Language Arts for K with less writing? (Sonlight)

[greenbeanmama]

We're using Sonlight P4/5 right now, but my son is ready and wanting to learn to read.  The LA for kindergarten with Sonlight has so much writing!  He's not that developed with fine motor skills yet to be able to handle that.  But reading and writing are two different things, and I'm not wanting to force the writing along with the reading.  I don't know what else is out there for kindergarten LA that would work for us.  Suggestions please!

[onyxravnos]

sorry, I got nothing but I want to know too!

[lmonter]

Originally Posted by greenbeanmama 

We're using Sonlight P4/5 right now, but my son is ready and wanting to learn to read.  The LA for kindergarten with Sonlight has so much writing!  He's not that developed with fine motor skills yet to be able to handle that.  But reading and writing are two different things, and I'm not wanting to force the writing along with the reading.  I don't know what else is out there for kindergarten LA that would work for us.  Suggestions please!

I've just been using All About Spelling for recognizing letters and their sounds and all that, and we've just been [organically] working on handwriting.  My oldest is 7yo, still mixes up b's and d's, and doesn't officially read yet.  Recognizes words he's asked about ("road construction ahead!") and smaller words like cat and dog and such, not a ton yet.  But he's perfectly normal in that regard (now other things... that's a different story... sigh).  We're doing Sonlight K with him this year.

Do you *have* to do the writing for LA?  Use Scrabble (or Bananagram or other) letter tiles instead? 
Or are there things/exercises you can just flat out skip?  Or other exercises you could do/come up with as an alternative?
I don't bother doing the science questions with my kiddo - he soaks up so much it's ridiculous - but he refuses to be put on the spot like a trained monkey and answer questions.  He's more the type that'll flip through an atlas/solar system book, think about things for a week or two, then draw the world or planets of the solar system on the dry erase board.  Complete with ancient Mars volcanoes.  ;)

[kittie313]

I have a 4 1/2yo girl doing Sonlight Lang Arts K.  She isn't *quite* to the ability for all the writing, so we are not doing that part yet.  I'm doing pretty much just the reading lessons and the activities that don't involve copywork.  Same thing with my 2 oldest girls (grades 1 and 2), they are doing lang arts 1 right now sort of.  I'm mainly just doing the spelling words, the readers, and a little of the copywork with some instruction in the writing process.  I figure that right now, I am more concerned with developing a strong ability to read than I am with creating good writers.  I learned to read years before I started working seriously on writing; heck I was in 8th grade before I learned the "correct" format for a standard paragraph as far as intro sentence and all that.  And yet, I am a strong natural writer for the most part and do very little revision on college research papers before submitting them to get almost perfect grades on them every time.

If the writing part of the lang arts is too much, just do the reading and activities parts of the lang arts and then introduce writing at your child's level.  It may start with attempting to print just a letter or two, and then move on to printing small words and maybe his name.  Or, you can use letter stamps or stickers instead of writing (I did this with my 1st grade dd when she went through lang arts K, she has motor delays and still isn't up to the writing in that level)

[Bird Girl]

I bought p4/5 last year, and did the read-alouds with my son. He really enjoyed most of them. For Language Arts, I am using The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading, which is a writing-free approach. My son is already five, so I added Kumon's Uppercase Letters for the first semester, and Lowercase Letters for the second. We're also doing Kumon's Cutting book--which has been a great fine-motor help.

He enjoys reading the little books that came with our Sonlight package--but we don't do the copywork pages yet, since he doesn't really write well enough to tackle them.

[elizawill]

I'm not familiar with  Sonlight Language Arts.  Is it possible to just write the answers for your child??  I've done this many times with my own kids.  Heck, I still help my 9 year old with math if it's too many problems & she'll just answer orally.  As long as their learning the lesson, I don't concern myself with their ability or willingness to write it all independently.  If that's not an option, here are other ideas...

We use First Language Lessons with my 6 year old. It is very gentle.  It's all oral and only takes minutes a day. This covers grammar & some narration. 

In kindergarten, we used Hooked on Phonics K (we actually are reviewing with it currently, as it complements our reading program with CLE nicely).  Hooked on Phonics K is completely oral and has no writing whatsoever (actually levels 1, 2, and Master Reader have no writing either).

For spelling (if you even need that??), we use magnetic letter tiles. We purchased them with All About Spelling (which I sold), but the tiles work wonderfully with my son and his current curriculum.

For writing in kindergarten, the only thing we used was Handwriting without Tears.  My son is going to be 7 in a few months though, so he uses dictation now.

HTH.

[SundayCrepes]

Would www.starfall.com work for you?

[onyxravnos]

oh i guess i do have something!

I 2cd the kid answering orally and you can write it for them. I do this a lot with workbooks and my ds as his ability level to comprehend is way ahead of his ability level to write. Or perhaps your LO could write on the computer instead? Sometimes that takes the pressure off needing to make the letters.... they make keyboards with larger keys too so that might help?

[Plummeting]

We used Phonics Pathways to teach reading at that age. You don't have to do any writing at all. :)

[Nitenites]

We use Sonlight up to Core 5. I've found their LA a bit weak. When learning to read, I use Explode the Code with my kids, and usually do at least 2/3 of the writing for them. They tell me what to write. Sometimes I write the wrong letter on purpose, just so they can say, "No, Mom! I said 'c,' not 'r'!"