christine in al Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 How do you help your kids memorize, what do the assignments look like, do they recite? write? Record and listen to themselves? What length piece do you expect of them? How does it fit in the week? Any great sources? ~Christine in AL Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sara in WA Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 The Harp and Laurel Wreath by Berquist is a great book of poetry for copy work and memorization. It can be used from elementary age through high school. We are part of Classical Conversations, so that is 95% of our memory work. The other 5% is scripture and catechism. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amyco Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 I agree about The Harp and Laurel Wreath. I've been using it for dictation and memorization for a couple years now. When my ds was in 1st and 2nd grades we memorized the small poems in First Language Lessons. Another resource is Living Memory by Andrew Campbell that you can purchase from lulu.com. It helps to have a bunch of selections collected in one place. As for method--young or old, it's a matter of repetition. If the child is just learning to read, they can memorize by hearing you read the selection and repeating after you, over and over and over. When they become fluent readers, it's the same process, only they say it to themselves. We work on one or two lines at a time until the entire thing is memorized. Every day we have about 10-15 minutes for memory work, and they recite what they have gotten so far at the end of it. 5 minutes a day every day is better than 20 minutes once a week. We also do occasional review. We don't record them. Honestly, I can't be bothered, but I know it's a good method for some people. They write the selections down before they start memorizing. I have read that it's good to wait to write it after they memorized it, but I think writing it helps the memory. As for selection of pieces--I gear mine toward their history or literature topics, mostly, and I don't always give them a choice in the matter. Even a little first grader studying the ancients for the first time can memorize some sayings of Heraclitus, for example. Last year my 4th grader was studying the Civil War and memorized "O Captain, My Captain." There is certainly no shortage of excellent pieces to memorize! You will know what your child is capable of. Hope that helps. Amy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
christine in al Posted March 28, 2009 Author Share Posted March 28, 2009 thank you to all of you. I didn't know about some of these. this is the look of one hand typing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3browneyedboys4me Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 An example, for year 1 unit 3 and 4, our co-op is having the children memorize all of Proverbs, and they love it! HTH, Bethany Blizard Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
~Jenn~ Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 Last year ds memorized lots of poems. This year we we've done Bible verses, some poetry and the books of the Bible. I'm off to check out the Harp and Laurel Wreath now! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ohdanigirl Posted March 29, 2009 Share Posted March 29, 2009 Check out Living Memory by Andrew Campbell. It is wonderful! We set up memory work binders and we all practice daily. After two years, I just thought of memory work binders. Up until now I had them slipped into the corresponding notebook cover, but they were too easily lost. We have done FLL memorization, poetry, bible verses, prayers and KFE lists. I try to keep it simple, read it through a few times a day or if it's a list read it through once and then read the first five a few times, repeat each day. After they have that they increase to 10, 15 and so on. We tried the recording and, writing it down, but my dcs found this to be much more to their taste. Your choice will also depend on their learning style and how long they have to learn the peice plus length. Good luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melora in NC Posted March 29, 2009 Share Posted March 29, 2009 Check out Living Memory by Andrew Campbell. It is wonderful! We set up memory work binders and we all practice daily. :iagree: Another recommendation for Living Memory! It includes memory work from all the subjects we study -- Latin, Greek, Arithmetic & Mathematics, Grammar & Composition, Literature, Religion, Geography, World History, United States History & Civics, and Natural Sciences. The memory notebook system it recommends is excellent -- simple and effective. Can you tell I love this book? We had been using Andrew Pudewa's Linguistic Development Through Poetry Memorization for a while before Living Memory was published, and I love the selection and arrangement of poems in this as well. I added all our poems from this to our memory notebooks and we are continuing to learn the poems from this book as well as material from Living Memory. We do spend a fair lot of time each day on memory work, reviewing and learning new material, but the kids enjoy it and I think it is valuable. We don't use recordings. I just read the poems, etc. to them and they say them back until they've learned them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Handmaiden Posted March 29, 2009 Share Posted March 29, 2009 An example, for year 1 unit 3 and 4, our co-op is having the children memorize all of Proverbs, and they love it! ALL of Proverbs? Wow, that would be quite an accomplishment! :hurray: How long does this co-op run? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallory Posted March 29, 2009 Share Posted March 29, 2009 We use Living Memory and Linguistic Developement... for ideas, as well as other books and poetry. This is one area where Dad really helps. Some times the boys challenge him to see who can have the most memorized in a week. A few weeks ago they did the first 16 presidents. It is fun to see who has it Sat. night! We also put the names of things they already know in a jar and on Sat. they draw out a couple to recite for us. Again, having Dad involved is nice for all of us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lapsetmom Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 Each week we have these things we recite together for memorization: --a new Greek letter --a Hebrew letter --seven new signs in sign language --their 12-15 Spanish words of the week --some Bible verses of the week; often, we will go verse by verse through a chapter until it is memorized --our Veritas press history cards and dates --math skip counting --our catechism question of the week --our country/capital/land feature of the week in geography --anything else pertinent to what we've been learning such as our prepositions song in English We also review past week's information periodically to keep things fresh and prevent a lot of forgetting. At the start of our day, we take about 15-30 minutes to do this as a family. I think I might like to add some poetry/literature, though. That is something I had entirely left out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Suzannah Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 This has by far been our most successful year for memorization! What I finally did this year is create "memory notebooks" for each child. I believe the idea came from Kendra (preschoolersandpeace.com). I went through TWTM and figured out what history, literature and science memorization they recommended for each grade, then either typed it up in a word document or searched online for it (map of the world for continents, diagram of layers of the earth, etc.). I also selected lots of memory verses for them to memorize. All of this was printed out, 3-hole punched and put in a folder at the beginning of the year. Each morning first thing, they spend 5-10 minutes looking over and/or reciting to me their memory work. As other things arise (memory verses for Bible class or items that I had forgotten or hadn't thought to include) we put them in the notebook and begin working on them too. Both school-age kiddos know the kings of England from Egbert to James I, layers of the earth, continents, planets, days of creation and many scriptures (reviewing often to be sure they still remember them). We are also beginning to work on types of clouds and some Shakespeare (a sonnet for both and Puck's speech for older DS). And of course DD does many, though not all of the poems in FLL. The only item that fell by the wayside was a portion of the prologue to the Canterbury Tales. I still hope for DS to learn it by the end of the year, but even if he doesn't, he could surely recognize it if he heard it referenced and that must be worth something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Suzannah Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 This is one area where Dad really helps. Some times the boys challenge him to see who can have the most memorized in a week. A few weeks ago they did the first 16 presidents. It is fun to see who has it Sat. night! We also put the names of things they already know in a jar and on Sat. they draw out a couple to recite for us. Again, having Dad involved is nice for all of us. This is one thing that we used to do but have let slide in recent years. DS used to have a sticker chart (back when he was motivated by such things). Each day he earned a sticker from me for having a good attitude during school. At the end of the week he had the opportunity to get two more stickers from Daddy: one if he had earned a sticker every day and another for reciting a memory verse correctly. It was a nice way to keep DH involved and took a tiny bit of the pressure off of me to always be the supreme giver and taker of stickers.:001_smile: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Honey Bee Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 As far as the "how" to memorize this is a good resource. I use in with my son and his phonics/spelling words (its actually modified to be for the 5 days of the week M-F instead of everyday) http://simplycharlottemason.com/timesavers/memorysys/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallory Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 It isn't really clear from my post, but the kids and dh all memorize. It is fun to know more presidents than dad, or be able to catch him saying the wrong word in a poem. They all carry around these index cards with this weeks items written on it, and really have a ball when they can find and hide dad's card, so he can't practice at work! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
laughing lioness Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 I have blogged about the memory work that we do here: http://goldengrasses.blogspot.com/2008/11/wr-memory-work.html We use CC, Living Memory, IEW's Poetry Memorization, MP for sources. We also do plays 2 times a year. Our latest was about WWII. Performance really brings to Memory Work to life. Here is a post about that :001_smile: http://goldengrasses.blogspot.com/2009/01/wr-winter-crunch-time.html I also run a drama camp in the spring so that younger kids can participate. We've found fun plays at Logos, Contemporary Drama Services, etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Suzannah Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 Plays! What a neat idea! A few years ago we did a Thanksgiving play for the grandparents but I hadn't really tried to make it a regular part of our school work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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