Language Arts Curriculum

[proudmomma23]

I used Sing, Spell, Read and Write last year and loved it, the K-1 combo. However, I have NO IDEA what to go with this year. Please help me. Writing is my DS weakest subject, Reading is strongest. I need lots of suggestions!

[boscopup]

WWE is excellent for struggling writers. It works on the separate skills before trying to combine them.

 

There are tons of spelling programs that could work well. Is he a good speller or does he struggle there too? That can help people give recommendations.

 

For reading, we just do good books and discuss them.

[proudmomma23]

What is WWE? He is a decent speller. I use Horizons Spelling for that and it has helped a lot. Should I consider Sonlight? It's so $$, but if it's worth it I will.

[Erika]

WWE = Writing with ease

 

Its really great for teaching kids to write in small steps. If handwriting is a issue then Handwriting without Tears is good for that problem.

[morosophe]

WWE is excellent for struggling writers. It works on the separate skills before trying to combine them.

...

 

For reading, we just do good books and discuss them.

 

:iagree: My son is a struggling writer/fairly good reader as well. I switched to Writing with Ease because it seems to highlight exactly the areas my son needed help with: if your son seems to have trouble with general comprehension (as opposed to struggling with decoding what a particular set of letters says), it might be worth looking into for him, as well.

 

For what it's worth, I think the actual physical work of writing is more difficult for boys than for girls at the kindergarten/first grade levels, and it impacts their writing. It also might be true that boys tend to be behind in writing skills for other reasons--I'm not a developmental expert, but in general that seems to be true. I've read a lot of comments praising Writing with Ease specifically because it seems to work well for boys by slowing things down for them.

[boscopup]

I've not heard great things about Sonlight's language arts program. Their readers are good suggestions, though you don't have to buy those from them, and the reader schedule, if you want it, is very cheap. The core of the program is living book based history, so you'd have to decide if you want to do their history or not. I don't use Sonlight, but I do check their reader lists for ideas to do literature for my own son. I also pick other books that I hear about on the boards or that I remember as a child.

 

Your spelling sounds fine. If it's working, keep it! :)

 

I suggest listening to SWB's lecture on teaching writing in the elementary years. It's excellent. She talks a LOT about boys specifically, because yes, they often develop the fine motor skills to write later than girls do. My own writing phobic son is just starting to have an easier time writing. We've been working on it, bit by bit. Now I'm comfortable with doing R&S English with him - written, not oral (not all the exercises, but enough to give good practice with the grammar skills being taught). At the beginning of this semester, he could not have done that. Huge change!

 

It's hard to watch these boys, when their brains are capable of thinking of excellent things to say about something, but they just can't physically write it down. The skills do eventually come together, supposedly. ;) So keep working the individual skills. Copywork, dictation, and narration (the basis of WWE) are excellent for working those skills and developing a child that can write down their thoughts properly.

[morosophe]

Should I consider Sonlight? It's so $$, but if it's worth it I will.

 

I would say NO to Sonlight's Language Arts curriculum. I did purchase it for this last year. I got the one to coordinate with what's now called the second grade reading level readers. What a mistake! The first day of every week, my son did copywork; the second day, he discussed something relating to that topic, whether a grammar concept or a writing technique or trope. Often he would rewrite the copywork sentence to explore a different writing choice or to make a point. (Some examples, just off the top of my head: pronouns, adverbs, similes.) That part of the program worked just fine.

 

However, the third and fourth day of a week were always composition work, and they were way, way too hard for my son. Plus, the actual writing of the story would be down to me, since my child was at the level where a five-word copywork sentence was considered sufficient (at least at the beginning of the year), and that was way too time-intensive.

 

Writing with Ease suited us much better, once I switched halfway through the year. It's still scheduled for four days a week, but the schedule goes: copywork, narration, copywork, narration. The copywork is chosen to go with First Language Lessons, but you could easily just point out what it's intended to teach (such as that the names of cities are always capitalized) as groundwork for a later formal grammar, or alter it to fit whatever grammar you are using. The narration involves reading a short passage to your child and then asking him questions to see what he retains, and then having him tell you "one thing about the passage." That's all it is, in first grade (which, for some reason, is where I'm assuming you are), but that provided plenty for my son to work on.

