men one time and realized that someone always brushed their hair and braided it for them. They were the most independent batch of people I have ever met, so I stopped worrying.

 

Is it just boys? And not having a lot of experience with fibers, sewing and knitting, etc.? My sons sewed and crotcheted, but not nearly as much as I did growing up.

 

-Nan

 

Teaching kids how to sew buttons on, polish shoes, and iron. I know a lot of people don't iron, but my 16 yo son can do a great job with a dress shirt. He learned how to iron from a 3-tour soldier who taught ds's Civil Air Patrol drill team. It's kind of funny to see a few 6 foot teen boys entering a house carrying ironing boards, an iron, and spray starch.

[elegantlion]

Teaching kids how to sew buttons on, polish shoes, and iron. I know a lot of people don't iron, but my 16 yo son can do a great job with a dress shirt. He learned how to iron from a 3-tour soldier who taught ds's Civil Air Patrol drill team. It's kind of funny to see a few 6 foot teen boys entering a house carrying ironing boards, an iron, and spray starch.

 

:lol:

 

Carp! Ironing and sewing a button, adding to the life skills list. It's hard to figure out where to back off and let them struggle. Sometimes my son just wants me to do things for him because that's part of how he feels love. This weekend he was playing with Java code on his own, but this morning he wanted my help to figure out if HIS bacon was done enough. :confused: Aside from school, this whole "I want to be grown up, but don't quit being my mommy yet" is hard to balance.

[freerange]

It's hard to figure out where to back off and let them struggle. Sometimes my son just wants me to do things for him because that's part of how he feels love. This weekend he was playing with Java code on his own, but this morning he wanted my help to figure out if HIS bacon was done enough. :confused: Aside from school, this whole "I want to be grown up, but don't quit being my mommy yet" is hard to balance.

 

We have this too. Even the bacon. And I'm vegetarian.:lol:

[Robin in DFW]

I still braid my dd18's ponytail before every soccer practice or game. It's the only thing I really do FOR her anymore...well, that and help her put fresh sheets on her bed...she just can't get those corners down around that thick pillow top mattress...

 

My ds13 drinks a cup of coffee (decaf) each morning...he begs me to mix up the sugar and milk...he says it just doesn't taste as yummy when he does it himself...

 

My dd22 (never homeschooled and in college) has trouble peeling hardboiled eggs and usually seeks my help with this rather frustrating task...can't make her understand that running it under warm water really does loosen the shell a bit...and have patience...;)

 

Great thread.

Edited March 22, 2011 by Robin in DFW

[Sebastian (a lady)]

I know 17yo elite swimmers who don't pack their own swim bags. Watching someone, who is nearly an adult, berate her mother because the mother forgot to pack her goggles is just appalling. Fortunately, since the age of 6, Swimmer Dude has been good friends with the youngest of 5 in a serious swim family. He is completely self-sufficient at swim meets. I wish I had known to do that with his sister.

 

So I'm not really being neglectful, I'm equipping them for life.

 

I stopped providing hands on packing for sports and scouts. I will ask them questions about what they have and make suggestions. But I'm not packing for them.

 

With my oldest, I still have to remind him of how rainy his first big campout was. But it only takes that one reminder to pull everything out and repack it in plastic bags.

 

I was talking with another mom on over the weekend about the personalities of my kids. I mentioned that one was incredibly daring and would try anything, but would also put a lot of trust into his gear. Trust that the gear wasn't always worthy of. I told her that I thought this was one reason why military pilots have so many proceedures that they memorize and do the same way over and over. It makes their reactions to various conditions reflexive. With this oldest son, I need to work a lot on process and making certain steps reflexive. (With his brother, I need to work on getting him to not think everything to death.)

[Nan in Mass]

There are small things like this that I do for my adult children, too. And ones that my mother still does for me. At some point, the relationship changes from must-teach-this-and-reinforce-that to the more mutual adult one of making life easier and more pleasant for each other by doing little things for each other. The things like my husband tieing my skates for me become small acts of love and involvement. It is important, I think, not to miss the crossover point and be left with no little things you can do to help your loved ones. Yes, the 12yo who is having his skates tied every day probably needs to learn to do it himself, but sometimes these sorts of things are what I think of as "sending off" things. When I leave my parents' house, they always ask if I need help carrying things to the car, and they take something even when I could get them all myself. It makes an opportunity for them to sort of send me on my way with a pat and a wave and a you'll-be-fine. Sort of like tucking someone into bed. My oldest likes me to be around while he is packing to go back to school.

