How often do you do all the LA components in 1st grade?

[LittleIzumi]

My brain hurts. :lol:

 

Phonics (ETC)

Spelling (AAS, eventually Wheeler's Speller)

Grammar (Me-made, eventually MCT)

Handwriting (she's doing cursive & print, by choice, both HWoT)

Copywork (from our unit studies)

Reading (books, not a program)

I haven't even tried to fit in formal narration & dictation. We just narrate from our readings sometimes.

 

LA is not her favorite subject :tongue_smilie:. Trying to schedule it all gives me a headache, lol.

[boscopup]

Ok, well first, I don't do phonics AND spelling. I pick one or the other. We dropped separate phonics when we started AAS, but my son was also reading well at that point already. I know your DD is taking off with reading after her VT, so you may not need ETC as long either. ;)

 

We used WWE for our copywork/narrations, plus I did narrations (oral) in history and Bible. We do a lot of oral narrations here. He actually likes them, as long as he doesn't have to write them. :D

 

For grammar, I used FLL1 and 2 at different points, though both were too easy for him in first grade. I could have just done what you're doing and gotten the same result. :tongue_smilie:

 

Now my schedule was:

 

Spelling - daily

Grammar - 3 times a week

WWE - 4 times a week

Handwriting practice (extra copywork) - 2 times a week - on the days that he didn't have writing in WWE

 

If we had needed phonics for reading, I would have done phonics 5 days a week, but not worried about spelling, or maybe just do AAS a couple days a week.

 

Now in 2nd grade, we're doing:

 

Spelling - daily (unless I'm lazy like I was this week)

Grammar - 3 times a week

WWE - 3 times a week (combining days 1 and 2 sine day 1 has no writing)

Cursive handwriting - daily

 

Oh, and with both grades, I had him read daily, of course. ;)

[linguistmama]

I would also only use phonics or spelling. In your case it seems like AAS would be enough. I would do either handwriting or copywork. For K we did handwriting and we just do copywork now that DD1 is forming letters well. I think I would worry about grammar after you get into a routine with the other LA pieces.

[SorrelZG]

I empathize, except that LA is DS's "thing".

 

Phonics is daily. We're reviewing and then this will be dropped.

Spelling is five days/wk. (dictation happens here)

FLL is currently 5/wk but once we drop the Phonics review and add Latin it will drop to 3/3, alternating (initial plans).

Reading is daily.

Copywork alternating with Handwriting curriculum (we have a request to learn cursive here, too), 2/2.

I do narration 5/wk after HOD's scheduled read aloud (or our own .. it's kind of becoming a habit).

Edited September 23, 2011 by SCGS

[chepyl]

Phonics - I have a VERY informal workbook we use a few times a week. It is just to review some of what he knows and reinforce some harder concepts (hard and soft g and c, silent e). We have a set of flashcards with the vowel spellings. We use them occasionally. We have worked through the spellings of long a and i with these. Not a daily activity. More of a "I need to answer the phone, do this worksheet quickly" activity.

 

Spelling - 3 days a week when we do lists, 4-5 days a week when we do dictation. We alternate weeks - list study week 1, dictation from list week 2. We use Spelling Plus and the Dictation book.

 

Grammar - Daily, mostly oral. I make worksheet pages for him to correct sometimes.

 

Handwriting - Dictation is his handwriting practice in those weeks, 2-3 times a week from Copywork in the spelling list weeks. We have not started cursive yet. We may start in January, then we will do handwriting worksheets more regularly. I remind him that all of his writing should be his best work.

 

Copywork - done in spelling list weeks. But not daily.

 

Reading - Daily, he reads 15-30 minutes silently each day. He also reads aloud from his grammar lesson daily. We do story time at bedtime regularly.

 

Narration - Daily. He must come and tell me about what he read. And he narrates back to me after history or science readings. Sometimes it requires more questions from me, but he is getting better.

