It has been a beautiful week. We spent a peaceful afternoon at the museum one day. We spent Friday listening to books, and watching some good documentaries on Netflix. I worked individually with Kyle on creative writing.

I have been enamoured with the Writing Road to Reading, ever since I got it this week. It is nothing short of genius!! The reading itself is a little laborious. This isn't a scripted book like Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons. It is very much a book where you have to read 500 pages over and over and over again until you "get it". You have to catch the philosophy and then make it work for you. There is no lesson plans or step by step instructions. What I appreciate about the 100 Easy Lessons, is that it is totally scripted and it takes the guess-work away. I never have to worry about when to move on, or when to introduce a new sound. When I taught my oldest son I used the script verbatim, now, I do not; but I very much enjoy knowing what to teach when, and when to move on. The Writing Road to Reading is probably not a book I could have started out with, without any experience with teaching reading or knowing the reading process. It can be done. I just don't really know if I could have done at the time.

Pros:
-I love that all you need to know if 70 phonograms and 29 spelling words in order to read, write, and spell anything
-the phonograms and spelling rules are organized
-found several helpful videos on you tube, without the videos I would be lost
-LOVE how they teach handwriting in reference to a clock. Example: a and c start at 2 o'clock. We really need this. B/c my main issue with the twins is letter/number reversal
-the six strokes needed to make all the letters in the alphabet (pre-writing)
-this is an entire Language Arts manual for all primary children through middle school
-you learn all the sounds for "a" :a in cat, a in lake, a in awesome. Every phonogram(or sound) with more than one sound, you learn all the sounds
-LOVE the notation system. It is Genius.
-Love the teaching of syllabus immediately, to spell and read words

Cons:
-The system is great, the book is not very user friendly; although I can tell they really tried. What would make it more user friendly is actually having lesson plans. But that is kind of against the author's philosophy. She wants teachers to have the freedom to implement the strategy as they see fit. The company does sell lesson plans for $70 bucks a grade.

This week I'm making the 70 phonogram cards and laminating them. I may also make some word cards.