 

It probably depends on the family. My family is pretty close as adults (see-each-other-a-few-times-a-week close) and we don't mind being interconnected to the point where someone leaves a hole if they aren't there to do the things they usually do. We are all adults, of course, and can do most of them for ourselves (barring fixing plumbing and a few other real skill-type things), but dividing up the chores makes things easier and more friendly.

 

My tea tastes better when a family member puts the sugar and the milk in, too. : )

-Nan

[woolybear]

okay, reading this and freaking out,because I can barely get my kids to do basic math, copywork and read anything, but.....how does one teach test taking skills and organization for school work. I'm hopeless.......I need to be taught before I can teach any of this....eek......my kids will be lost at college, assuming they could get in or we could pay for it. And yes, I tie my 10 yos skates too.

[Sebastian (a lady)]

There are small things like this that I do for my adult children, too. And ones that my mother still does for me. At some point, the relationship changes from must-teach-this-and-reinforce-that to the more mutual adult one of making life easier and more pleasant for each other by doing little things for each other. The things like my husband tieing my skates for me become small acts of love and involvement. It is important, I think, not to miss the crossover point and be left with no little things you can do to help your loved ones. Yes, the 12yo who is having his skates tied every day probably needs to learn to do it himself, but sometimes these sorts of things are what I think of as "sending off" things. When I leave my parents' house, they always ask if I need help carrying things to the car, and they take something even when I could get them all myself. It makes an opportunity for them to sort of send me on my way with a pat and a wave and a you'll-be-fine. Sort of like tucking someone into bed. My oldest likes me to be around while he is packing to go back to school.

 

It probably depends on the family. My family is pretty close as adults (see-each-other-a-few-times-a-week close) and we don't mind being interconnected to the point where someone leaves a hole if they aren't there to do the things they usually do. We are all adults, of course, and can do most of them for ourselves (barring fixing plumbing and a few other real skill-type things), but dividing up the chores makes things easier and more friendly.

 

My tea tastes better when a family member puts the sugar and the milk in, too. : )

-Nan

 

This is a sweet observation. And it can be tough to find the balance point.

 

You want your kids to be capable. But you want them to know that you as their parents will always be dependable. Constantly shifting balance.

[Nan in Mass]

I have a site recommendation that can help with test-taking skills (a little - sigh - this is hard).

 

And I have a book recommendation that can help with the organization part.

 

I'll come back and post them in a bit but right now I am supposed to be commenting on two papers not checking this GRIN.

 

=Nan

[Nan in Mass]

Here is the book: That Crumpled Paper Was Due Last Week

And the site is: http://www.bucks.edu/~specpop/topics.htm

: )

-Nan

[Joyofsixreboot]

So much to contemplate. We're good on life skills. The only person I'm packing for is three. I, like an earlier poster, never learned "study skills" . I wrote my master's thesis from a stack of xerox copies w/ o a draft. I have no idea how to teach my younger kids this stuff. The first four have worked it out on their own but number five is not a student. Checking out the study skill link next.

[woolybear]

Here is the book: That Crumpled Paper Was Due Last Week

And the site is: http://www.bucks.edu/~specpop/topics.htm

: )

-Nan

 

 

Thank you. That looks very helpful. I bookmarked it, because I think I will need to reread it.

[Colleen in NS]

Colleen in NC was the one who really did the hard work and then she explained it to me.

 

I'd love to read Coleen in NC's post(s)

 

 

Maybe Colleen will chime in here?

 

LOL, I just opened this thread to look for a post I had seen of Nan's a day or so ago (can't find it - must look elsewhere), and I see references to me. I'll have a closer read later and reply if I have anything to add.

 

There are small things like this that I do for my adult children, too. And ones that my mother still does for me. At some point, the relationship changes from must-teach-this-and-reinforce-that to the more mutual adult one of making life easier and more pleasant for each other by doing little things for each other. The things like my husband tieing my skates for me become small acts of love and involvement. It is important, I think, not to miss the crossover point and be left with no little things you can do to help your loved ones. Yes, the 12yo who is having his skates tied every day probably needs to learn to do it himself, but sometimes these sorts of things are what I think of as "sending off" things. When I leave my parents' house, they always ask if I need help carrying things to the car, and they take something even when I could get them all myself. It makes an opportunity for them to sort of send me on my way with a pat and a wave and a you'll-be-fine. Sort of like tucking someone into bed. My oldest likes me to be around while he is packing to go back to school.

