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Copywork AND dictation
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Do any of you do both copywork and dictation? I’m under the impression that in a traditional CM education you are supposed to transition out of copywork into dictation at a certain age. However, my sons (14, 10, and 9) are not good writters or spellers. If any of you do both things, how often do you do and how long each time do you spend?
I also was wondering with dictation do you set aside a specific amount of time each day for the student to study their dictation exersize or do you leave it up to the child to study on their own?
I usually do both but the balance definitely changes as the child gets older. My teens still are expected to do some copying–they keep special notebooks for things that mean a lot to them. I don’t assign anything special or set aside special time for this, they just know to do it. For the ages between 9 or 10 and 12ish, we still do both simultaneously. For younger children, I set aside a time for them to study their dictation passages and even make sure I’m available to give a little help as they do this; for my teens, I just give them out two passages at the beginning of the week and we do one on Wednesday and one on Friday. They are responsible to prepare them themselves. Does this help?
Very helpful, thank you!! When children are doing copywork (around 9 or 10) how long do you work on an exersize? Do they spend a certain number of minutes, or do they work until the exersize is complete?
I choose exercises that the child can get done in 10-15 minutes, so that is the time I expect them to do it. Obviously this will be pretty short passages at some ages but much longer for a proficient writer. We don’t typically work longer than that–the only exception being “dawdling” which means if they stare out the window and don’t get anywhere, the are telling me they need to do something else for a little while–chores work well–and then later they have to come back and finish it during time they ought to have had free. So we occasionally end up spending more time. 🙂
We do both copywork and dictation each day. My 11 year old is using Spelling Wisdom, but I pick passages out of the younger kids’ books, usually nature books or history. My older son does not do too much copywork because he does the daily dictation, but my younger two do copywork also each day. We use a timer a lot. For copywork I say, “start here and go until the timer dings, but it must be exact and as neat as you are able…” Dictation for my 8 and 10 year olds is shorter and taken from their school books as well. I try to pick something that has one really hard word and a bunch of “normal” words. They draw mnemonic devices on the marker board to work out the hard ones and then I dictate.
Caroline,
How much time do you expect for copywork for a 9 yo? I like the idea because it really focuses on neatness and exact copying instead of rushing to get a certain amount done.
Faith 🙂
Faith,
Last year my 9 year old started with 5 minutes and worked up to 10. He has poor handwriting, although he can draw really well (go figure). He just turned 10 and am am planning on inching him up to 15 minutes this year, but that is the most I would expect in concentrated effort from any of my kids no matter their age.
Thanks, Caroline. I’m going to try 10 minutes this year. My daughter has really good handwriting…except when she’s rushing. I’m hoping if she knows she need to write for a certain amount of time no matter what, it will make her slow down a little and be neater and more accurate. I appreciate the advice!
Faith 🙂
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