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Under what conditions do you make your dc rewrite their narrations? Do you just have them rewrite it if it is sloppy or are there other circumstances that cause you to have them redo it?

When my ds first started written narrations last year in PHFHG, I found it important to hover a bit and make sure he started off right. I used the Written Narration Skills list and worked through those steps one at a time until, moving on to #2 only after he mastered #1, and so on. It felt important to give him a feeling that he could handle written narrations. I wanted him to have a good attitude about them, so I did quite a bit of hand-holding (and the guide helped me know how to go about that). This year, in CTC, I have just been underling misspelled words and will be working more on starting sentences in different ways, closing sentences, etc. I guess in general I expect him to be on topic and go in an order that makes sense. From there, we work on more specifics, but usually just one thing at a time, and that one thing can be worked on awhile. I don't think I'd have my ds rewrite his whole narration, as this would seem to send the message that the entire thing was incorrect. Since written narrations are supposed to be a reflection of what that individual personally remembers and took from the reading, there really isn't one "right" narration. If a child was totally off on his written narration (like talking about things that didn't happen), I guess I'd hover more and guide it more in an encouraging way. I think this is a skill that takes a long, long time to get, so if you're at the beginning of teaching it, I'd really give some help and guide it a bit more until your child is more comfortable with it. HTH!

In Christ,
Julie

I rarely make my daughter rewrite her narrations but she does well with grammar & spelling.

Here was our progression...

Step 1 - oral narration (Once a week, I type up what child narrates. S/He reads it and tells me anything s/he wants to add or change.)
Step 2 - copied narration (Same as step 2, but child copies finished narration onto paper)
Step 3 - written narration (Child writes out narration & I check for basic spelling, grammar, & accurate content)

Combined with R&S English this has worked very well for my 10yo daughter and now my 7yo son. And it fits in nicely with HOD.

Hi Ladies,

This has really helped me! Daisy, specifically, can you tell me if you use that progression over time or through one week? I mean, do you do it: step one (orally/typed) until this is easy (maybe several weeks) and then move on to step two, etc.? Or are all three steps done on one narration over one week? My son using CTC just produced a written narration for unit 3 on Jacob and Esau. The narration had very little to do with the reading in "The Story of the Ancient World" because he knew quite a bit about the Bible story and really went with that. Despite having pointed out the starting sentence to use, the questions in the guide to focus his thoughts, this is what he produced. I think your first step of having him do it with me orally and seeing it written down might train him better to stay on topic and include details. This is his first HOD year - he didn't do Preparing. He actually did quite a bit better on his first two but I had helped him more.

Rachael

I used this progression over years but it could be truncated depending on how easily the child writes.

I started with stage one before my children were writing and progressed to stage 3 by the time they were in 4th grade. If I had introduced narration in 4th grade, we could have moved through the steps faster because the writing wouldn't be so tedious, kwim?

I wouldn't hesitate to use the above stages to teach your son narration. With my 10yo (who is very familiar with narration) we orally discuss the questions included in the section and then she just writes. But if I was in your situation, I'd start by

discussing the questions,
have him narrate to you while you type (I give NO feedback during the narration. I'm only there to type),
have him read what you typed
make corrections for content, grammar, & readability (was that really in the story, is there anything you wish to add, that sentence doesn't quite make sense, it doesn't "sound" right, etc.) Most of the corrections should probably come from HIM and not necessarily you nick-picking his narration, kwim?
print it out
have him copy it into the box.

As his narrations improve, he can start taking over more of the steps. I don't think it would take too long. Just my advice, of course. Others may have other suggestions.

Thank you ladies! I will try the things you suggested.