Name: Spreading the Feast Gathering
Start: 2025-07-11T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-07-12T23:59:59-05:00
Location: LaGrange, KY

This topic has 7 replies, 6 voices, and was last updated 12 years, 9 months ago by 4myboys.

Viewing 8 posts - 1 through 8 (of 8 total)

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September 10, 2012 at 11:02 pm
Inky
Member
I’d love some advice, from those more experienced, on the pros and cons of “just” listening to oral narrations, vs typing them out. The latter takes more time (con) my daughter is proud of her work (pro), but I guess I’d like to hear which one is better training for her? Any opinions out there?
Thanks
September 11, 2012 at 12:22 am
Monica
Participant
How old is your daughter?
How long has she been doing oral narrations?
September 11, 2012 at 1:06 am
Inky
Member
She’s 6 and has been doing them a year. She’s good at them – sometimes takes some encouragement to get going, but one she hits her stride, will enter right into the spirit of it!
September 11, 2012 at 1:18 am
Misty
Participant
At 6 yrs I would not expect written narration. I personally would giver her time to improve her writing, and also her oral narrations. You will know when it’s time. For me, when the oral is so long I feel like I don’t ever need to read the book it’s time to switch :0)
September 11, 2012 at 1:33 am
missceegee
Participant
Inky, I’m thinking you may mean that you type as she dictates. Is that right? If so, I’d just listen the majority of the time and periodically type up one for your portfolio. When we begin longer books, meaning those we don’t finish in one sitting, I will often have the child draw a narration at book’s end and dictate one or two sentences to me for the picture. This is my balance.
My other trick, since I have 4 kids, 3 school age this year, is to let the two older ones dictate their oral narrations into handheld voice recorders if I’m unavailable. Later, I listen and give feedback. This has helped me a lot over the last year.
September 11, 2012 at 1:36 am
Inky
Member
Yes, I’m sorry for the confusion….Missceegee you understood correctly. She certainly couldn’t write out her own narrations yet. What I mean is that I type as she writes.
Thanks for the advice!

September 11, 2012 at 1:53 am
mccormickmomma
Member
I was curious about this too. My son is 8 and in third grade. I have him narrate several different subjects back to me that we read… Aesop’s Fables we usually read and he narrates and then draws a picture. For history, bible or religion, sometimes we do it orally and sometimes I write what he dictates, which he seems to like. I was wondering what frequency was good for this.
September 11, 2012 at 2:04 pm
4myboys
Participant
Personally I find I get much more from my 3rd grader ds8 if I write out his narrations. We use notebooking pages for Bible, History and Science now and he draws a picture on the page while I read to him and then he will dictate a short narration for me to write. I will often have to give him part of the first sentence to get him started still, but then he can narrate fairly well. Occassionally he’ll write a sentence or two himself, or label objects and people in his picture, but I don’t require that yet. We only do oral narrations (more like discussions) for literature, though sometimes I have him draw something about the story. We are only on day two of our new school year, so I’m not sure if we’ll progress to written narrations this year or not. I am more focused on my older ds in that regard right now.