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Kathryn
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| Posted: July 23 2011 at 4:28pm | IP Logged
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Help steer me here but when my kids attended pre-K and even up until about 1st grade I think, they "journaled" every day. In reading the current Seton newsletter (that applies to my son), here's what they say:
My son seems to have difficulty writing a paragraph or anything longer.
The only way to learn to ride a bike is to ride, the only way to learn to read is to read, and the only way to learn to write is to write. Just like riding a bike or reading, writing is a skill that needs to be practiced. The more it is practiced, the easier it becomes.
To practice writing, an English professor at Christendom College suggests that students keep a journal. She points out that “ironically, the only way to lessen the painful nature of writing is by writing everyday. Perhaps the easiest way to facilitate this practice is by encouraging your child to keep a journal. A journal is a notebook in which the child writes about specific events or ideas; or it may be a place where he fights out personal battles, or reflects on people or events.
“The journal is a place for practice writing…Writing in the journal gives the child practice in putting on paper the ideas which are floating in his brain.… Just let him practice. Let him become accustomed to the written word, its powers and its deficiencies. Have your child carry his journal in his pocket on his daily excursions to the store or to the park or wherever. Encourage him to write about what he sees or thinks. The next time the dinner table becomes the scene for a discussion, ask him to present his perspective on the issue.”
Besides a paper journal, there is also the possibility of keeping a journal on the computer, or even posting in a blog.
The goal is to have your son become accustomed to writing everyday and not be afraid of writing. Ask him to say a prayer to his guardian angel as he begins to write.
You don’t need to look at his spelling or punctuation. Just have him write his own thoughts and ideas, using his own words. The hardest part about this assignment is that you need to be patient. The first hurdle is simply to have your son get used to writing and not be afraid of writing. Believe it or not, his writing will improve, but for now, just be happy he is actually writing and is not fearful of writing or expressing himself in words, whether on paper or on the computer.
Now back to my questions:
1) I'm not sure the open ended free rein of writing will work for him and am wondering if I should give him more specific topics.
2) I thought typing instead of writing would help so do you think a private blog or just typing it out is sufficient?
3) How, where, when is this addressed in a CM method utilizing our modern media means? I know those starting w/ CM move from copywork to dictation to narration, right? So does "free" journaling fit in here?
My son has exceptionally difficult time organizing thoughts in his mind and obviously then on paper. Writing is laborious. Even when we do some narration, his words and manner of speaking seem so jumbled up and I do work on that but wanted to move more into having him WRITE good sentences...I'm not even looking for paragraphs right now. Do I need to back up somewhere else?
Thanks in advance,
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Kathryn in TX
(dd 16, ds 15, dd 8, dd 5)
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SallyT
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| Posted: July 26 2011 at 6:43am | IP Logged
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My own $.02 is that journaling is great for people who are already comfortable with writing. As a high school teacher, I found that consistently, the dead worst thing I ever did was having kids journal or "free write" -- even at that stage (this was mostly my very non-academic students), the blank page was a brain-shutdown. Either they just wrote nonsense (or profanity, or obscenity), or they wrote nothing, and I don't think that either of those options really accomplished anything like the claims that Seton newsletter is making.
Not that journals don't do those things *for kids who already like to write and think in writing.* I have at least one journal-keeper in my house, but it's totally voluntary. For the kid who still can't think and write at the same time, ie can't simultaneously come up with some coherent thought *and* find written words to express it, journaling as an exercise is probably not worth that much.
I required very little independent writing of my current 13-year-old until the last year or so. From kindergarten to 5th or 6th grade, he largely did copywork for language arts. In about the 5th grade he started to write fan fiction for a Redwall website, which was his first foray into really writing; again, I didn't assign this, but it was a signal to me that it was time to move forward. Now he's really ready to take on more extended writing projects. (and I mean really, I hardly ever had him even write independent sentences until he was at least 10 or 11, maybe later. Never mind requiring coherent thoughts in writing!)
I think writing is just a really developmentally-determined thing. I can't imagine what the benefits of having preschoolers "journal" would be; my experience has been that it takes, usually, a lot of time to reach the point where the part of the mind that invents and the part of the mind that renders invention into words work together. And the more a child does practice correct spelling and grammar and excellent written English, via the medium of copywork, the more likely his own writing will be to reflect those things naturally.
Sally
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Becky Parker
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| Posted: July 26 2011 at 8:35am | IP Logged
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I would have to agree with Sally. I used to worry all the time because I did not have my kids "journal" like my school kids did when I was a classroom teacher. I was afraid they would be so behind in writing. But, when my oldest ds went to highschool, even though he hated writing and did the least amount possible while he was here at home, he got all A's in his English class. I attribute that to the copywork, dictation and narrations he did. I think journaling, for kids that are poor writers, might actually be a way for them to practice the poor skills.
