This summer I knew we needed to catch up on some of the skills we missed out on at the end of our school year because of the unexpected events that we experienced. One of the areas I knew we really had been lacking in was spelling. It just hadn’t been a very big concern of mine at the time but I knew I really needed to make an effort to catch my kids up to where I felt they should be.
While I pondered just how to do this a couple of my girls came to me with an idea. They didn’t know I was trying to figure out how to secretly do school without the kids feeling like I was taking over their summer break. Instead, they came to me with a thirst for knowledge and a way to obtain it. They decided that we should do a “word of the day”.
Of course I told them this was a fantastic idea! I had found my way to teach, for them to learn and for all of us to feel like we were accomplishing something without feeling like we were missing out on summer in the process. Because they came up with the idea I asked them how they hoped to proceed with doing the “word of the day”. They each thought they would think of words that they wanted to learn and every morning we’d go over them and then at night they would spell them for me. I told them this was a great idea and that we’d start the next morning.
That first morning the girls thought a great word would be “dictionary”. I thought it was great too. So, we started with dictionary, included encyclopedia and many other wonderful words over the summer. They quickly decided that they wanted different words from each other so we had a pretty large list going. I would sometimes subconsciously plant a word or two in their minds for the next day but overall the kids chose words that really interested them and that they hoped to spell. Each night they’d spell their words at the dinner table and try to impress each other. Most of the time they not only learned their own word but the word their siblings were learning too!
The kids have had fun so far with learning new words each day. It hasn’t been a struggle to get them to learn and to practice. Sometimes in order to teach we have to let go of the reigns and let the kids take the lead. Our “word of the day” has been so successful. The kids are so proud of themselves and I feel like we’ve done some catching up and are back on track for our new school year that we will start in September. At the rate the kids are going they will have learned about 300 new words by the end of the summer. I know I am proud of them and they are proud of themselves. What a great way to learn!
Did you do anything particular this summer to prepare your children for the upcoming school year that your children just loved?
Michelle writes about her family and their homeschooling life at her blog Pass The Flu Bug Please. If you have time stop by and say hello!
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Tagged as: customizing learning, kids' perspective, spelling, written by Michelle
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