Sunday, October 19, 2014

School Tidbits

Our big news is that Stacia finished the Raceway program in Sing Spell Read and Write. She would have finished much earlier...but I discovered with the program we were using for her and Zander she was MEMORIZING the work and not really understanding the phonics. Last year we began a totally new program and she progressed through the entire thing. She reads well now - and knows the phonics. LOL
 
Our children are always "behind" in language arts. This happens for several reasons. First and foremost is our educational philosophy and our long time experience with homeschooling - knowing what works with our kids. I focus on phonics alone until they master that....then we add in writing, spelling, grammar.
 
Zander exceeded all predictions by the "experts" and DID learn to read - phonetically. It just took us quite a few years longer than the norm. This means when we were ready to begin other areas of language arts I knew he was "behind." (Our 26 years of homeschooling really causes us not to sweat this - he'll be caught up by the time he graduates.)
 
And so, last year, I decided to start him on spelling and Wordly Wise.  From past experience, I knew that our Wordly Wise vocabulary books were a bit "excelled." He was in 5th grade and I started him on the book I had - 3rd grade - first edition. He  understood why he was behind and didn't cringe much when others his age had a 5 or 6 on their books. He finished it and I decided to skip through books 4 and 5 and order 6. Imagine our SHOCK when he began to work on it....
 
"Mom, these are the same words from book 3."
 
"All books do a bit of review."
 
"Mom, lesson 2 are old words too."
 
I checked! My WORD. We had edition 1. They are now on the third edition. Yes, book SIX is EXACTLY the same material that book three was over a decade ago.  EXACTLY - all the way through.
 
Last year was rough - but NOW we find Zander is a year AHEAD in vocabulary. ::snort:: He's happily working along in book 7. 
 
I've ordered book 5 for Stacia (she's in 3rd/4th grade).
 



Choosing Joy!
©2014 D.R.G.
~Coram Deo~
Living all of life before the face of God...

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