We are currently doing Charlotte Mason narration style at home. We used to do Before Five In A Row (B4FIAR), where my son had a great time doing all the activities related to the book. The only problem is, they have a book list and most books in the list are out of print. With the narration style, we can use any book available and attack it the Charlotte Mason way :)
So without further ado, my first specimen is my son’s favourite book Where the Wild Things Are (Amazon US) (Book Depository)[aff. link]. We read it, pin pointed the words he couldn’t understand (for vocabulary lesson) and I took down notes as well for words worthy of spelling practice.
First activity is the Story Sequence using pictures. I scanned and printed pictures from the book and had Mavi arranged them. And then, I asked him to tell me the story (in his own word) using the pictures. I couldn’t believe he remembers 70% of the lines from the book!
Spelling and Vocabulary. Then we moved on to the spelling and vocabulary. By this time I ran out of ink so I just have to rely on my papers and sharpies LOL (I don't run out of ink these days and I always print in high quality thanks to our ECO Tank Printer from EPSON). For vocabulary, I have him read the definitions (practice reading) and then the meaning. He figured out that he needs to match them. The same with the spelling, decoding the scrambled letters to form the right words.
Story Sequencing using Words. We’re doing the sequencing using words only. This is to practice his reading analysis and skills.
Creating and Acting. After the oral narration, we printed graphics from Making Learning Fun and colored them so we could make them as puppets. This approach is similar to our Hickory Dickory Duck Unit.
And here they are! To assess, I made him retell the story (this was on a separate day) using the puppets and vocabulary words.
I was so happy that we did this!! I have never seen Mavi become interested in “home” schooling again (he’s on vacation mode LOL). He even told me “Mommy, can we do this again?”.
So yes! We are doing this every week. Now I am excited for our next book narration.
