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My 13 yo (7th grader) gets a bit lost in reading The Story of the Ancient World in CTC. I have recently (in the last 2 weeks) begun to read it to him, but even then he gets a bit overwhelmed. Do any others have these issues with your children and what do you do? My main concern/desire is helping him develop the ability to comprehend and organize his thoughts when he reads or hears a challenging text. He has had a lot of challenges this year with the readings in CTC history, storytime and extension. Any suggestions? We're on week 15.

I'll also add he's been through Beyond, Bigger and Preparing and not had any issues with the readings until this year. I know in pp it has been suggested that a child having comprehension issues is not properly placed, but I don't think placement is our issue. Even I have to reread portions of Story of the Ancient World to make sure I've grasped the concepts.

My ds had challenges understanding this book also. I had made a few posts and maybe some of the information that Carrie and others shared might be of help. In the second one Carrie gave me a real understanding of the process of learning to understand books that were written in this style.
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Thank you Lynn. Those are great links. It is helpful knowing the bigger picture!

Thank you for sharing the links. Particularly the second. Carrie's response really relaxed me and helped me better undersrand the goal. My girl is 10, 11 mid-june, and we are in unit 3 of CTC. She doesnt seem to have real trouble with this text and really likes it, but it does meet her with much more where she is with a bit of stretch. Carrie's reply helped me balance my expectations of my DD's output to a more reasonable level. She doesnt struggle with the book at all, just the output but not a lack of comprehension.

I think maybe letting him read outloud to himself and record it then letting him play the recording as he just follows along and perhaps makes notes msy help. He could even read and record just impotant names, events, places, dates, key ideas and play that back to hi,self before writing the narration. I think perhaps it would be okay and helpful to go over all the questions BEFORE he reads so his mind is in gear and has a hint of the who,what,where and he can connect and fill in gaps from there.