4Real Forums: wondering if on the right track

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Topic: wondering if on the right track

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dolorsofmary
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Posted: June 11 2011 at 11:07am \| IP Logged

DS is 5 and will be 6 in August. He will be doing K work at home starting this September. For various and long winded reasons I have 2 sets of Bob Books (set 1 and set 2) that I wanted my son to go through this summer. He begged me for some toy and I said he could have it if he completed these books for summer work in order to get the toy. He loved Bob books at first but then he likes to blast through until he is supremely frustrated so I pace him wiht only 1 booklet a day except weekends and holidays. I feel like I should maybe change it up. Like do 1/2 a book a day or can it even. I do have other things he could do like some alphaphonic sheets and some pink series homemade matching game but they are easier and the bob books were purchased at cheap price but during my husbands time of unemployment. So I feel somewhat strongly about him finishing what we agreed to because it is not free but cheap but purchased at a time of economic downturn for us and I don't want him to feel that he can fangle things. Your advice? I know that not everything needs to be extremely fun. We just finished little saints program and it was very very gentle and I find that this bob books is much harder than little saints. Hmmm...sometimes when I write things out like this ithelps me think more clearly. Hmmm...I would hate to sell the bob books, I do have a deal with my son. I could just do 1/2 a book a day, or postpone it even. Hmmm...your ideas? Thanks!

I just talked to my son and I am going to be doing MODG K with my son starting this september. He loved Little saints but it required so little of him. I have noticedhis pencil grip really advance naturally by doing nothing and having him gravitate toward coloring pages and get better at gripping the crayon. I guess I also feel that the bob books and another book I have (dry erase preschool/k skills book with mazes and stuff in addition) make him frustrated.

I guess I always read - have fun with your child at this time ... time to 'pull hair' will be when he is older. cherish this time . I have done this with little saints and i would like to keep it happy like that but I feel that these bob books and dry erase book are good preps for k curriculum. I tried the k curriculum last september but ti was not 'fun' enough, it was too much work he felt and so we did little saints. now its like - hmmmm... I'm thinking of adding a game and circle song to the books this summer to help out. I feel like these bob books and dry erase book are an intro to K work.

I have to balance the - have fun with your kid during these perish years and - husband saying he has to do k work this coming year and - well I don't know.

I could try to do more montessori type version of modg k but i don't know how much time I will have to create all of that! I do have only 1 kid but it can still be very time consuming. I do have montessori on a shoe string.

kristinannie
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Posted: June 13 2011 at 11:28am \| IP Logged

If the Bob books are really hard for him, what is making it hard? Does he know all of his letter sounds really well? That could be the problem. If so, I would focus on that for awhile first. Is it blending? You could try this easy blending game. Pass the ball back and forth and say the letter sounds slowly (He passes you the ball and says the letter sound of p, then you pass the ball and say i and he passes the ball and says g then you pass the ball and say p, i, g, pig...all letter sounds not letter names). Then you keep going so every other time, he is saying the word. I hope that makes sense because it is hard to write it out and easier to just show you!

We have also had a lot of success with magnetic letters on a magnetic board. I will put "at" on the board and then he can try out different letters to see if he can make words. He loves that.

I have truly found that one day things just clicked with DS5. It went from a struggle to a lightbulb day and now he is reading so much better and we just have to keep up with the phonics.

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dolorsofmary
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Posted: June 13 2011 at 11:32am \| IP Logged

Thank you so much for that suggestions! I am definitely going to do that! Rosemarie

hylabrook1
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Posted: June 13 2011 at 12:19pm \| IP Logged

Just thinking that when a book is *harder* , it takes longer to get all the way through it. An entire book of something easy is much less work than a just a couple of pages of a book that poses more of a challenge. So, especially when something takes more effort, someone has already exerted LOTS of effort even to get through only a small bit of the job. Am I making sense?

Here's where I'm going. Maybe instead of measuring each day's assignment in terms of "a whole book" or "half a book", you might say, "We'll work on reading for 15 minutes each day." This is how Charlotte Mason recommends teaching young children - short, focused lessons. It's a bit intimidating to think you have to read an entire book that's a reach for you, but, hey, you can be done in 15 minutes, regardless!

Peace,
Nancy

dolorsofmary
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Posted: June 13 2011 at 4:48pm \| IP Logged

thank hyou all so much! Today was big cooking day (meaning with only 1 child I can cook a lot of meat and then we eat left overs for like 3 days or so, so today we were in the house a lot cooking for the St. Anthony of Padua feast.) and I took your advice thank you so much! First we did 1 page of the bob book and then he chose to make baking soda and vinegar volcano, then we did another page, etc. and we swapped out the volcano with a boat race (small boats in a small tub of course with straws and we tried to beat each other) and after each play time we did another page. At about the 1/2 way point of the bob book he got very frustrated because it was using letter 'I' a lot and he kept on saying the short vowel sound for 'e' instead. I used your idea of getting letter magnets off the fridge and htat helped a LOT and I also used the ball idea which he LOVED too! And then we did 2 pages of the dry erase book, each time after we did one page we then played (his choice always) he liked it much better but tomorrow I will do only 1/2 of a bob book unless he does not express frustration. Thank you for your invaluable encouragement! I might have thrown in the towel and then felt that I was making my life worse come september. And in this way he can get the 'carrot' he wanted so badly once he finishes. Thanks!

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