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Hi everyone,
I am only on week 6 of Preparing and I/my dd9 are struggling with the 4th day/creative writing part of the scheduled poetry. I will be honest and say I strongly dislike poetry, always have since highschool ruined it for me by over-analysing everything and taking the beauty out of a poem! Each week, we have struggled together with creating our own version of the poem and sometimes it ends in tears, sometimes we just give up and sometimes we get there by me just basically giving my dd the answers! I honestly do not feel it is any fault of the manual.......I think I am just unsure as to what to expect my daughter to understand and know at this stage of the process. If she doesn't 'get it' and has no idea how to come up with a phrase for how to personify the moon for example, do I just give her one? Do I spoon feed until she starts coming up with her own ideas? Or do I try and explain it more/ a different way? I think this is what I have tried to do but because of my personal issues with poetry, I am not very good at it!!!! Lol.

HELP!!!
Thanks in advance,
Corrie

Hi Corrie!

I'm sorry you are having a rough time! We are having a difficult time with mental math in Singapore (math is NOT my strength), so I know the feeling!

Have you tried going back over what personification is with examples and then asking "leading" questions with her as far as what to write? Such as, "Let's think of some traits/ways that we can make the moon sound human.", and then I would list them for her on a whiteboard or paper. Maybe even give examples of other non-human things and how they are personified. It helped my DS to have a list with ideas he helped think of and then go from there. "Leading the horse to water" so to speak! Maybe you have already tried this with no luck, but those are my thoughts...let me know if you have any more questions!

My dd was very similar to yours and now we are in Unit 16 and those types of activities are much easier then even just a few weeks ago. We were used to more of a textbook approach so it was hard for dd to think beyond just "what is the right answer." I started modeling a bit using a different poem/story/example so she could see what it was we were working toward and to share in the activity with her w/o giving her the answers. She still had to do it for herself for her own poem/writing. Hang in there and keep at it.

Sarah,

thanks! I needed to hear that! I know it is early days for us ....one of my biggest faults is unrealistic expectations, of myself more than anyone else! I am also very black and white, which probably doesn't help with the subject of poetry! I will model for as long as it takes for her to get the hang of it I suppose....

Jessica,
good ideas! Thanks. Maybe I will look ahead for the creative writing days and prepare some examples before the day so I can have some ideas ready to write up.....in the moment I am just as useless as she is! What a pair!

My ds is not a natural creative writer, so I understand your question about how much to "help". When we did PHFHG's poetry, the time I tried to help him the most with was just picking things he knew the most about. We tried to tap into what he was most familiar with, and use that as much as possible in his parts of the writing. For the outdoor type poems, we tried to look out our windows for different views of things and describe them. My ds loved to use the names of crayons to describe things with colors in his writing (i.e. ruby red). Reading it out loud together a few times helped too. In fact, doing the poetry activities HOD planned throughout the week on the other days really did begin to help him to think more creatively too. Reading the poetry in appropriate voices or with a matching sounding "mood" to the way we read it made it fun too.

I too did not grow up liking poetry for the same reasons you described. I have good news - after the many years of doing poetry with HOD, now I love it! And so do my kids. My attitude changed about it as we moved through the manuals. The biggest thing to convey to our dc so they learn the joy of appreciating the beauty of poetry is that there is not one right way to write poetry. Poetry is a form of personal expression, so the only "right" way is the person who's writing the poetry's way. Once I realized that, I quit trying to help my ds's poetry be "right" and just went to being an encourager for him when he was writing rather than a critiquer - it took a big burden off my shoulders that I realized wasn't meant to be placed there. I tried to keep our writing sessions for the RLS poem relatively short, and I tried to keep my advice shorter.

We did a lot of quickly jotting ideas down on a markerboard, reading them out loud and circling his favorites - what he thought sounded the best - and then I let him write. Huge difference in how the lessons went! I had to pull back and remind myself of this kind of approach again this year with RTR's Medieval History-Based writing lessons. It's difficult for me not to take over the lesson with my ideas. Anyway, this is a good reminder for me to pull back out of that role and enjoy the lessons more. Thanks for asking this, and I hope something here helps! I will tell you PHFHG turned my ds into a creative writer, a task I though possibly was impossible. He's a very logical person, but he loves poetry now. Loves it. I encourage you - it's worth it!

In Christ,
Julie

Thanks Julie....great advice! I also have the tendency to think there is always a 'better sounding way' of writing something also so I will practice being more encouraging to her ideas rather than what I do now!