Too long and detailed narrations?

Threekidsmom, 

First, welcome to SCM! I haven’t seen you on here before, so forgive me if you’ve been here a while and I’m just noticing! 

I, too, have a child who will give extremely long and detailed narrations, except his are written! He has taken almost an hour to complete a written narration before, with minute details!

It sounds like you might be confusing summarizing with narrating, as you said. Narration is the skill of telling back what one knows of a particular subject. If your son gives long narrations, then he is a good listener and has the ability to recall with ease your family’s readings. This is a good thing! According to Charlotte Mason, you should not interrupt a child during his narrations because it can cause him to lose his train of thought. We’ve all been frustrated by the person (or child) who interrupts us mid-thought and we can’t remember what we were saying. It’s the same for the child whose mother interrupts him to correct or hurry his narration. I know it can be frustrating, but try to see the bright side. There are many mothers on here who have a hard time getting a complete thought out of their children during narration! I should think you would be thankful to have a child who understands the concept so much that he remembers and is able to tell back detailed information.

And also-we do history reading combined as a family. Should each child give their narration in the presence of everyone else? Should I just pick one or two of them each day to give narration?

Most of us do history as a family with children giving narrations one at a time. For the older children (9 or 10 and up) they should begin written narrations. So your son is old enough to write his narrations and then you read them over and discuss with him later. For mothers with multiple children, it is generally acceptable and recommended to start with the youngest child giving a narration first, and then moving through the group until you reach the oldest child. Just as everyone’s perspective is different, so each child will remember different details or characters of the reading and the group’s narration as a whole will probably be very complete.

Am I making this harder than it needs to be?

I don’t think you’re making it harder than it needs to be; I think you and your family must be new to narration and you want to be sure you’re doing it correctly. Please correct me if I’m wrong on this and you’re a seasoned narrating family! I definitely think you don’t need to interrupt your children as they give their narrations, as I’m sure you do not allow your children to interrupt you, but to wait until you’re finished speaking. It is important to give them this courtesy. Also, don’t overanalyze what your son is doing. If your son is able to accurately re-tell the day’s history reading, no matter how long it takes him, then he is narrating. A summary would be similar, but I love it when my children pay attention to details; and summaries are often not as detailed.

You may want to have your 12yo begin written narrations. He can write as much as he likes, and you can read it and discuss later. He is old enough, and it sounds as if he’s already gotten very good at verbal narrations. Writing them is the natural next step, in my opinion.

Keep up the good work,

Lindsey