10 yr old SOTW narration

[Mom-ninja.]

I need some honest feedback. Please tell me if I have reason to panic or if I need to have faith that it will come together. Here is my 4th grader's history narration. I tried not to lead him because I wanted to post what he comes up with on his own. This was after he answered the review questions. He narrated and I wrote.

 

"The Spanish wanted to invade the Aztecs because they thought the roads were made of gold and the walls were made of jewels. So he launched an army. The Aztecs welcomed them in because they thought that they were gods. They gave buckets of gold and shields made of gold until the Spanish started to argue with the Aztecs, and they started to fight. They were forced in a chamber in the palace. Then one night the roads were empty so they walked out and built a bridge. The Aztecs were in their canoes and attacked them. The Spanish came back with another army and defeated the Aztecs."

 

 

There are so many things wrong that it makes me groan. He never once mentions Cortes by name. He uses too many pronouns and you can't tell who is who. It's just choppy, jumps around, and not coherent. He puts in too much detail in certain areas and not enough in others.

 

I read this and want to bang my head in the wall.

 

He is doing WWE 3 (week 20) right now. If I spoon feed him with questions to lead him to what he should narrate then his narrations are obviously better. However, I also have to tell *how* to word his sentences. I'm trying to get him to use better vocabulary because he'll sit there and say, "so.....because.......so.......then......" He over uses pronouns and is never clear about who or what he's talking about.

 

He can do dictation very well. His narrations make me want to scream and pull my hair out.

Edited April 21, 2011 by Kleine Hexe

[Halcyon]

I think the pronoun thing is a guy thing ;) My husband CONSTANTLY does this when telling me a story, leaving me saying "Wait-who is 'he'? What 'they' are you talking about?"

 

That said, I think it might help if you had him write fewer sentences--perhaps about just one aspect of the story. Have you asked him to write just one sentence about, say, the first paragraph? Then you can have him rewrite that sentence, clarifying the pronouns.

 

You might also consider (depending on his personality) letting him play teacher, while you write a narration--this is a fun game we play sometime. You read a section of a book or story and then write a narration (you purposely try and do the narration the way your son might, using non-specific pronouns, forgetting to name people, etc.) Then you have him correct your work. It might help him "get" the problem better. We do this with my son once in a while, and it has helped him better see the gaps in his thinking by correcting my work. It would have to be a story that he's not familiar with, and you can help him "play the teacher role" by saying things like "So, teacher, is it clear who I am talking about here?" or "You do understand who that "he" refers to, right?" and basically hamming it up.

 

Again, this has worked with my son (he loves to correct me LOL) so it might be a fun change of pace for your son. Also, you might ask him to re-read his work, asking the question "who is this referring to?" every time he encounters one of his own pronouns--that might clarify for him when he needs to be more specific.

[Mom-ninja.]

One of the issues he has is picking out the important parts of a passage. He can go on and on with details that are not relevant to the main point. He does this in his every day conversation as well.

 

I think I'll try the role reversal. Would be a nice change instead of me sitting there cringing.

[Halcyon]

Okay, so how bout playing another game (can you see a theme here lol)? Let's pretend you have a bomb you need to dismantle in the next 30 seconds. Your son has read the instruction manual, and needs to give you the quick and dirty on how to disarm it. Could he do it? What would he say? You'd have to figure out how to incorporate this--maybe you'd write up a detailed passage including information on the pretend bomb's history, how it was built, what it looks like, interspersed with information on how to disarm it. He would have to pull that information out and give it to you.

 

Is this too weird? We do stuff like this a lot :lol: Not bombs, necessarily, but whatever it takes!!!! :tongue_smilie:

[Kuovonne]

Since you sound so frustrated, I just want to point out some things that your son is getting right in his narration. (It sounds like you already know the problems he has.)

 

The narration is orderly and sequential. The paragraph sets up the topic (the Spanish wanting to invade) and continues to the resolution of that topic (the Spanish ultimately defeating the Aztecs). I might not be able to tell *who* was involved, but I can tell generally *what* happened and what order the events happened in.

 

He does a good job explaining the *why* behind the action: why the Spanish wanted to invade, why the Aztecs initially welcomed them, why they fought,

 

He uses rich sentences with varied sentence structure. If he were handwriting for himself, he might not punctuate correctly, but he is still using robust sentences.

 

His words fit together well.

"The Spanish wanted to ... because they thought .... The Aztecs welcomed them ... because they thought ..." (Nice parallel structure between contrasting what each group did because of what they thought.)

 

"the roads were made of gold and the walls were made of jewels" (great parallel images)

 

"launched an army," "forced into a chamber in the palace" (strong verb)

 

"buckets of gold," (imagery)

 

"argue with the Aztecs," "built a bridge," "another army" (alliteration)

[Garga]

Well....here's my theory:

 

When I write a paper (I take college classes here and there), I start by writing a horrible rough draft and then re-write it and re-write it over and over again. I re-write every line of every paper at least 8 times. At least. And by the time I'm done, my papers are pretty good! (To toot my own horn.)

 

In my mind, a narrative is a rough draft. And I would expect it to be embarrassingly bad.

 

In the little writing program I'm using with my son, it asks the child to write a rough draft, and then revise it against a checklist. The checklist has things like, Did you use the exact name for things? (meaning use Cortez instead of "he"). Did you use colorful adjectives? , etc.

 

I think if you consider his narrative as a rough draft, that it's not so bad. I know that the examples of narratives in the SOTW activity manual are much more polished than your son's. But I'm not exactly convinced that they should be more polished at the 4th grade level.

 

However, to solve your issue and feel that you can make progress, maybe, for a time, you could have him revise his narratives. If you show him the mistakes and work with him on them for a few months, he may create better narratives from the get-go, without needing a revision.

Edited April 21, 2011 by Garga

[Garga]

I think the pronoun thing is a guy thing ;) My husband CONSTANTLY does this when telling me a story, leaving me saying "Wait-who is 'he'? What 'they' are you talking about?"

 

 

:::snort!!::: You must live in my house.

[Erika in TX]

What if you wrote a list of people/events that he should include in his narrations? Then he would have the key names and such to refer to and it would help him organize his thoughts.

[Aubrey]

Narrations make me want to bang my head against a wall, so take this w/... maybe a whole carton of salt.

 

You had your ds do this w/out too much leading. What would happen if he put it away & got it back out in a day or two? Would he find some of his mistakes?

 

Then in another day or two, ask him questions about the 2nd draft; have him revise again.

 

Never more than 2-3 times, I'd think, at least before highschool. But seeing what he's written w/ fresh eyes & then thr someone else's eyes can be surpising & helpful.

[Mom-ninja.]

Thanks to everyone. Thanks for pointing out the positive and for the suggestions.

 

He needs more guidance from me, and I have to remind myself that that's normal. I shall not panic. I shall not panic. :)

[heliconian]

One of the issues he has is picking out the important parts of a passage. He can go on and on with details that are not relevant to the main point.

 

My 10 year old had this exact same issue until a few months ago. Then he suddenly stopped drowning us in detail and could summarize concisely. I have no idea what happened that made the difference, though.

 

- Ellen