 

It probably depends on the family. My family is pretty close as adults (see-each-other-a-few-times-a-week close) and we don't mind being interconnected to the point where someone leaves a hole if they aren't there to do the things they usually do. We are all adults, of course, and can do most of them for ourselves (barring fixing plumbing and a few other real skill-type things), but dividing up the chores makes things easier and more friendly.

 

My tea tastes better when a family member puts the sugar and the milk in, too. : )

-Nan

 

Well, I came looking for another of your posts, but I'll take this one, too. Ahhhh....so refreshing to read this. You ALWAYS give me a new perspective on something.

 

EDIT: Oh, DUH, Colleen!!!!! *This* is the thread I was looking for. It's Nan's OP that caught my eye! Thanks, Nan, once again for reminding of us all that stuff. It was a pick-me-up for a very tired mother the other day.

Edited March 24, 2011 by Colleen in NS

[Colleen in NS]

I hope you all don't mind me raising this thread again - in internetland, I know it might be old. I didn't see it on the weekend as I was busy all day Sat. and my b-day was Sunday, and right before the weekend I was trying to keep up with a mushrooming thread that I'd started and wanted to follow through with that on Monday...so I never really noticed this one til today (except for a quick look at Nan's OP).

 

Nan, I just want you to know that your OP was a refresher to me, as I am quite tired right now. The old winter blues fading away, but spring is still cold here, and I was sick during our two weeks off in Feb., so I didn't get to do any of the fun projects I wanted to do. I've slacked on some schoolish things the past couple of weeks and wished I had other WTMers around me IRL....so to come here and read a fresh take/kick in the pants/encouragement to keep on with this whole education thing, was great. Don't ever worry that you are getting repetitive or anything. I need it! Maybe others do, too.

 

The advantage of this system is that if you get these academic skills down, high school content subjects are hard work but straight forward. For any subject, you pick a spine (doesn't have to be a textbook - it can be any sort of overview), study it (read, outline, summarize it), figure out what skills are involved and learn them (laboratory skills if it is a science), figure out which bits need to be memorized and memorize them, and then pick areas that are particularly interesting to you and investigate them further by doing research - reading and writing about them about them, and doing experiments. This is the pattern that adults follow when they learn anything using an academic way.

 

This is SO good to hear from someone with older kids, and one who is university-educated and whom I perceive to be smart in ways I want to be smart, too. :D What you talk about in this quote is the way I suspect things should work out in high school and beyond; it's what seems to make sense to me after puzzling for years over the methods and threads and weavings of the WTM; and it's good to just read someone else saying that. Someone who is outside of my mind. :D

 

..planning and teaching content is glamorous, teaching and practicing skills is not.

 

Yeah. I think this is why I'm tired right now. I'm at that homeschool phase now where I am bored, my oldest is bored, we are bored with doing skills work. So this is when I slack a little, figure out how to liven things up at times, let some things slide for a week or two, and tell myself, "In a few more years, many of these skills will be second nature and will make room and ability for a few new skills that will add life. Colleen, it *will* be worth it in a few more years. Slack today, but pick it up again and keep going. You don't really have a great grasp on some grammar concepts that will help you in the long run. But you will." (now, could someone just echo that back to me, please?)

 

Hmm... The part where she was explaining to me what she had figured out was done via emails, so there are no links. I remember her posting questions about how exactly outlining led to being able to write essays and research papers but I don't have links. It was somewhere between two and five years ago, I think? I could be wrong. I put a lot of the pieces together into chunks over the years. I just didn't put chunks together and arrive at the conclusion that dictation is the basis of being able to take notes from a college lecture and narration and outlining help with adult self-education until Jan, when my youngest was in Japan and it became apparent that he was becoming an adult right now (he grew up a lot in Japan) and I better finish up my part of teaching him skills by teaching him how to tackle a class and a textbook. That led to my researching study skills, and that led to me putting the chunks together. Sorry not to be more helpful. Maybe Colleen will chime in here?