 

**I combine a lot of things. I think any written work should be considered handwriting practice. I think narration can be practiced with content subjects and silent reading practice. Integrating LA into other subjects makes it less painful. It does not seen like an extra subject or more work to do. It becomes less busy work, too.

[SorrelZG]

 

Handwriting - Dictation is his handwriting practice in those weeks, 2-3 times a week from Copywork in the spelling list weeks. We have not started cursive yet. We may start in January, then we will do handwriting worksheets more regularly. I remind him that all of his writing should be his best work.

 

 

Ooo! Good thought .. DS's spelling involves copywork along with dictation.

 

Is there a reason to do copywork a la WWE if you're using copy/dictation for spelling? If not, I'm dropping it.

 

Still only going to do cursive 2-3 times a week until he can do his regular writing with it.

[Whereneverever]

My brain hurts. :lol:

 

Phonics (ETC)

Spelling (AAS, eventually Wheeler's Speller)

Grammar (Me-made, eventually MCT)

Handwriting (she's doing cursive & print, by choice, both HWoT)

Copywork (from our unit studies)

Reading (books, not a program)

I haven't even tried to fit in formal narration & dictation. We just narrate from our readings sometimes.

 

LA is not her favorite subject :tongue_smilie:. Trying to schedule it all gives me a headache, lol.

I'd try to do phonics, handwriting/writing, and reading daily. I'd rotate the rest throughout the week. I also wouldn't pick up dictation until she can drop handwriting and possibly spelling.

[MerryAtHope]

My brain hurts. :lol:

 

Phonics (ETC)

Spelling (AAS, eventually Wheeler's Speller)

Grammar (Me-made, eventually MCT)

Handwriting (she's doing cursive & print, by choice, both HWoT)

Copywork (from our unit studies)

Reading (books, not a program)

I haven't even tried to fit in formal narration & dictation. We just narrate from our readings sometimes.

 

LA is not her favorite subject :tongue_smilie:. Trying to schedule it all gives me a headache, lol.

 

AAS is a complete phonics program, so you could combine there. I don't do grammar in 1st grade, other than informally (gently correcting their grammar as they speak--ie, "Mom, I throwed the ball as high as the tree!" me: "Wow, you threw the ball as high as the tree?" etc...)

 

I only do handwriting at this age, not copywork. In fact, I would make sure that the copywork is not above her phonics level (definitely not beyond her reading level, but preferably also not beyond her spelling level. Copywork that is too advanced can actually work against the strategies you are trying to teach in phonics for many kids). As they grew, I incorporated both, but not on the same day--I would do either handwriting OR copywork, not both in one day.

 

Reading--yup :-).

 

Narration--1st grade is pretty young. Narration from readers is fine. Something I did instead at this age was have them narrate from something I read in science or history--I'd have them choose a picture on a page and tell me everything they remembered about the picture.

 

Merry :-)

[Sevilla]

My brain hurts. :lol:

 

Phonics (ETC)

Spelling (AAS, eventually Wheeler's Speller)

Grammar (Me-made, eventually MCT)

Handwriting (she's doing cursive & print, by choice, both HWoT)

Copywork (from our unit studies)

Reading (books, not a program)

I haven't even tried to fit in formal narration & dictation. We just narrate from our readings sometimes.

 

LA is not her favorite subject :tongue_smilie:. Trying to schedule it all gives me a headache, lol.

Here is what we do for 1st grade:

 

Spelling: 1 chapter per week (2 days per week)

Handwriting: Daily (one page per day in HWOT, sometimes two pages)

Grammar: First Language Lessons 2x/week. We were doing it 4x week because it's his favorite subject, but I realized we'd have blown through the whole book too quickly and he'd be left with a gap between skills and expectations down the line (in FLL2 or FLL3), so I slowed it down.

Reading: I don't count this as part of LA, we do our reading for our unit studies and history and do this 3-4 days per week (different books each day). He also does a lot of reading on his own - I'd say at least an hour per day

 

Narration/Dictation/Copywork are through Story of the World and FLL1 right now, but will expand with WWE1 when we begin that.