[Michelle My Bell]

After years of schooling, I would say that I recommend:

 

First Language Lessons - Grammar

 

Writing With Ease - Writing

 

All About Spelling - Spelling

 

 

That is the magic mix in my house.

[proudmomma23]

Thank YOU!!!! I am enjoying all of these thoughts and ideas. Yes, DS is entering 2nd grade. On his CAT test, he scored low in language usage and grammer and high in reading comprehension. But, I will definitely look into WWE. I'm still open for more ideas if something else works in your household.

[morosophe]

Well, if he's going into second grade, and you want an alternative for First Language Lessons, consider Rod & Staff grammar. (Their second grade grammar book, which is the first year of grammar they provide, is Preparing to Build.) That's what I'm going to start my son on next year. He's very visual, so the oral nature of First Language Lessons would be a total flop for him. (That's part of why we needed Writing with Ease, actually, to work on his comprehension of information gained aurally. He actually doesn't do badly at comprehending the stuff he's read, despite my little foray into decoding versus comprehension above.)

[Michelle My Bell]

Well, if he's going into second grade, and you want an alternative for First Language Lessons, consider Rod & Staff grammar. (Their second grade grammar book, which is the first year of grammar they provide, is Preparing to Build.) That's what I'm going to start my son on next year. He's very visual, so the oral nature of First Language Lessons would be a total flop for him. (That's part of why we needed Writing with Ease, actually, to work on his comprehension of information gained aurally. He actually doesn't do badly at comprehending the stuff he's read, despite my little foray into decoding versus comprehension above.)

 

I would use the 2nd half of First Language Lessons if it is something that interests you and then move into Rod and Staff grade 3. We love this program as well.

[SnMomof7]

We use - narration from our readings, copywork from our Bible readings (mostly), Rod and Staff, All About Spelling :). Works great!

[Ecclecticmum]

After years of schooling, I would say that I recommend:

 

First Language Lessons - Grammar

 

Writing With Ease - Writing

 

All About Spelling - Spelling

 

 

That is the magic mix in my house.

 

:iagree: Thats the basics of what we are planning to use next year. This year (k) We are using Sonlight LA K, ETC Primers, and Language Lessons for little Ones Vol 1, plus ETC wallchart, Rock N Learn, and all sorts of other bits & programs.

 

Next year we will be using the above, plus Explode the Code books & Online program, and possibly still queens LL, and as I said many many other bits & pieces lol.

 

The ones OP quoted as the basics though, they are all fantastic programs. I am just one of those nuts that has to add every possible extra on top of them lol.

[gswhitfield21]

We have used Shurley Grammar, which is a scripted program that has jingles to aid in the memorization of parts of speech, etc. I found it to be a sound foundation. Then we were side-tracked by CC and used Essentials of the English language, and my ds test scores plummeted that year. I felt it did not provide enough practical application for him. So I added in some other resources this year.

 

For my youngest, I just bought First Language Lesson from Peace Hill Press and Writing with Ease. He has resisted Grammar studies this year, so I hope these programs will be a gentle introduction for him. Time will tell!

 

For my older, we stated Classical Writing and are using Harvey's Grammar. We are also using IEW's Fix-it! editing program. It has provided the extra practical application that he needed. After Harvey's I may continue with Rod and Staff for High School.

 

In retrospect, I probably would have stayed with Shurley Grammar. However, I would supplement the writing with WWE or CW.

[Guest]

Phonics Road or McRuffy.

[Ellie]

Isn't there another SSRW level? If so, why not use that?

[johnandtinagilbert]

Since you used SWR, you may really appreciate The Phonics Road. It is a like a cousin to SWR, so you will pick up with skills from SWR and then move along in writing skills with the literature study. It's an amazing program and will cover ALL of your language arts needs -- all of them! My blog has tons of info.

[proudmomma23]

There is a second level to SSRW, but I've read a lot of reviews on it and they weren't too exciting. I didn't think SSRW prepared my DS well in the writing department, sentence structure, paragraphs, story-telling, etc...