Copywork what should I expect?

[scampbell2003]

My DD8 is doing Copywork in Beyond. Today I was so frustrated with her. I had to apologize because I was upsetting her. She is using wide ruled paper and printing. How do you teach Copywork correctly? Her handwriting is very nice but she needs improvement on spacing and consistent letter size. She is copying from the book. Do I say nothing to her? She erases a lot which drives me nuts. But she is just trying to make it really nice. I know today I need to change my approach with her because I was not helping her at all.
So am I doing it correctly by having her pay attention to indentation and paragraph separation? What should be my expectation for her. By the way I have her only work for about 10-15 minutes and I tell her not to rush but to take her time.

[scampbell2003]

Sorry I said she is 8 but really she is 7 for 2 more months. She is growing up so fast and I am getting ahead of myself Anyway I looked in some of the previous threads but still wondering....

[alydar]

Hi

Just thought I'd share my experience with you. My ds is 7 also and we're in the last bit of Beyond (10 more units to go). When he first started doing the copywork he was using the handwriting paper with the dashed line in the middle (I'm sure it has a "formal" name but I can't recall). And his writing was big; a little shakey here; a little jumbled there; words too close together; too much space between letters of the same word....... And to add on to all of that he did. not. like. copywork. at. all. Fun times.

So, because I figured for him the above mentioned issues were the most important for him to concentrate on I didn't worry about indentation, paragraph separation, etc. He needed the basics worked on: how to separate words, how to close in those letters in the words, straighten up those lines that are supposed to be straight, round out those p's, b's, and a's, keep the letters the same size - that's where the handwriting paper really helped. It gave him the visual guidelines that regular ruled paper doesn't. And I sat with him while he did it so we could immediately address an issue and tried to keep the atmosphere between us light and gentle. Sometimes I have a hard time remembering that all of this is his first rodeo. All these skills and expectations of him are new in his little life. And it's my job to be there to guide and support. It can get frustrating when it seems like there's no progress but I have found that as long as I stay calm and gentle with a willingness to help him through the issue we are able to accomplish more and walk away with smiles.

The next thing I did to help him was I copied the section for that day onto the paper leaving a blank line underneath each of my handwritten lines. That way he was actually copying my writing that was located directly above the line he was writing on. Clear as mud? That kept him from having to look in the teacher's manual at the poem, then back at his work, then back at the manual, then back to his work. I think that took out a frustrating element for him.

Fastforward to now. He's using wide ruled paper and we have on occasion copied directly out of the manual. His spacing is better, his formation is better, and he can really put out some nice copywork when he commits himself fully. But I have noticed that the consistant letter sizing does suffer more on that paper than the handwriting paper with guidelines. But it's a learning process. He's still learning. And practicing. And gaining confidence in his skills and abilities as he sees himself improve. Now I don't sit with him anymore while he does copywork because I take that time to work with my daughter. But when he tells me he's through I tell him to check it and correct anything that needs changing or attention. He knows by now what I'll make him fix and I figure this is a good lesson for him to learn how to be responsible for himself.

And I also wanted to add that I learned from one of the other fine ladies on this board that the copywork shouldn't be a long affair. I was guilty of setting a certain writing amount rather than a certain time allotment for copywork in the beginning of Beyond. But I learned it's better to have a small amount of quality work and an unfrustrated student than lots of mistake-ridden work and an upset student. So we usually set copywork for 5-10 minutes (depending on how focused he is on his work vs. the birds or clouds or fly on the wall or....... ) That has served us well.

I hope some of this helps.

Many blessings!

[jer2911mom]

My dd7 is doing Beyond copywork as well and we use handwriting paper with the dashed line (it's the Mead journal that has space at the top half of the page for drawing a picture). My dd uses her pinkie to create a "pinkie space" between her words. I have also seen the recommendation of using a penny, but I think the pinkie is easier since it is right there. I would think using handwriting paper might be your best bet for getting the letters the right size.

Also, I xerox the poem twice, once for the cutting apart day and the other so that she has a flat copy to work from. That way she can tuck it under her journal and just look at the part she is working on. It reduces the amount of text to have to sort through as she glances back and forth. I draw an arrow in pencil next to the line where she is starting from that day.

HTH,
Kathy

[psreit]

My dd is still using handwriting paper for copywork. I write it on a white board and she copies from that. She knows how the letters need to be placed on the lines. She does her Day 4 spelling words on notebook paper to get her familiar with using it. I am seeing improvement on the notebook paper, but I'm not going to change right now. She will be using 3-lined paper to learn cursive, so I will probably use more notebook paper once she has cursive down pat. The second grade writing paper isn't as wide, so dd is learning to make her letters smaller. It also helps for practicing consistent letter sizing. If you are doing the poems for copywork, you don't need indention. Then just skip a line for the next verse. HTH

[creekmama]

My son is the same age as yours, and he still hates copywork. But it's getting better! We're now in Bigger at half speed, which requires more writing, so he only copies a couple of lines of his poem every day. The other ladies have already given great feedback. I still have to sit right next to my boy and put my arm around him or pet his back while he does copywork! But that's okay. He's getting more independent every day, and one day he won't want me to snuggle him at all.

[scampbell2003]

Thanks Ladies! I always am sitting with her and we only work 10-15 minutes. My mother is a retired school teacher and said her handwriting is very nice. She has been writing on wide ruled paper most of the year and is doing really well. The issues she has are minor.

I am wondering how to encourage her to doing her best. I also was wondering what I should be expecting. She is able to write the poem on wide ruled.

Are there tricks for helping her keep her letters and spacing the same? Or does that just come with practice. It seems to help her to skip a line on the wide ruled so she can see the sentence she had just written. This day I was trying to get her to not skip a line. Maybe that is why we had the problems we did today. When does a child begin to write easily on each consecutive line?

We were doing Abeka cursive with her this year and she has done very well with it. I went back to print in Beyond so she could focus on it until we start Bigger in the fall.

Thank you for all the help! I really appreciate it.

[moedertje]

My ds is in Beyond and had beautiful handwriting, but he still needs some help on spacing his words, he uses his pinky between words. I also use the method Julie has in the post below to help him see where the spaces between words need to be.
My older ds still struggles with inconsistent spacing and letters, but improved greatly when I used Julie's method below.

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=4618&p=34014

HTH and success

[Carrie]

This is such a good thread! I'll just pop-in to share that 5 min. of copywork, working up to 10 min. eventually, is enough at this age. It is good to start small and to always stop before YOUR frustration point hits (as well as the student's frustration point).

CM would say that one beautifully written line is better than many lines done poorly. Actually, CM would go as far as saying one beautifully formed letter is better than a whole series of sloppy ones. So, with that in mind, I'd pull back to 5 successful copywork minutes and work up to 10! Also, don't miss the link in the post above, as it has a great visual for ideas that may be of help.

Blessings,
Carrie