Language Arts

Language Arts:

Children are read too everyday from classic children's literature. Narration, or the verbal retelling of a story is a common pasttime at the dinner table. I love Five In A Row and all the recommended books that go with it. Developing Linguistic Patterns Through Poetry Memorization is a wonderful audio program from the Institute For Excellence In Writing. Their Phonetic Zoo, and Teaching The Classics are also favorites of mine.

We do not push any of the children to learn to read by a certain age. The girls have all "taught themselves" to read around age 5, while the boys have taken a few years longer to become proficient readers with help from Mom. Hooked on Phonics, Teach Your Child To Read In 100 Easy Lessons, and Sound Beginnings all grace our bookshelf, and are used according to which one seems to be working best for each child. I recommend you start with Teach Your Child To Read, because it's the least expensive.

The Classical Writing series is a treasure, although a little overwhelming at times. I definitely need to read through the lessons ahead of time and "teach" the concepts. They are wonderful books written by homeschooling English Majors/Masters, and are a complete English program, including good literature as models for writing. Additionally we use Teaching Writing Structure and Style from the Institute for Excellence--a wonderful video program which sees results fast!

Wordly Wise, Winston Grammar, and Getty Dubay Italic Handwriting Series are used at various levels, as needed.
As far as writing projects go, we write about what we read, or what we've been arguing about (not amongst ourselves, usually, but with acquaintances with whom we don't exactly see eye to eye!). A few of our writing projects can be viewed at Schamelot, our other blog.