staceyobu Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 In general, he is a decent writer. He doesn't mind copywork. He does well with reading a passage and writing a summary. He hates dictation. WWE 2 ends out the year with two days a week of dictation. I almost have to read it one word at a time. If it is lengthy at all, he is hating life even with me reading it one word at a time. I don't want to let him off the hook for something that is a necessary skill. Is dictation the multiplication of writing? Or, is there some writing curriculum with less dictation that would make for a happy 3rd grade year? I am planning to move him to W&R fable for 4th grade. I don't know that he is totally ready for that next year either. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chelsmm Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 I wouldn't make him do it. But that's just me. I have one child who didn't mind WWE, and another who hated it. So we ended up dropping it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eagle Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 We just got to the part of WWE2 where the copywork turned into an extra dictation for the week. DS is not thrilled about that. I looked at the samples of WWE3 and I just don't think it looks right for him at this stage, so we are going to put it off for a year. In the meantime, I plan to do our narrations with SOTW and get Bravewriter's Arrow for copywork and dictation. ETA: We will do MCT Island for grammar/poetry/word roots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ByGrace3 Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 My dd couldn't handle WWE dictation. Ds does better but still panics at the thought. I even break up the sentences and write hard to spell words on the page. He does fine with AAS dictation but WWE is another story. Dd dropped wwe 2 around week 20. Ds is about to complete it. With dd I moved on to use CAP Fable and BW in 3rd. I think BraveWriter copywork and dictation was a perfect bridge. I did a lot of French dictation--- the passage is typed out with a bunch of blanks and the child listens and fills in the blanks. As the year progressed my dd was filling in almost the entire thing, but the transition was miraculous. Next year for ds for 3rd my plan is to do WWE 3just the narrations with BW copywork/dictation and maybe CAP Fable...depending how it goes... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bluegoat Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 I think dictation is a good thing, but I think WWE 3 is very heavy on it, and it gets very repetitive. We tried doings studied dictation, but my dd still hated it, though she is quite literate for her age and enjoyed the readings and books that it used. I would try something else myself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karensk Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 WWE 2 is rather advanced for a 2nd grader, especially the dictation selections, IMO. It sounds like your 2nd grader is in good shape for his grade, since he generally writes well. If you took a month or two break from WWE, perhaps when you pick it back up again, the dication will go more smoothly. If not, you might consider skipping some of the dictation lessons, doing them just once a week to avoid burnout. Shortening the dictation passage may be another way to continue working on that skill without making him feel overwhelmed. I think that dictation is an important skill, especially for taking notes. However, it does not need to be mastered right away. You have years ahead of you to work on it. HTH! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mohini Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 Start out by shortening the dictations to a couple of words - maybe just the title of the story or something. You can also do dictation with spelling words (if your dc is working on a spelling program.) One of the unsung benefits of WWE is endurance. The repetition of copywork and dictation teaches kids to keep plodding on through - and as they do their skills improve slowly but measurably. Just ramp it down a bit for a while - you can even dictate funny sentences about his favorite characters like "Spiderman is afraid of spiders." Maybe that will take the pressure off and you can slowly move back into WWE dictations. Moving to CAP is fine too of course if you think it will be better for him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SparklyUnicorn Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 My thought is there is more than one way to do things. If that's not working, find something else that does. I often turned the dictations into copywork. Part of the issue was both of my kids just had difficulty physically writing. They wrote very slowly. They both have no trouble memorizing things as evidenced by the many plays they've been in and scripts they have had to learn. They can remember pages of lines after me running lines with them a couple of times. So that can't possibly be the issue. But it's frustrating when one writes very slowly. I've come across stuff like studied dictations. Where the student studies the sentence to be written rather than just having it read out loud. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pitterpatter Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 Someone here has a couple of really good blog posts on studied dictation, but I can't seem to churn them up. CM schoolers use this approach, I believe. Before starting WWE 2, we used the vintage text Dictation Day By Day with studied dictation to ease into the idea of dictation. DD had done dictation with AAS, but we hadn't used WWE 1 prior to our use of WWE 2. She really, really enjoyed studied dictation. Aside from the spelling aspect, DD does well enough with WWE dictation, but I know she would choose studied dictation, if given the option. How did he do when dictation was copywork the first day of WWE and then the same passage was dictation the second? Did he like that better? If so, you could continue in the same fashion through the end of WWE 2. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pitterpatter Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 While we're talking about it. Is CAP's dictation easier/different? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SparklyUnicorn Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 While we're talking about it. Is CAP's dictation easier/different? There are options for the instructor. You choose which ones to use. They offer a range of difficulty. The easiest ones are very easy. The more difficult ones I'd say are also easier than what is typical in WWE. I'm only going by Fable. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lori D. Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 I did a lot of French dictation--- the passage is typed out with a bunch of blanks and the child listens and fills in the blanks. As the year progressed my dd was filling in almost the entire thing, but the transition was miraculous. That's brilliant! :) That was often the case here with many different subjects -- if I could find a good "stepping stone" way of doing things, we could transition at the slower pace needed by the student into the higher level of work without the wailing and gnashing of teeth and hating/dreading of the subject. ;) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 French dictation, definitely. And studied dictation. Even if you stick with WWE, you might try an Arrow from Brave Writer and read the guide to the Arrow that comes with it to get a feeling for how a different program approaches dictation. Or just drop it. Dictation is a good way to learn, but it's not the only way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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