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Is Narration Really For Every Child?
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I often ponder this question and wonder if narration is really for every child. Why do I ask? Because I have a DS who is 10 and he despises narration. After reading what I think is a good book and understandable at his age, when asked to narrate he says “I don’t know” or starts to cry or something and we both end up upset. I don’t even like doing narration time because I know how it’s going to go. I question narration for him because he is a highly visual person and auditory learning is not a strong skill for him at all. I can just look at him and tell he is zoning in and out. To give him something to do is a distraction to himself-he is very easily distracted. I have noticed however, that if it is a very simplistic book, well below his reading level, he can narrate it fairly well. So, is narration truly for every child? Should I just do narration “projects” instead? Written narrations aren’t much of an option right now either. Thanks for the advice that I know you great ladies have to give!
Maybe if he isn’t really paying attention then the passages are too long. I don’t call it narration when I ask my daughter about a book. I might say ‘What was your favorite part?’. Sometimes I will tell her something I liked and then we can talk about it. I use to ask for narration and she did the same thing. When we are just casually talking about it, she has more to tell me.
I don’t usually call it narration, either. I mean they know what it is, so that’s kind of silly, but it helps to use other words/phrases. I may ask for a telling back, picture, favorite part, discussion on character behavior, etc.
I have 2 very different learners, one is definitely visual, and one seems to be both, auditory/visual or hands on. When I read aloud, my visual learner likes to sit right next to me so he can see the words (I don’t let him everytime so he can strengthen his audio skills) and he prefers to read aloud or to himself. My more audio learner does exceptionally well when read to and reading to himself is not a huge issue except for the fact that he struggles a little with unfamiliar words.
My visual learner will draw a picture and say he’s only going to share the scene from the picture (and I say, OK) but then he tells back what happened before and after…he seems to recall more if he’s drawn a picture and the pressure is off to tell back everything.
I would keep practicing, maybe let him read something he enjoys and tell back to gain some confidence. Ask open questions, like, What was your favorite part? Who is your favorite character and why? What would you do in that situation?
There are several threads specific to narration with lots of ideas that are not just having the child sit there and “tell back”. And, SCM has a list of ideas as well.
For me, narration has been the best part of a CM education, but it takes lots of practice and patience.
Jennifer, it really is even more important for your son! =) He is having to train himself to do many things at once and it is hard! My 10yo dd has very similar issues and is diganosed with an Auditory Processing Disorder and we have to work hard to help her. But with patience and time it will come together. I use simple stuff first and it is okay! This needs to be eased into and built upon. You can’t narrate well without going through the tools to do it first.
I often let my dd draw her narration afterwards because it allows her time to process what she heard in the passage, organize the order of events, and then present it to me orally. Does this drive me nuts? Sometimes, but it is effective. 😉
I just went to a class about this last night. She has so many ideas of ways to help. One very significant one was to have a picture of the subject up where the student can see it – this helps him decode what you are talking about. If he truly has auditory issues, he is probably only getting 65% of what you say. They have terrible short term memory.
Having a list of characters in the story helps. Sometimes if you stop when a person is introduced and write down something about them, it helps cement it in their minds.
Due to the issues of not understanding everything and the pressure to perform, a child’s stress level rises so high that the short term memory is nil. My daughter has a small waterbaby doll (soft sqeezeable rubber) that she holds all the time and squeezes. I never minded because it seemed calming to her, and now I know it relaxes her stress levels. She loves classical music, and I think again, because it realxes her brain and makes it less “busy”, allowing her to concentrate. We often have it going in the background to keep us all calm. 😉
Please know that the CM methods are the very tools that she is using to teach PS children and other people to retrain their brain’s pathways (although her methods are not spread out over a day, she does it intensely for 45 minutes a day, 5 days a week). It is all in her book.
Here is the link to the other thread:
http://simplycharlottemason.com/scmforum/topic/processing-disorder-autism-and-add-help
My 11 year old daughter is extremely visual. She has real problems with narration. I am the exact same way, so I completely understand this. She is a wonderful student in every other respect. I was so frustrated with her narrations because all my other kids do so much better with it. Anyway, I found this video where Susan Wise Bauer is addressing this topic. It eased my mind a lot and gave me permission, so to speak, to let her the visual learner that she is. I have no idea if this is what’s going on with your child, but I’m posting this in the hopes that it will be helpful to you. The part I am referring to starts at about 4 minutes into the video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPJx06cG6Vg
This is a skill that I wish I was better at, so we are persevering and she is getting better at it. I really don’t want her to have the low retention level that I’ve got whenever I listen to something versus reading it.
Shani
Wow I got a lot of great ideas here, I have the same struggles with my DD7. After reading your posts I think I start to unerstand better where she is coming from and how to taggle it. Just from obsving her I made some changes last school year because we were going nowhere with narration. One thing that really helped her is reading the books herself( if possible). I can’t do audiobooks with her either. Blessings Christine
We all have strengths and weaknesses in regards to learning. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that we should not push ourselves to strengthen our weaknesses.
You mentioned that your child narrates well with easier material. Perhaps it would work best to back up to that level of material for narration until he has the foundation in place to move to harder material. That way he is still having to work on the weaker auditory learning but can do the majority of his work in his strength.
My son with auditory processing disorder and other LDs took forever to be able to narrate well. But we have perservered and it was so worth it. Things that help for him were to start with short readings(we used Aesop’s Fables), then go to only stories (Not informational readings like science),and having him have his own copy of the book to follow along on if you read aloud (especially good for visual kids). What made me perservere is that he could tell any incident of play, finding things in the woods, or going away without any difficulties. I knew he could tell. We just had to work on it being from books. There was a time when I really thought narration didn’t mean him. But, I’m glad we stuck to it.
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