 

I don't do any phonics except what is in Spelling Workout - I was not a fan of EtC and it didn't work well for DS.

[Five More Minutes]

Like others, I don't do phonics, as spelling covers this. On a good week our schedule is:

 

Spelling: 4 days (15 min/day) - This includes dictations.

Handwriting: 4 days (5 min/day) - Right now we're concentrating on a letter each day. This will include more copywork once we've got letter formation down

Writing: 4 days (about 10 min/day) - This incorporates narrations, dictations, and copywork.

Grammar: 2 days (5-10 min/day) - This includes narrations, dictations, and copywork.

Independent reading: 15 - 30 min/day, while I do phonics and guided reading with DD4

 

We also do narrations during history and science, and after "assigned books."

[acurtis75]

Last year I felt like we were very disorganized and I didn't have a good handle on what we were getting done each week. I'm trying something new this year and so far it seems to be working pretty good with dd6. At the beginning of the week I make a list of everything I want to get through for the week. This is language arts list:

 

Spelling Workout - one lesson

ETC book 8 (she probably doesn't need this but I figured we might as well finish series)

MCT Practice Island - 1 - 3 sentences

MCT Sentence Island - 1/2 a chapter

Daily Grams Grammar 2 pages

FLL - 2 to 3 lessons

WWE - one lesson or "week"

 

I don't really schedule any reading other than non-fiction for history because she reads a lot without being told.

 

Our goal is to finish that list during the week but what is covered each day varies from week to week. We might get all ETC out of the way one day, do spelling & practice island the next and then do FLL & WWE together the third day, etc.

 

I try to make sure we do something for language arts each day but we never get to everything in one day.

 

What we get to most days:

Bible, Math, at least one LA subject, Latin (at least practicing the chant for the week), Geography songs

 

What we get to most weeks

Greek alphabet, History, handwriting (also doing HWOT print & cursive at dd's request), Latin worksheets

 

What we run out of time and hardly get to....

Science & Mindbenders. I'm trying to do better but these are the things that get skipped a lot!

[Mrs Twain]

Reading/Phonics--daily

Grammar--daily

Spelling--daily

Writing--daily

Handwriting-daily

Reading Comrprehension workbook--3 times per week

Narration from WWE--2 times per week

[Ellie]

Daily (although I don't do "language arts"). A little bit at a time, every day. :)

[ScoutTN]

We do this:

 

Reading - every day

Spelling (AAS 2) 3 days 20 minutes.

Phonics (finishing up Phonics Pathways) 2 days, 10minutes

Handwriting/copywork - (HWT) 4 days, 15-20 minutes

Grammar (FLL1) - 15 minutes, 2 days

Poetry memorization - 3 days, 10 minutes

 

She does dictation as part of spellling. I have her narrate (from reading, history, science, picture study, field trip - anything really.) every day.

I write one or two down each week to keep in her notebook.

 

We are almost done with PP and will add another day of spelling then.

We are skimming and condensing FLL because we both find it dull and insanely repetitive.

 

hth :)

[Lisa in the UP of MI]

My brain hurts. :lol:

 

Phonics (ETC)

Spelling (AAS, eventually Wheeler's Speller)

Grammar (Me-made, eventually MCT)

Handwriting (she's doing cursive & print, by choice, both HWoT)

Copywork (from our unit studies)

Reading (books, not a program)

I haven't even tried to fit in formal narration & dictation. We just narrate from our readings sometimes.

 

LA is not her favorite subject :tongue_smilie:. Trying to schedule it all gives me a headache, lol.

 

Last year for first grade we did:

 

Phonics: finished OPGTR, even though she was already a very fluent reader and it was all review; 5 days a week

 

Spelling: We had completed AAS 1 the year before. Once we finished OPGTR (took maybe a month or so) we reviewed for a few weeks before starting level 2. We did 4 days a week for a while, but then settled down to 2 by the end of the year.

