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How often per week?
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Seems very little accomplished if I just have my son copy (because his writing is sloppy) the same 2 or 3 sentences all week, then dictate on Friday for spelling. Am I expecting too much?
How old is he? If he is sloppy, either he’s just being lazy, or maybe it’s too long of a passage for right now. I know with my DS, I backed off on how much he writes (now we do 2 lines), and if certain letters/words are sloppy, I have him re-do it right away.
He is 13. it is laziness and I tend to give him less and less because he hates to write. I believe I need to buckle down and not give into his whining. I also need to enforce short lessons so as to give him hope once again. i too often second guess myself and revert back to old habits out of fear. I need to walk by faith here.
The other question is, how often should I do spelling per week? He does like Spelling Power done orally, but I really want to incorporate literature. Oh, what to do…
mama_nickles, Thank you for the input. I just discovered the “A Fine Arts-Day Schedle” in my book. Yay! I see that Dictation is done 2 times per week. I will start there and adjust if I need to. Also need to remind myself every morning to start with short lessons. Ah…What if you switched him from copywork in general to giving him his own Commonplace Book or Book of Mottos? He is really just about old enough for one. If he got a special journal and was in charge of picking out what to add and you made a big deal of it and explained and showed examples from online of some, maybe that would help him. Require him to write in in several times a week. Just a thought.
I wouldn’t have him copy the same sentence 2 or 3 times a week – then dictate it. I personally would find that so boring, I can’t see that I’d be eager to work hard at it either. I’d do the spelling differently… there are other ways to prepare studied dictation.
I think a Commonplace Book / Book of Mottos would be much more likely to have him put some effort into it….
I think I will keep dictation and spelling seperate. I do like the idea of his own book and not repeating the same sentences;he can do this twice a week. I do agree that he needs to graduate from copy work.
As for the spelling, he really does like the list approach from Power Spelling. I believe we will do this orally once a week. Any word that is a problem, I’ll have him begin his own list at the back of his Mottos book.
So glad to have this imput. Thank you, Ladies.
About spelling and incorporating literature.
I have “spelling from literature” on the schedule once or twice a week. When I am done reading aloud a literature book, I just go around and ask the kids to spell words I pick from what we just read. We just spell orally when we do this. They like it and it’s quick. I can tell what they need to work on when I do this, but that’s not really my goal. I’m just asking them to spell words I think they can spell but that will make them think.
I also think spelling words from the story helps them think about what we read.
We do “spelling form a list” the same way. When they do dictation, they are expected to spell the words properly. That’s about it.
We have a wide range of accomplishment in spelling at my house, but in general I’ve seen that reading produces good spelling more than studying spelling would–and it’s much more fun. They all improve as they read more.
I bought two journals that are a very nice quality and attractive to a boy. One will be for his mottos, (hopefully he will take pride in it and desire to show his beautiful handwriting). The other will be for dictation, which will not be corrected at all since I just want him to aquire the habit of taking notes; and the back half will be a running list of problem (spelling) words taken from any living book that we are working with and occassionaly from Power Spelling since he does like lists. I believe spelling will be done orally since he really enjoys that.
I find one method that helps with retention of words is to have them study the correct word spelling, close their eyes, picture it in their minds, and then say it orally and write it out in front of me. Only problem words. With that method it is almost always solidified in their minds.
mama_nickles, Thank you for the input. I just discovered the “A Fine Arts-Day Schedle” in my book. Yay! I see that Dictation is done 2 times per week. I will start there and adjust if I need to. 
Also need to remind myself every morning to start with short lessons. Ah…
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