Even wth technology, your child still needs to be able to read and write...
For years parents have been asking Judy to write this book so they can help their children with writing and spelling at home. They had shown alarm at how writing and its many skills, including handwriting, were being taught at school. One of the more memorable comments was about children being expected to produce good handwriting while sitting on a seat under the trees or on a beanbag in the classroom. Parents felt their children should be seated at desks for such a task.
They also expressed growing concern about some of the skills that were being required of their children at increasingly young ages. Some of these tasks were being set for homework and parents were having to extend their own skills with writing in order to help their children with such tasks. These activities included writing poetry. They could vaguely remember having to do this at high school, but not when they were six and seven year-olds. This worrying trend included presenting oral book reviews in Year 1, with palm cards, and the completion of written assignments in the early grades of primary school. Meanwhile children’s instruction in actually writing anything constructive down in good, neat writing seemed to be a thing of the past. They began to wonder if writing anything on paper was necessary at all, as their children were being required to have iPads etc. as part of their school lists even in their very first years at school.
Children have been caught up in these changes when it comes to all written work, whether it be by hand or with the help of computers and iPads, iPhones etc. Where once they were thoroughly taught the skills of handwriting, for example, throughout their primary school years, now it seems much more sophisticated skills are being required of young learners who are expected to be able to write legibly almost at the beginning of their learning so they can get on with much more complicated forms of writing.
We fail to realise that technology doesn’t make children any brighter or any more able to learn more quickly. If they can’t keep up, they fall behind. They start pretending. For the lucky ones, parents become the ones who are doing their homework, trying to keep their anxious youngsters up with their classmates. The others just stop trying.
There is a solution at hand. It’s simple to use and it works, even on these technological genii who spend their waking moments on their phones usually playing games with their thumbs. If you believe your children need to be able to write using their hands and spell using their brains, as well as being good at using technology, then this is the book for you. It teaches you how to teach children to write successfully using author, Judy Frost’s, teaching technique, CODES.
CODES incorporates tried and true methods of copying and dictation linked with children’s current reading. It improves their handwriting and spelling. It also includes some newer ideas such as spell/reading. Punctuation is included.
The book gives complete instructions in how to use CODES. It provides examples from children’s work which clearly illustrate how to make corrections, how to record their progress and how to check on how they are going with their writing. They can see their progress for themselves and they grow in confidence as their writing and spelling improve.
A technique for learning spelling, not just for Friday tests but for always, is included; again with full instructions.
Judy has some helpful tips on how to improve handwriting for older learners as well.
She has included, as an ending to the book, short histories of the written word for your information and for you to pass on to your children. They may be thinking it all began with them and their mobile phones. The truth is, however, countless people, over thousands of years, have contributed knowledge, expertise, pure determination and courage in order to bring civilisation to its present stage of written communication. Where we go from here only time will tell.