 

Handwriting: We did this daily until she finished the book.

 

Writing/Formal Narration: We did WWE 4 days a week after we were done with the handwriting book. We did 2 days worth of lessons in one day, so we finished 2 full weeks worth of lessons in one week.

 

Reading: Nothing formal at all. We always had a bedtime story going and read various books during the school day as well.

 

Grammar: None

[Kuovonne]

Here's what I did / am doing. My dds were / are a little younger than 1st grade, but the concepts are the same.

 

Phonics / Spelling / Handwriting / Grammar

Our spelling program forms the backbone for all these subjects. Every day I dictate 1-4 sentences for DD to handwrite write, based on her spelling words. I explain the phonics of any new words and any words she misspells. I point out any incidental grammar, such as starting with a capital letter, ending with a period, adding suffixes to verbs and nouns, etc.

 

Reading

McGuffey's reader. DD reads one lesson per day. She repeat the lesson until it is fluent. After she can read it fluently, I have her narrate the lesson.

 

I don't do copywork.

 

I started my older DD with MCT with no prior grammar and she did fine with it.

[FairProspects]

Well, we do both phonics and spelling as they are separate skills to ds. He can read really difficult words but can't spell them. And if I waited for him to read fluently (or what I consider fluency) before we introduced spelling, we would never get there!

 

Phonics: 4 x week

Spelling: 4 x week

Grammar: 2 x week

Handwriting: 4 x week (learning cursive)

Copywork: 3 x week (WWE)

Reading: 20-30 minutes outloud daily from books at his reading level (currently SL Readers 2)

Edited September 24, 2011 by FairProspects

[go_go_gadget]

Last year my son did OPGTR, FLL and handwriting daily, Spelling Workout 3-4 days/week, and WWE four days/week. My daughter is doing first grade now, but she's young (not quite five), and is *almost* ready for WWE but not quite. She does phonics, FLL and handwriting daily, when AAS arrives she'll do it once/week, and I've started giving her very short copywork. She should be ready for WWE in the next month or two, and will do it three days/week.

[lewelma]

We call them the "baby boxes" (Math and Writing are the big boxes)

 

10 minutes each in 50 minutes with 2 min break in between each box

Grammar (MCT)

Spelling (Spelling workout)

Handwriting (Getty Dubai)

Poetry (IEW poetry memorization)

Math facts

 

we rotate 4 on each day.

 

Ruth in NZ

[ByGrace3]

This is our LA schedule:

 

Phonics: Abeka phonics 5X/week (15-20 min)

Grammar: FLL 3x/week (5 minutes or so)

Writing: WWE 4X/week (10-15 min)

Handwriting: HWOT 5X/week (5 min or less)

Spelling: AAS 4X/week (15 min)

Reading: 5x/week (15ish min)

 

It works out to about an hour a day usually.

[jengjohnson]

My first grader does:

 

FLL 3x a week

AAS 4x

WWE 4x

Reading - 4-5x from Pathway Readers (she's just finishing the first grade 2 book)

ETC 4-5x (She's on book 5, but I'm thinking of dropping this. The spelling isn't sinking in like it does with AAS.)

 

She also reads and writes on her own. Narrates from science and history.

[petepie2]

Last year my 1st grader (strong reader) did:

 

WWE (4x)

FFL 1 (3x)

AAS (3x)

Reading (5x): We did this in the afternoons using Sonlight readers.

 

Now she was writing very well, so we didn't do formal handwriting last year, but if we had she would have done A Reason for Handwriting 5x a week.

 

Next year I'll have a first grader, and I'm sure he'll still be doing phonics. We'll do OPGTR daily, and he may do a couple of pages in ETC for reinforcement (he needs its.) I may start AAS slowly with him. AAS is so simple in the beginning that I wouldn't substitute it for our phonics. It would be like going back to the beginning! I think he can learn how to spell CVC words while doing more advanced phonics.

