Preparing Guide and Language Arts

[pamh]

My 9 yr old son, who would have been entering 5th grade this August is staying home this year. I already had the Preparing Guide with Rod and Staff 4 so I thought I'd use that for his Language Arts. Do I need to add, Ignite your Writing, since he's going into 5th grade? I'm afraid there could be a slim chance on him returning to ps next year and want to make sure he doesn't fall behind in Language Arts.

Background: He has a horrible time writing legible, complete sentences. I even questioned his 4th grade teacher multiple times for giving him A's on his writing work at school because I felt they were HORRIBLE! His teacher felt I was too hard on him and that his A was appropriate.

Thanks in advance for any advice!

Pam

[blessedmomof4]

Between Rod and Staff 4, DITHOR, and the Preparing Guide, there is plenty of writing and writing instruction. I don't think it would be necessary to add a writing program.

[my3sons]

Between Rod and Staff 4, DITHOR, and the Preparing Guide, there is plenty of writing and writing instruction. I don't think it would be necessary to add a writing program.

I agree! We are doing PHFHG with our 9 1/2 yo (and he loves it BTW ). He does well with writing, and it is more than enough. Focusing on the ample writing that PHFHG already has planned will give your ds time to work on 'quality' rather than 'quantity'. Here is a rundown of writing type assignments in PHFHG...

R & S Grammar (we write about 1/3 of it and do the rest orally or with me writing on markerboard)
Dictation (3 x a week)
DITHOR Student Book (if you do Level 4/5, approximately 3 workbook pages a week, with more writing on a page)
Science Notebooking (2 times a week, approx. 4 sentences)
History Notebooking (2 times a week, approx. 4 sentences)
Science lab report (same as above)
3-5 vocab. cards for history (1 time a week)
Common Place book (copy Bible verse, quotations, special things from reading, probably 3-5 sentences, 1-2 times a week)
Creative Writing of a poem using RLS's poetry as a model (approx. 4 stanzas, 1 time per week)
Written Narration with history (5 sentences, 1 x a week)
Science short answer (answer 5 questions, 1 x a week)

The variety of writing done in PHFHG gives a nice balance to the day. HTH, and I think you and your ds are really going to enjoy PHFHG!
In Christ,
Julie