2nd grader writing troubles - please help!

[cherylterese]

My 2nd grader (7 year old boy) is really struggling with writing this year. It has never been his strong suit, but after a morning of crying, tears and tantrums over it I am at a loss. Last year we did Writing with Ease Level 1, and although it wasn't his favorite part of the day he did complete the exercise each day with minimum difficulty. This year we're doing Writing with Ease Level 2 and it is not working for him at all. Suggestions please! Is there something else that would work better for him? He does a page of Zaner Bloser each day as well, and that is not an issue.

[Wabi Sabi]

What about it is not working for him? What parts of it does he struggle with?

[cherylterese]

He says that it is too much writing. The dictation is also a struggle. The reading/narration days (where I write) are fine.

[Mom-ninja.]

Dictation is hard. Ease into it. It's okay to break it up and give it to him in smaller chunks until he gets better at it.

 

SWB says in one of her lectures that if a 7 yr old tells you his hand feels like it is going to fall off from writing then it is. These little ones sometimes have a very limited time frame to endure writing.

 

You can even break the lesson up into different times of the day.

 

Where are you in WWE2? What sentences is he saying are too long?

 

In 2nd grade I alternated penmanship (Zaner Bloser) with WWE2 dictation days so that my ds was not doing both in one day.

[Mommy to monkeys]

My son is 9 1/2. Two years ago, you would have thought I was torturing him my asking him to write ANYTHING. But it does get better. I think writing is somewhat developmental with boys. We suffered through trying to make 3 different language arts programs in 2nd grade work for him (Abeka, CLE, and Rod and Staff). He just wasn't ready for all that writing. All of those perfectly good programs, but he just wasn't ready. I really began to see improvement last year. . .this year the writing is just no big deal. He told me recently he'd rather write all day long that do math. (Ha!)

[cherylterese]

My son is 9 1/2. Two years ago, you would have thought I was torturing him my asking him to write ANYTHING. But it does get better. I think writing is somewhat developmental with boys. We suffered through trying to make 3 different language arts programs in 2nd grade work for him (Abeka, CLE, and Rod and Staff). He just wasn't ready for all that writing. All of those perfectly good programs, but he just wasn't ready. I really began to see improvement last year. . .this year the writing is just no big deal. He told me recently he'd rather write all day long that do math. (Ha!)

 

Maybe that's all it is. We are only on the second week in the book. So did you make him do it or not do writing for awhile? I'm not sure what approach to take.

[dbmamaz]

My son is 9 and only stopped crying at having to write a sentence this past june. I am only making him do very small amounts of writing - a sentence of copywork with science every day, sentences for spelling words he misses (spelling power), a free-write every week for 7 minutes. Thats it. (we will increase throughout the year, tho) I think the most important thing is to keep their love of learning alive, so you go at a pace which is comfortable for him . . . not worrying about what other kids are doing. Just like so many other things, its partly developmental.

 

i was thinking about it today - homeschooling, you know when he is ready for the next stage and you give it to him, but at school, if he wasnt ready to absorb the language arts lesson in 2nd grade, by the time he's ready in 4th, they arent going over that any more, so he falls further behind.

 

I have great faith in my kids to let me know when they are and are not ready for the next level

[jer2911mom]

I thought WWE 2 looked like too big of a jump from WWE 1 for 2nd grade, so we decided to hold off on it until either the second half of 2nd or the start of 3rd. The summary narration didn't look so bad; it was the dictation that made me decide to hold off.

 

HTH,

Kathy

[JoyfullyNoisy]

I don't usually post, but felt I could share my recent experience with this problem.

 

I also thought WWE2 was a bit of a leap from WWE1 (because of dictation). My DD (7) didn't have the spelling tools necessary at her command and fought back against any dictation. We're using Sequential Spelling this school year and I make 3 dictation sentences per day exclusively using spelling words. No frustration now.

The problem may be the physical act of writing, or it may be that spelling out those difficult sentences is intimidating.

Edited September 22, 2012 by JoyfullyNoisy

[Caribbean Queen]

...it may be that spelling out those difficult sentences is intimidating.

My 7 year old does studied dictation from The McGuffey Primer.

[cherylterese]

I think I will put the book aside for now and come back to it later. In the meantime I'll try simpler dictation and shorter copy sentences. He's very interested in writing letters, so maybe that can be his writing for now. (In the meantime, his 5 year old sister will happily copy anything I set in front of her!)

[mskelly]

I lOVE these threads! It sure does help to be reminded we are not alone and our kid isn't the only one having these problems. I also put WWE2 away after a few weeks. We didn't use WWE1 though. I started giving him dictation from other subject areas or the AAS dictation sentences. He does narrations in all the other subject areas also. I just try to make sure he does enough narration, dictation, and copy work in the other subjects and that seems to be working MUCH better for us. I think SWB says you don't "need" the WWE book if you are using the techniques in other areas, it is just there to make it open and go for parents.

[serendipitous journey]

I think I will put the book aside for now and come back to it later. In the meantime I'll try simpler dictation and shorter copy sentences. He's very interested in writing letters, so maybe that can be his writing for now. (In the meantime, his 5 year old sister will happily copy anything I set in front of her!)

 

This sounds very sensible.

 

Just some thoughts (from another mama of a writing-averse little one!):

 

RE narrations, it can be very helpful to have them narrate a bit after each short chunk: maybe a paragraph or so at a time. Often poor narration really does reflect poor understanding, esp. from WWE where the child is hearing a segment of a larger story. I find narration to flow much better when we are working from one book for the narrations (or, as in AO, from several books but working through each one). Even narrating a stand-alone fable is much easier for a child who has heard and narrated similar fables before: and Aesop's fables are a terrific place to begin narration, they are short and punchy with a clear plot. You could try one a week for starters?

 

RE handwriting letters: I have found it very helpful to try and keep Button at grade-level in Zaner-Bloser writing. We have done a "writing-intense" summer where he did some in the AM, some in the PM, to bring him to 2nd grade level by September. If yours tires easily, you can break his assignments up like this. Also, Zaner-Bloser has a free online worksheet-generator (though you can't save your sheets, and you can't make grey traceable letters, just solid black letters or blank lines) and you can plug his short copywork into this for better writing practice. StartWrite software allows you to do this and make traceable letters, and in the font of your choice, though it's not a perfect program; I've found that StartWrite font size 48 corresponds to Zaner-Bloser 2nd grade paper.

 

For writing per se, please do look at 8FillTheHearts marvelous writing ideas -- posts 33 & 34 here -- which you can begin to teach with just 3-word sentences. And a not-marvelous, but maybe useful, resource is Winning With Writing which is worksheet-ish but, I think, a nice complement to WTM-style writing education; however, it is not at all necessary and doesn't suit everybody.

Edited September 22, 2012 by serendipitous journey

[Farrar]

You might also look at Bravewriter and The Wand. :)

[cherylterese]

Thank you - so many great suggestions! Now I will not dread writing time on Monday so much. :001_smile:

[PeacefulChaos]

I actually don't do a writing program with my kids until they hit 3rd grade.

Astro is in 1st (will be 7 in November) and writes copywork for grammar and the stuff in his spelling/ETC/ZB workbooks. Spelling and ZB are each 1 page/day, ETC is 2 pages or so twice a week.

Last year, Link did copywork/dictation for grammar and the same, except ETC. He did the writing for half of his dictations (last 2 sentences, usually).

In third grade, Link is now doing dictation in grammar, Writing strands, spelling, ZB, and all the writing for his dictations. I don't write anything for him anymore.

Anyway, I said all that to show how we eased into it. :)