[Quiver0f10]

My brain hurts. :lol:

 

Phonics (ETC)

Spelling (AAS, eventually Wheeler's Speller)

Grammar (Me-made, eventually MCT)

Handwriting (she's doing cursive & print, by choice, both HWoT)

Copywork (from our unit studies)

Reading (books, not a program)

I haven't even tried to fit in formal narration & dictation. We just narrate from our readings sometimes.

 

LA is not her favorite subject :tongue_smilie:. Trying to schedule it all gives me a headache, lol.

 

My 1st grader does:

 

Phonics Pathways M-F

SWR M-Th ( will start after Christmas)

FLL 1 M W F

WWE 1 M-TH

HWT-2X/week T TH

Narration-M & W from history, science or lit.

[SilverMoon]

I don't do phonics and spelling at the same time. When they're reading well spelling can replace the separate phonics instruction.

 

I also merge copywork and handwriting into one. When my kids start working on cursive I drop the copywork until they're good enough at cursive to do a whole copywork assignment in it.

 

My current first grader does spelling, copywork, "book basket" reading, math and Latin daily. Her grammar is FLL and only three times a week, with specific narration practice on the other two days. We do history three times a week, and science on the other two days. Her seatwork is broken up into twenty minute bursts, and generally takes less than an hour total.

[Ellyndria]

We don't do phonics anymore. AAS covers that for us.

 

We do:

 

Spelling - AAS, 4-5 times a week

Handwriting - HWT3 (cursive), 5 times a week

Grammar - FLL2, 3 times a week

Writing (copywork/narration) - WWE1, 4 times a week

Reading - Uh... he reads plenty on his own, so I don't schedule it. I am trying to fit in having him read to me a couple times a week, but I am slacking on that the past couple weeks.

[joyfulhomeschooler]

AAS is a complete phonics program, so you could combine there. I don't do grammar in 1st grade, other than informally (gently correcting their grammar as they speak--ie, "Mom, I throwed the ball as high as the tree!" me: "Wow, you threw the ball as high as the tree?" etc...)

 

I only do handwriting at this age, not copywork. In fact, I would make sure that the copywork is not above her phonics level (definitely not beyond her reading level, but preferably also not beyond her spelling level. Copywork that is too advanced can actually work against the strategies you are trying to teach in phonics for many kids). As they grew, I incorporated both, but not on the same day--I would do either handwriting OR copywork, not both in one day.

 

Reading--yup :-).

 

Narration--1st grade is pretty young. Narration from readers is fine. Something I did instead at this age was have them narrate from something I read in science or history--I'd have them choose a picture on a page and tell me everything they remembered about the picture.

 

Merry :-)

Appreciate this post Merry... reading through the other comments I started to worry I wasn't doing enough with my first grader. Thanks for adding a down to earth approach :-)

[serendipitous journey]

oh, this thread is so encouraging! First grade is seriously kicking me in the [pants :001_smile:]. Here's what we do. I'm dissatisfied with the lack of fun extras so this is a work in progress, but Button is learning well and thriving generally. Also his math is well ahead of his language arts (though he speaks beautifully) and he doesn't read a lot on his own, so I prob. feel we need more language arts than some of you with littles who read a lot.

 

Each day we school:

AM, while I work with baby and help Button a bit:

handwriting page/copywork from WWE (lightly supervised, which is officially not ideal)

math review (2-10 problems of operations he knows; this is only b/c he's accelerated and needs to practice regrouping regularly or he forgets how)

math fact review (10 problems)

a Kumon time or money page

-- play break, 15-30 minutes --

2 pages Phonics Pathways, one old and one new usually

AAS review

15 minutes "free reading"

 

PM, during baby's nap:

New math lesson

WWE1

Growing with Grammar

Reading from Free & Treadwell reader

AAS

A short Latin lesson (we just added Latin this week)

ideally, a reading from literature, history, science, or living math but we're not regular with this.

 

In between, lots of outside time.

