writing things

Writing of any kind is a pain in our homeschool world. And so I've been trying to find some new ways to approach it and keep it from being quite so painful.

I have found some free samples at Currclick (I get an email every week from them that tipped me off) that offer work with penmanship, specifically the Thanksgiving Cursive CopyBook - not the creative writing, but writing nonetheless. Little B is still in the learning curve with cursive, though not doing too badly. I want to find a way to encourage him to improve it without totally driving him crazy. And so this particular method seems to please him because first he traces a couple of sentences then writes it on his own. And it's only a a few lines, not what feels like an overwhelming amount of writing - though in my book he has easily gotten enough practice to make it worthwhile. If you open it and scroll through, you'll see blank pages as well as the copywork. I'm only printing the ones where he copies what he's traced.

From this same site, I also found similar work in these: Human Body Sample (it's fascinating and well done and I'm considering buying all three volumes (.50 each or $1.50 together), not just sticking to the sample....be aware they discuss reproduction at the end of this sample, should you try it....always a good head's up! ;D ). Fifty States Copywork is quite similar and also can be purchased in a bundle or as several separate volumes (links on that page).

But then there is creative writing. Something I love but am not good at and hardly know how to culture because Little B gets so frustrated or doesn't know what to write or is bored with the things we find (very hard to motivate a 9 year old boy at times, yet when wants to, he is darn good at it!). Until this. Granted, we're just finishing the first week (okay, I am not done, he is...the teacher has to participate...which is good for me!), but I'm pleased. And Little B is pleased so far. We'll see how it goes, but he's excited about it and looking forward to it. As am I.