(OTOH, my dd loves to write, is rather good at it, and has been keeping her own journal for a few years now. She does this voluntarily, at night before she goes to bed. I don't check it or anything.)
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Mackfam
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| Posted: July 26 2011 at 8:43am | IP Logged
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SallyT wrote:
| My own $.02 is that journaling is great for people who are already comfortable with writing. |
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I'm so glad Sally answered - I really appreciate her perspective and her insight and truthfully I couldn't agree more.
I don't require journaling, but I do have a couple of children that do it voluntarily once they are writing independently. I'll see if I can give some thoughts on your specific questions, Kathryn, and just so I'm clear, we're really talking about your 10 yo son, right? I'm going to take your last observation first:
Kathryn wrote:
| My son has exceptionally difficult time organizing thoughts in his mind and obviously then on paper. Writing is laborious. Even when we do some narration, his words and manner of speaking seem so jumbled up and I do work on that but wanted to move more into having him WRITE good sentences...I'm not even looking for paragraphs right now. Do I need to back up somewhere else? |
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At 10, I'd say he's doing fine. My 10 yo son *JUST* started writing narrations the latter half of last year. That is his only writing (besides copywork and dictations)...in other words, there are no required book reports, 5 paragraph essays, or the like. These written narrations are generally very short - perhaps 1 - 4 sentences at the most right now. In about 6 months, I could certainly see some improvement. In written form, he's just starting to get the idea of organizing his thoughts. That will come the more he reads and observes how other authors do that.
Overall, I recommend:
Beginning written narrations - These will be extremely short at first and that is totally fine!!! Start with 1 written narration a week and maybe move to 2 a week when that isn't overwhelming.
Copywork and Dictation - Choosing wonderful selections which express literary thought WILL really help in your child's writing. Copywork assists with this too, but dictation selections are studied, working with one grammatical/mechanical part of the selection at a time (all this within the context of a *living thought*), and this studied dictation really helps the beginning writer to *see* how thoughts are formed and considered and structured in writing. It slowly begins to translate in their own writing.
A Private Blog - This is something that can be a vehicle for journaling, and both my older children really enjoy it! Boys especially begin to develop passions or interests and for these things, they delight in writing about it! A blog can be a fun medium for them to work in.
Story Starters by Karen Andreola - My children and I discovered this resource last year and we all really enjoy it. It might not work well for every child, particularly for the child that panics in the face of the unknown, but I do want to point out that it is distinctly different from the "tell me about your favorite cardboard box, and if you were a stamp on the box, what would you see...." kind of idiotic writing prompts usually packaged under the name of a story starter. They are imaginative, engaging story beginnings, and my children find them to be captivating and enjoyable to finish. We do this on Fridays and I like that my writers can WRITE their endings, and my non-writers can NARRATE their ending to me. All are practicing organization of thought. This is a form of exploring creative writing and our family really enjoys the format. I find that these story beginnings truly "warm the imagination" which is something CM finds important as a child begins to express themselves in more abstract (free) writing (more on that below), but consider carefully as this format may not be the best fit for every child!
With the exception of the Story Starters, I see the wisdom in having the child:
WRITE ABOUT WHAT YOU KNOW
I know Julie Bogart talks about this in her Bravewriter series, and Charlotte Mason was a passionate advocate of this. The child that is asked to write about something they aren't familiar with finds the topic overwhelming, stale and uninteresting.
Ok...your questions:
Kathryn wrote:
| 1) I'm not sure the open ended free rein of writing will work for him and am wondering if I should give him more specific topics. |
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This is a good observation you've made for your son, and I'd say trust your instincts. As Sally pointed out, I think some children are comfortable with creative, open-ended writing (like journaling), and others would be frozen in the face of it. I can often see how one, big topic could also be overwhelming, and it's one of the reasons I find a great haven in beginning written narrations: the child writes about a particular short selection of reading. They are (1) writing about what they know, (2) writing about something specific, (3) writing based on a limited selection of reading (not an entire book, though an older student might give me a written narration of an entire book). Since written narrations are a natural extension of oral narrations, they aren't completely unfamiliar to the student either (although the first written narrations are usually awkward and that's totally fine in my book!!!)
Kathryn wrote:
| 2) I thought typing instead of writing would help so do you think a private blog or just typing it out is sufficient? |
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Another excellent observation!! You're doing great, Kathryn!! My second writer really struggled for a long time with the mechanical motor skill of writing so when he began written narrations, I let him type them in an email program and just email them to me! It has worked well with both my writers. My high schooler writes in a word processing program and emails drafts to me, but my younger writer simply writes in his email program for now and emails written narrations to me. I've made my share of mistakes in home ed, but one of the things I have always been glad about doing is beginning to teach keyboarding skills (typing) starting in 4th grade! We spend 2 years working through a simple keyboarding book and by the time I'm ready to ask for written narrations (end of 5th grade/around 10 yo), they have basic typing skills well in hand.