-Nan

 

In a nutshell, about three years ago I kept posting questions on here, asking how copywork/dictation and narration, plus outlining/rewriting led to essay writing for high school. I just couldn't see a "thread", and I didn't know what I should be aiming to do by the end of grade 8 or so. But then when I went to the WTM conf. in May 2009, and SWB gave all her new writing talks, I took many, many pages of notes (I've never concentrated so hard in my life!!!) and suddenly so many things started to fall into place in my mind. So I started blabbing about it here, because I was so relieved and wanted to talk about it with others who also struggled. Wildiris, if you're still looking for posts, you could start in early May 2009.

 

Interesting what you wrote, Nan, about dictation leading to notetaking from lectures. I clued in to this fairly recently, too. And I tested my theory a few months ago by having my ds listen to a TTC astronomy lecture, and told him to "take notes" - write down the things you think are most important or interesting, and don't worry about trying to keep up with the lecturer (I figured this was good advice for a then-12yo-first time lecture notetaker who used to hate handwriting). I told him it would be sort of like dictation, but he didn't have to write whole sentences, just words/phrases that seemed important and that *he* would understand when he looked at them later. I also told him it would be like narration and outlining, with their skills of being able to pick out the most important ideas. Once he understood that, we watched the video, and I tried really hard not to say anything the whole 30 minutes. I just watched out of the corner of my eye, to see if he was even writing. He was! It was as though he'd done it all his life - every two or three minutes, he'd furiously write down another phrase or two, and go back to paying attention to the video. So I was glad to see that my theory seemed to be working out. (I don't know if it will go this smoothly with my daughter - I know every child is different with a different timeline - we shall see when she is ready) When he was done, he said that it was an alright experience (meaning not stressful). I looked at his notes, and casually asked him to explain back to me what he had taken notes about, and it was no problem. Then I told him that sometimes people take lecture notes and rewrite them into sentences so they remember the content better, and that we might try that later in high school. And that we would do the notetaking thing again sometime this year, and gradually work more and more of it into his high school years.

 

Anyway, my point is, that like you, Nan, I could also see now the earlier skills played right into lecture notetaking. Also, I started off with letting him pick the lecture, so the interest would override any pain in learning a new skill. I figure I can throw in a boring lecture or two much later, when he is comfortable with the skill - because I'm sure he will have to listen to *some* boring lectures in his lifetime.

 

Nan, remember when we talked about art skills one time, too? I don't think these are exactly crucial to future work, but when I was doing Drawing With Children with my kids a few years ago (we did it off and on over three years and finished it last summer sometime), I realized how important to learning that drawing (really, seeing) skills could be. It was a case of, I took a WTM rec, tried it out, though I only saw it as "I guess I should do art with my kids" at the time; and bingo, a revelation came. And then I clued in to the fact that drawing is foundational for painting, both of which are two-dimensional (although eventually you have to learn to see three dimensions and put them two dimensionally onto paper); and sculpture (the third art skill mentioned in WTM logic stage - and yes we are doing sculpture this semester, after doing the painting book last semester) is three dimensional and so the drawing/painting sequence precedes sculpting. I guess artists already know this, but I didn't.

 

Even something as obscure as fibre arts. I love fibre arts in general, and one day I clued in that one of the things I've always loved to do (crochet) was a form of weaving. Then I realized, so is knitting! So is macrame. Weaving together a fabric of some kind. Start with a plant or animal fibre, spin it into a thread, weave that thread into a fabric, and possibly cut and sew that fabric into a usable item. It's as if the mind-training via the skills in WTM jump-started me to be able to see patterns and sequences in other areas.

 

Now, where was I.....OK, I guess I'm sort of on track, with this being a skills thread....

 

Colleen is there explaining it all over again.

 

Colleen is there explaining it all over again, because she also constantly needs reassurance about what she's doing; and because when she writes things out to answer a question or think something through with someone, she is forced to think about what she is doing, all over again. And taking her theories and learnings from her oldest and figuring out how to apply them to her daughter. Seriously. I love the WTMers here - you all help me, too.

[Nan in Mass]

Colleen - Do you know about the Smithsonian's crocheted coral reef? Talk about fiber arts!!! I actually got to see it this last November. It was awe inspiring! Here is a link http://crochetcoralreef.org/ I have fabulous pictures. I will email some to you if your internet access is good enough to receive them without coughing.

-Nan

[Nan in Mass]

Added a bit to emphasize further that love of learning is built by getting to choose what to investigate and write about (what to add to the content spines), and by being good enough at the academics that they aren't a struggle. The tiger mom threads point that out. And a PPPPS LOL. I also finally got around to going back and rereading and fixing any errors.

-Nan