Other Language Arts

Other than Reading and Handwriting Jetter and Social Butterfly have just a couple of other subjects that fall in the Language Arts category.
Spelling was quite a struggle for Jetter until I found the program (through the help of my consultant) called All About Spelling. It is an approach that teaches the rules of spelling, which makes more sense than just having the kids memorize a list of random words each week. The thing that is so helpful for Jetter is the hands on approach. Here you see him at our "spelling board". The little tiles he is working with are magnetic letter tiles. Using these, he spells the word that he is currently learning. We also use these tiles for learning new spelling concepts. Other than the tiles, the program also encourages using the white board to practice writing the words. This is motivational, but it also helps Jetter understand the concept of syllabication. He can write each syllable of the word in a different color of marker. He can also label "vowel teams" or "consonant teams" an other things that help him to remember the spelling rules. Social Butterfly uses the same program, but chooses to skip the manipulative part. She likes writing her words on the whilte board in color so I allow it. It seems to be a great program for all learning types.
Finally, we have grammar. Jetter will start his formal study of Grammar next year. Social Butterfly is using a program called Shurley English. She loves it! It comes with CD of "jingles" that are designed to help the child learn the parts of speech and their functions. She listens to the jingles and memorizes them She is currently working on the prepositions jingle which is quite long since it names the 49 prepositions. It sounds rather juvenile, but the application of what she learns in these jingles is not! She "parses" sentences quite well and will have no problem next year with sentence diagramming.