Kathryn wrote:
| 3) How, where, when is this addressed in a CM method utilizing our modern media means? I know those starting w/ CM move from copywork to dictation to narration, right? So does "free" journaling fit in here? |
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For her time, CM was quite progressive and she felt it was important to use practical and useful modern tools. I believe she would have enjoyed some of our modern media as long as it was used as a tool, not a crutch, and used in moderation, never to the exclusion of worthy books.
As far as writing instruction, CM was quite strong in her wording, expressing that parents/educators should not hamper a child with excessive writing instruction (Home Education, p. 245-247).
** Children under 9 --> oral narrations mostly, but they also may write simple things (write a part--narrate a part of a book, or write about a walk they have taken, or some other "simple matter that they know")
** Children around 9 - 12 --> begin to write their narrations, learning punctuation and grammar through literature. Their reading is wider and has more depth and therefore at this point can transition into written narrations. Notice the 4 year range above....there is a wide berth given in considering the readiness of a child in beginning writing...CONSIDER YOUR INDIVIDUAL CHILD!! I always find it interesting to see how many narrations were written in poetry/prose form by CM's students and think it a credit to the great variety of poetry the children were exposed to.
CM wrote:
| Rhythm and accent on the other hand take care of themselves in proportion as a child is accustomed to read poetry. |
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(Vol 6, p. 193) ** Children in high school grades/forms --> receive some instruction on composition and more formal writing, but even then it isn't too much because CM felt it was important that each child be able to express themselves in their own individual style of writing. Julie Bogart (Bravewriter) calls this "the writers voice" and I see great value in fostering this *individual voice* even while offering a little more formal writing instruction. Writing at this point should be natural for a child that has been educated with CM methods, and this instruction looks more like fine tuning. Essay work, letters to editors, poetry, current events writing, formal reviews -- are all examples of high school writing.
Children in CM's schools certainly free-journaled in their nature notebooks as well as in other notebooks, of which they kept MANY. I also find this mention in Vol 6 (p. 193)
CM, emphasis mine wrote:
| In III and IV as in the earlier Forms (my note: Forms III and IV would be roughly equivalent to our grades 7-8 and 9-10), the matter of their reading during the term, topics of the day, and the passing of the Seasons, afford innumerable subjects for short essays or short sets of verses of a more abstract nature in IV and III: the point to be considered is that the subject be one on which, to quote again Jane Austen's expression, the imagination of the children has been 'warmed.' They should be asked to write upon subjects which have interested them keenly. |
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This says to me that the children, if they free write, may write on subjects that interest them because their imagination has been warmed. You can see many examples of the children's writing on p. 195 - 209 of Vol 6.
I hope this helps give you some ideas on writing, and specifically journaling, for your son, Kathryn. I would not force or require journaling, but I would offer it if he is interested in writing about a topic he enjoys journaling/free writing about...an example might be a particular passion he has - journaling his lego creations, his World War II interests, his latest bug finds - whatever HIS interest and passion is. And yes, sometimes these journals work well in an online format such as a private blog.
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Jen Mackintosh
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Wildflowers and Marbles
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Mackfam
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| Posted: July 26 2011 at 9:10am | IP Logged
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Oh dear! I was cross posting with Becky and she said it so much more succinctly that I did!  I like her response! I love it when you add your thoughts here, Becky!!
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Jen Mackintosh
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SallyT
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| Posted: July 26 2011 at 12:18pm | IP Logged
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Becky said: (OTOH, my dd loves to write, is rather good at it, and has been keeping her own journal for a few years now. She does this voluntarily, at night before she goes to bed. I don't check it or anything.)
Yes! Even though I sat through countless workshops on The Writing Process, Blah Blah Blah, I never quite understood how keeping a journal, which I had always viewed as an essentially private activity, came to be this pedagogical tool, to be evaluated as part of a grade. I will also never forget being in a teacher workshop, back in my rather free-wheeling twenties, in which we were encouraged to "journal" freely for some minutes, and what I wrote, which was the thing on my mind just then, was *not* in any way, shape, form, or fashion something I wanted to share. Should have known better, I guess, but there was that blank page, and I had to write something, and what came out was what came out. We then had to trade papers and comment on each other's journals; I was sitting next to this very nice older man, and I was horrified to have to hand him what I had written. That ranks right up there in the top three most excruciating moments of my life. So I tend to have this prejudice against journaling as a formal exercise, which I'm sure colors everything I have to say about it!
