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Deborah Wuehler and family

What exactly is Language Arts and what should it cover? Basically, we break the whole down into all the mechanics involved in these areas: reading, writing, and speaking. To cover all that is necessary in those things, you will specifically teach your children how to read, how to spell, how to evaluate excellent literature, evaluate reading comprehension (do they understand what they are reading or are they just going through the mechanics of reading), grammar (normally for the higher grades), vocabulary, writing book reports, creative and research composition, and essay structure. The goal would be to understand what is read, and then to be able to articulate that in writing and speaking.

There are many ways to teach these subjects. Here are some examples of how to teach Language Arts:

• You can do a "box" approach and cover all in a good Language Arts curriculum package, or use several products to cover spelling, vocabulary, comprehension, writing, etc. CBD.com and Rainbow Resource are good sources to research. If you can't afford a whole program, all you need is your Bible, a library card, and a little creativity. There are tons of free resources on the web.
• You can read good books aloud and have the children narrate portions back to you. This covers comprehension, and thinking and speaking skills among others. The Charlotte Mason philosophy covers this very well. Karen Andreola  has written a Charlotte Mason column every month in our digital magazine since January. (The TOS magazine is FREE!)
• Children can write what they remember of a portion of a read aloud, using strong verbs, and good vocabulary. Institute for Excellence in Writing offers much help here. (Andrew Pudewa of IEW also writes a monthly column in TOS!)
• Children can present book reports to your family or homeschool group.
• As children read a good book, they highlight vocabulary they don't understand and look up the meaning and writing down the definition.
• You can choose words out of their reading or science or history books and use those as their spelling words.
• Use their reading of biographies, classics, science, or history books as prompts for writing assignments.
• Use the words they misspelled in their writing as their spelling words for the next week.
• You can take the unit you are studying on any subject and have them write about what they are learning and doing in their hands-on world of unit studies. Science can include lab reports. History can include time-lines and small bits of information learned.
• Children can prepare a science or project fair type board with bits of facts that they have collected on a subject, as well as write a report about their subject to go with their board. They can present this to family at the end of the year, or to your homeschool group on presentation days. And if your group has a project fair, they can enter their project board.
• Whatever subject they are interested in, have them write about it and speak about it. If they love to bake, have them write about the process, take pictures, and come up with a small booklet of favorite recipes they have made. Animal husbandry, artists, scientists, missionaries . . . whatever the topic, write and speak about it.
• SchoolhouseTeachers.com offers excellent classes in Language Arts among a myriad of other subjects such as film-making, history, art, music, science . . . Kim Kautzer from WriteShop is one of our many amazing teachers!

Why is reading, writing, and speaking so important? Because God is a writer, God is a speaker, and His Words are our life breath and must be read daily. We are created in His image and made to read, write, and proclaim His glory and gospel in a compelling and understandable way. Let's become like Him as we become better readers, writers, and speakers. All for Him and to Him and through Him!

~Deborah

TOS Senior Editor

SeniorEditor@TheHomeschoolMagazine.com  

Diana Waring

Dear Friends,

It's probably a function of this sabbatical season that I'm in at the moment--intentional resting--but when I looked at today's topic, I did NOT think of grammar or research writing or any of the normal concepts associated with "Language Arts."

Instead of picturing children working diligently (perhaps resistantly) in workbooks and curriculum, a different and delightful image drifted into my brain, like one of our lazily falling autumn leaves. Rather than language arts, I began to think about the art of language. 

When I say art, what does that conjure up for you? Does art speak personally to you of creativity and mastery and beauty? Are there thoughts of quiet and solitude to gaze intently upon a masterpiece? Do you picture light and dark emphasized in brilliant colors? Do you see pastels or oils or watercolors?  Perhaps Renoir or Rembrandt? Do you delight in humorous art, majestic art, profound art, homemade art?

Now that you have thoroughly envisioned ART, combine that with LANGUAGE--its stunning power, its ability to wield words to bring healing or hurt, its gifts of shaping hearts and families and cultures. As an author and story-teller, I have a rapturous love of words . . . well-conceived words and flowing essays, turn-of-phrase witticisms and eloquent speeches . . . poetry, drama, literature, apologetics, biographies, humor, fiction, stories, epics. And with more than half a century of delightfully playing with, working with, and persuasively using words, I am pondering the topic behind the topic. While it is helpful to ask "How do I teach language arts?" perhaps a more foundational and life-shaping question to ask is "How can I give my children a love of language?" From that starting point, the journey is much more obvious.

Before we begin to teach grammar or delve into what makes a good essay, let's give our children a love and delight in words!  One of the best ways to do that is to read out loud on a regular basis. We read to our children the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the Anne of Green Gables series, the Hank-the Cowdog books, along with Gene Stratton Porter, Brother Andrew and A. W. Tozer. We laughed together, cried together, listened eagerly to what came next in a story, discussed theology and worldview and whatever came up as a result of the reading.  (It was a bit messy since the kids would sometimes beg us to continue reading until we finished a book-one time it was after midnight!)  But, oh, how rich those experiences were . . .

Don't just be a hearer, though. It is also critical to be a doer. Play with words. Make up your own puns, limericks, and Tom-Swifties. Our kids wrote parodies, new verses for sea chanties, and wild songs like the "Round Trip Ticket to Samoa." They wrote poetry, short stories, dramas, research projects, and emails.

Give your kids a love of words. And, best of all, of The Word.

Remember, stay relational!

Diana

Raising Real Men

www.RaisingRealMen.com  

Hal & Melanie Young

Reading and writing are critical life skills that help us to learn from past generations and to leave messages for future ones. So how can you teach "Language Arts" in a boy-friendly way?

Read aloud a lot and don't stop once they're reading. The desire to enjoy the world of books is a huge motivator in learning to read and reading for pleasure.

 Reading as a family builds family unity through shared interests and experiences and allows them to hear what more complex language sounds like before they're ready to read it themselves. That makes their comprehension soar. Audiobooks are great, too, for the same reasons.

Don't limit writing by handwriting. We've written many articles and several books, but hardly ever written any of it by hand. Composition is a different skill than handwriting. Many boys struggle with penmanship in the elementary years. Make sure they don't start thinking, "I can't write!" by letting them dictate some, if not lots, of stories and essays to you. They'll be amazed at the sophistication of what they can write when they aren't held back because their small motor skills aren't there yet.

Make spelling visual. Some of our boys didn't even need spelling at all, while others fought to learn every word. Our friend Dianne Craft taught us to make the words more mentally "sticky" by adding colors, patterns, and pictures to them. We'd draw each word big on a sheet of cardstock. This has been a lifesaver for our struggling spellers.

Avoid busywork. Boys have little tolerance for work that has no good reason and it's not just the handwriting struggles. Ask yourself, "Does this serve any real purpose?" and remember that you are the teacher - you don't have to assign work the publisher just put in there for classroom control while the teacher works with other children.

Don't despair! It's amazed us to see boys who struggled with learning to read, or spell, or have decent handwriting, become real scholars in high school. Protect your son's love of learning through the early learning years and watch him shoot ahead as he becomes a young man. What a blessing!

By His grace,

Hal & Melanie

PS.Want to make Christ the center of your Thanksgiving celebration and build great memories, too? Get our gorgeous, practical E-Book, We Gather Together: Sanity and Celebration at Thanksgiving.

Learn what reading will do for your family 

in the article . . .

The Engaging Homeschooler: Read! Read! Read! Capture Your Child's Minds with Exceptional Literature 

 in the latest issue of