C has completed the First Language Lessons for the Well Trained Mind level 4:

So we’re making some big changes to his language lessons. On Mondays he picks a memorization piece (right now that’s Articles of Faith but it can be a song, poem, scripture, etc.) At some point during the week he has to write out the piece he’s memorizing and on Friday I check to see how he’s doing. He practices it throughout the week.

On Tuesdays he gets his new spelling words, which are getting more challenging but he still rarely gets any wrong so I don’t make him do enrichment for spelling.

On one of the days (he picks – M,T or W) he reads a biography and does a note outline (main topic, three interesting points about the person.)

On the other days I let him pick – journal entry, report on what he’s reading for fun (currently Harry Potter book six), or pretty much any sort of reading/writing of his choosing.

On Thursdays he narrates for me the literature reading (Shakespeare for kids right now) and does a story chart – characters, plot, theme, setting, etc) with all of the kids.

On Fridays he also narrates for me the history reading, does his memorization test, and has a spelling test.

Eventually he’ll do an oral narration, written outline and then formal paragraph for the various reports & readings but we’re working slowly towards that. Since he’s only nine I think one written report a week is enough. 🙂