Still, what Becky describes is exactly how journal-writing works in nature -- as the compulsion of a person who thinks in writing. It's less a tool than a kind of overflow tank for a certain kind of mind which needs this precise kind of overflow tank, as opposed to the overflow tank of building a boat in the basement. And journals tend to be for fragments -- I've been reading a "biography" in letters and diaries of the English writer Barbara Pym, and what I notice most about her journal writing is how dashed-off it is, just notes about people and situations which she wanted to put aside to use later in her novels. Her journals seem less like practice in writing than practice in observing, as if she were doing nature study by studying human nature. That's where a journal is really useful, for notetaking of one kind or another on an independent basis, with the understanding that there's nothing really to quantify about what's written down.
I love the idea of a private blog, however, if a child has a particular interest in something he can describe and explain and comment about. For some people, the idea that they're writing *to* someone *about* something they know is a really powerful motivator. But as Jen says, it's pretty normal for a 10yo boy to be really disjointed in his thoughts -- if you think about the classical model of the Trivium, he's still a couple of years away, at least, from being ready for that dialectical stage, when the mind is really ready to take on *structured* thought. And doing that in writing may take even longer. My now-13-year-old has always been able to talk a good game, express himself articulately and so on, but until this past year, getting him to render those thoughts in writing was like trying to milk a rock. This year it's been much better, like a switch flipping. I expect next year to be even better. And so on.
Both my older kids have had blogs, and my 17yo daughter has kept hers up pretty consistently; my son on the other hand has cast about for something for his blog to be *about*. "About" never bothered his sister, but he has to have a topic and a goal, and so he's changed titles and templates and "this is a blog about X" headings a million times. But finally his entries, whatever they're about, are more than a sentence long. Marked contrast to his first blog, at about age 10, when he wanted to have the persona of a monkey, and all he could think of to say was, "Hello. I am a monkey."
OK, backing away from the computer now . . .
Sally
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ekbell
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BTW my oldest brother was diagnosed with dysgraphia (the official term for an inability to think and write at the same time, sufferers may also feel a characteristic type of physical pain when writing by hand) and the advice given for such children is remarkably similar.
The following is my summary of the advice and how it matches CM's methods.
Start with separating out the various writing tasks as much as possible so that the child only has one area to concentrate on at a time. Be careful to avoid unecessary physical strain when asking for handwriting work, writing to the point of pain is counterproductive. Dictating either to an adult or recorder and learning to type is recommended (touch typing doesn't tend to be as physically demanding). Copywork and oral narrations fit this recommendation very, very well.
Once the child is at ease with such tasks, it is time to start carefully combining them. Again it's best to start small. I personally think that dictation and short written narrations work better then a lot of other recommendations for this stage.
After the child is comfortable with combining writing tasks then and only then should they be required to work on tasks that require thinking and writing together. Some children may still need to separate the tasks as much as possible with the help of recorders and keyboards. (my oldest and youngest brother have needed such accommodations in highschool and college- my oldest brother's college was very helpful, they GAVE him a laptop as well as extra time and a quiet place for exams that needed to be done by hand -my youngest brother has found his netbook very useful in highschool).
Again CM recommendations on topics and length fit very well, starting with topics that the child is familiar with and has already thought about is ideal. 'Cold' writing (writing on a topic without previous warning or discussion) is to be avoided. Free or creative writing without previous preparation and thinking time is particularly problematic as that sort of writing is the most demanding style of writing from a having to think while writing point of view.
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Kathryn
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| Posted: July 26 2011 at 1:10pm | IP Logged
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Thanks so much for the wisdom and advice! I knew that "cold" writing wouldn't work at all. I guess I can't organize my own thoughts enough to know how to direct him so I always turn here for help!
Now, I'll have to go back and realllly read and re-read what you all have writeen and sit and ponder and come up with a plan for him. I hope to post back what I come up with.
Thanks again and cont'd ideas are welcome,
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Kathryn in TX
(dd 16, ds 15, dd 8, dd 5)
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Kathryn
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| Posted: July 26 2011 at 1:19pm | IP Logged
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Ohh...I should also add that he is technically 11 now. We did have some testing done this past Spring and although he didn't get an "official" dyslexia diagnosis there were enough red flags that we are now working with a reading program specific for dyslexics. It also addresses the ADD factor too and so it's working well. I think I just try to move him along faster than he can physically, mentally, emotionally do so it's a real BIG challenge for me to slow down. Since we're starting our 3rd yr homeschooling I have let go a lot of what would be expected for his age/grade but there's still always that voice (hmmm...maybe that's the neighbor's voice and the in-laws voice and the grandma's voice and not mine!) 
In the CM model, I would prob. have to look at the "under 9" category for him tho in terms of where he is developmentally.
Continuing on....
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Kathryn in TX
(dd 16, ds 15, dd 8, dd 5)
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Becky Parker
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Mackfam wrote:
| Oh dear! I was cross posting with Becky |
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No problem Jen! I was just thinking what a beautiful job you do of explaining things! There is much food for thought in your post.
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Becky
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4Real Forums : Language Arts Come Alive
Topic: Journaling
