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Martha
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| Posted: Aug 16 2006 at 10:14pm | IP Logged
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I have seen these in catalogs & heard about them online, but didn't actually find a human with the books until today at the park.
Oh they look great! We currently use faith and freedom frm seton. however, I find a desire to naturally do narrations, dictation and I love how these seem to be little power houses of phonics, spelling, literature, and reading all in one wee little book.
At least, that's the impression I got.
Now, what I want to know is how they are actually used in the real world? Is it book 1 in first grade through book 6 in 6th? How do you use the speller/word book?
How do you ladies do dictation? This came up at the park. do you read it 1 time only and they must go from that? I thought you read it without them writing once. Then read it a phrase at a time for them to copy. Is there considered a proper way?
Do the readers suggest copywork too or do you just pick a sentence yourself?
How well do you think this would follow CHC's Little Stories for Little Folks? or Seton's K phonics workbooks?
I'm thinking the first would be smoother.
I'm trying to lean towards this method of schooling, but having to "un-school" my own brains thinking a bit at a time to get completely there. I was excited to see this book, because coming up with all the dication, narration, copywork, spelling, ect.. myself is a bit over-whelming of a thought!
Anyhoo..
thanks for any opinions/suggestins for this reader program!
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Martha
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Becky Parker
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| Posted: Aug 17 2006 at 7:26am | IP Logged
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Martha,
I don't know how much this will help but we use the CNR's. I started my dd in the primer when she was in K. She wasn't ready for it until about 1/2 way through the year. My ds will be in K this year and I know he will NOT be ready to start the CNR. It depends on the child. My dd loves them. She started the primer in K, then in 1st we just kept going until we finished the primer and started the next section in that book which is for 1st grade. For the reading, we would go over the new story together, especially the new words, then she would practice on her own and when she felt she had it she would read it to me. I didn't push her to finish the book by the end of the year, but let her take it at her own pace. She continued to read through the summer, and now that we are starting 2nd grade, she's excited to be starting on the 2nd reader. I didn't think going over the new words helped much, with all their markings, I actually thought it made them harder to read. But one day she got stuck on a word and instead of asking me, she looked up at the list of new words, found it, and used their markings to figure it out. I was surprised!
I have to admit, I used the CNR while using CHC's Little Stories for Little Folks, and my dd really enjoyed the CNR more. I dont really know why, but LSFLF became quite painful for her. She would beg to skip it and use the CNR instead. So I started using Sound Beginnings to teach her the phonics she needed and the CNR for reading practice. This has worked well for us. I think the CNR is great, but there is certainly a need for more phonics instruction (IMHO).
We don't use the speller that came with the set. I don't know how to be honest with you. Maybe I should take it off the shelf and really look at it again.
As far as copywork and dictation, the readers sometimes have a passage in cursive that you could use, or just come up with one on your own. If I use their passage, I don't expect my dd yo write them in cursive though! There are two different methods that I have read about for dictation. One is studied dictation, where you go over the passage with your child first, noting punctuation, spelling, etc. Then dictate the passage for them to write. I think this works well. Actually, I have my daughter copy a passage for copywork one day, then use the same passage for studied dictation the next. I'm not clear on it, but I think the other method for dictation would be to dictate it without having studied it first. This would be a way to possibly "test" your child to see what they already know without your instruction. I'm sure someone else on this list can give you better info. about this.
Just a side note - I had my ds use the CNR for 5th grade when he was in 5th. He liked it more than I thought he would. He didn't care for the 6th grade book, but at that time he was reading so many other wonderful things I didn't push it.
I've heard that Kolby sells a teachers guide to go with the CNR. I don't know much about it though.
Hope this helps in some small way!
Becky
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ALmom
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| Posted: Aug 17 2006 at 2:39pm | IP Logged
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The Kolbe teacher's guides aren't really helpful - they are just an answer key to the questions in the book - and those are easy to do yourself.
The CNR are wonderful literary stories. My biggest complaint is that in the upper grades a lot of these are excerpts from out of print books (but of very high literary quality). We wanted to read the whole novel. One of the older books' emphasis is on science and technology (but since they were written in 1800s, be sure to explain what was new then or your dc will be confused about the excitement over the invention of electrical lighting in homes. The other older book seems to emphasize history and has a lot of excerpts from actual speaches, etc. In the upper grades, I find the CNR more useful as supplemental reading in history and history of science. The stories and excerpts are great, though.
One thing to be aware of - the CNR are not phonics based at all, although there are a few phonics quides here and there. I found them more useful as quality reading material after my dc were actually reading and as a vocabulary study. Someone who does more sight vocabulary reading might find them more useful to teach reading than we did, but we had to have phonics based reading instruction with phonics based readers at first. (Of course, Faith and Freedom are not phonics based either). Kolbe also uses them for spelling - basically adding the vocabulary words to any spelling words being studied. I haven't used them as spellers yet, and probably won't, though we do vocabulary with the words prior to reading the story. It is helpful to remember multiple levels of meaning with words as sometimes the words as they are used in the story have a more archaic meaning.
CNR definitely have a much higher literary quality than the Faith and Freedom but the reading level is more difficult and since they were written in the 1800s some of the stories require you to give some background in order for dc to enjoy them. The younger grade stories don't have this as much as the older grade stories and excerpts. Also some of the older books have more violent content (not gratuitous, but definitely more detailed battle accounts, etc. We didn't have a problem with these per say but my dd wasn't as thrilled with them as my son was. We have read and enjoyed younger grade readers in upper elementary as well and I do second not being a real stickler for finishing a book. They are worth having just to read.
We havent' done tons of dictation but due to the literary quality of the work, there is plenty to choose from in the CNR stories. I cannot imagine doing that with Faith and Freedom - they may be fun stories to read, but not dictation quality, imo. CNR are definitely dictation quality.
Janet
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Martha
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| Posted: Aug 17 2006 at 6:02pm | IP Logged
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ahh, well then I don't feel bad about not having them and don't really think I will change from F&F readers then. 
I'm really wanting to "let go" of having so many subjects, or sub-subjects, but I also don't want to over-burden myself with tons of teacher work. I like my kids to work about 75% independent and 25% as a group.
My dh is really starting to lean me towards literature appoaches, so we are taking baby steps in that direction.
Thanks for the real life info ladies, it's priceless and I appreciate it. It would have been so disappointing to find that information after I bought them. 
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Martha
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4Real Forums : Living Learning
Topic: Catholic National Readers
