Written narration-is this ok?

[LynnH]

I am new to this homeschooling thing and every now and then go through a period of doubting myself and if I am pushing my son enough, is he doing what he should be doing etc. When he does his written narration he does a good job of doing it for the most part by himself and then I come in and we go over whatever skill it may be we are focusing on such as spelling or capitalization. My concern is that when he writes he just gives the basic facts. His sentences are short and to the point. He doesn't write anything more than the general story and I am just wondering if that is ok or should I encourage longer sentences and more details. Here is this weeks narration so you can see what I mean.

"In Israel, Athaliah tried to kill all David's family and rule over as queen. So Athaliah's daughter saved Joash and hid him in the temple. Once he was seven, soldiers guarded him. The soldiers yelled long live the king. She came in and got arrested and killed."

[my3sons]

I think that sounds like a good narration. It is in a good sequential order, and it makes total sense. Some of the sentences are long, and some are short - so it flows well. When my ds did PHFHG last year, his written narrations looked pretty much the same as your ds's. Last year, I was glad he was limited to writing a handful of sentences because it helped him learn to pick out the most important things to share. Your ds did a good job of that already! Last year, we really worked on picking out the big ideas to put in his narrations, and also on him using people's names and places in his narrations. Again, your ds is already doing that well.

This year, in CTC, my ds's narrations can be longer, and we are working on using the proper verb tense, correcting errors, flow, etc. Here is his latest (unedited) narration:
God wanted Gideon to attack with 300 men to show His Glory. God told Gideon to let any man who is afraid to go home. God then told Gideon to send home all the men who knelt down to drink. Gideon took 300 men against the Midianites. Gideon spied on the enemies camp and heard a ??? (I can't read this word) and it meant that Gideon won the war. Gideon refused the king's spot because God was the king, but he took a gold breastplate. When Gideon died the Israelites worshiped idols again.

As you can see, we are still working on many things in narration, but I am pleased overall with his progress. In fact, typing this out was good for me because it is helping me realize what he still needs to work on with his narrations. I think your ds is right on track with his narrations. You can be proud of his work - he's doing well!

In Christ,
Julie

[flowerchik]

also keep in mind, he's a boy. Biologically,he's not wired to be very eloquent. Of course there are exceptions but for the most part boys tend to keep things short and sweet. I would just be thankful he has a clear grasp of the information.

[Kathleen]

Lynn,

Our narration is VERY close to that this week, too. My son opted for 3 longer sentences that say almost the exact same info yours included.

I think moving to written narrations is actually helping Grant with looking for the main idea because his oral narrations are VERY detail-filled. (He's not a big fan of writing. So, he will figure out how to say what's neccessary in far fewer words when writing it.) I'm seeing this carry over to his oral narrations a bit though in that they're getting a little more concise.

I'm totally new to narration with Grant, so I'm learning as we go. It helps Grant to think about the questions that I ask him right before the narration he writes. He tries to think if he included all the answers to those questions in his narration. He also says his sentences out loud before he writes them down.

Is Noah memorizing the Shadow poem? I'd like to see him acting that out. Grant decided on Autumn Fires to memorize. (And since it's a short one, he's already got it down. I haven't peeked ahead to the plans for next week. But, since I'm guessing he'll have a little extra time I told him he could paint a picture of what Autumn Fires makes him think of and he's super-excited about that.)

Kathleen

[LynnH]

Thanks so much for your replies. I feel much better now. The only writing instruction of any kind he has been exposed to up to this point is "Writers Workshop" in public school, which was a terrible fit for him. With that it seemed like the more he wrote the better they liked it, even if his ideas were all over the place. The combination of the writing exercises in Preparing and the lessons in Igniting are working so much better for him, but I just wanted to make sure I was expecting the right things from him.
Kathleen he decided to memorize "A Good Play". He really likes that poem, I guess because he loves to build forts around the house. He can't do just hand motions though he has to grab sofa pillows and move them around and grab a chair and lift it. It is pretty funny to watch.