 

I am content generally with our coverage of math and reading, which are laying excellent foundations, and our tons of outside/play time. I am would like more literature reading, science reading & experiments, art, history, and living math -- and Button would like those things, too! But with the timing of Bot-bot's nap, this is about all we can manage. I am thinking of moving some PM things to the morning, but our morning work already runs us until 10 or so and I'd like to get out to parks and hikes more often and earlier. In the evening I do not read to Button b/c with my husband's schedule, DH ends up spending time with Button while I put Bot-bot to bed and then I'm exhausted. However, there's 20 to 30 minutes btw when baby goes down and Button goes to bed where I could add some reading when I'm sleeping better and not so fried.

 

and, this thread reminds me that we're not memorizing yet!

 

thanks to the OP and everyone else. This is helping me think better about my days ...

[angela in ohio]

I don't. I concentrate on reading (phonics) and handwriting (copywork) for K-2, then start grammar and spelling when we are done with phonics. About the time they are a year or two into grammar and done with handwriting, I start teaching writing. The literature part of reading is a constant in their lives, and so I don't cover it as a school subject at that age.

[Heidi]

Phonics/spelling (phonics road 1 is a combination of both: review phonics flashcards, test 5 words, spell 5 new words)

Reading practice (opg & then mcguffey reader lesson)

Handwriting/copywork (copywork is handwriting practice. we use wwe or copywork pulled from a reading book)

 

Daily. It doesn't take long at all.

I don't do grammar in first grade.

 

Our schedule:

 

Math first thing in morning

-10 min. break-

Phonics/spelling

-10 min. break-

Reading

-10 min. break-

Writing (wwe)

[LittleIzumi]

Wow. I don't think I've ever had a thread with such different answers :lol:. Lots of food for thought!!! I think I'm going to power through our HWoT Cursive to make sure she knows all of the letters (she knows 90% already just from asking me how to make them), and then make our copywork the handwriting. I will also read through our ETC and AAS and decide what order/combo to do with that. I think I'll try to mix in either ETC or AAS words into our science-unit-related copywork that we do, too. I only plan to do grammar 2x/week. Woot! Thanks!!!!

[FairProspects]

oh, this thread is so encouraging! First grade is seriously kicking me in the [pants :001_smile:].

 

Me too, if its any consolation. My biggest problem is just that we can't get it all in before lunch anymore like last year because there are more subjects in first (this is mostly because ds insists on breaks between subjects). Ds is going to have to decide to give up morning breaks or quiet time/down time or he has to be okay with doing some things (like fun science experiments and history) in the afternoons. We just can't break all the time and try to fit work in around our breaks!!

[Amy Jo]

Last year for DS7 (we should have done more spelling OR more reading, but last year was a very difficult time for our family):

Phonics / Spelling / Grammar - did SWR phonograms then spelling lists, but it was apparent he wasn't ready to write that much, so we used tiles instead (which were a pain to organize - I wish I'd found a better solution to keep him spelling.)

Grammar - nothing formal - SWR includes some discussion, we did talk about capitols and punctuation, and I would correct some of his speaking. In 2nd he is doing KISS Grammar, takes about 5-10 min, 3 days a week.

Handwriting - Cursive First was to much at the beginning of the year, dropped it then restarted later in the year with Teach Me Joy's cursive handwriting, did it ~4 days a week

Copywork - none, I started it after he finished handwriting

Reading - team reading a few evenings a week - I wish we'd done more.

 

Plan for DS5 next year, when he is a 1st grader:

Phonics / Spelling - Websters, 4x/week (moving to SWR in 2nd), SWR phonograms, Elizabeth's Phonics Game

Grammar - informal

Handwriting / Copywork - finish Teach Me Joy's cursive then move to Proverbs copywork from Copycat Books, 4x/week

Reading - Probably team read at least 3-4x per week after he is far enough into Webster's, assuming he doesn't guess words. I'm going to focus on the spelling though, so hopefully 'reading' is easy and fun.