Perfecting our Rod and Staff plan

[deltagal]

I think we're getting much better at maximixing our time with Rod and Staff, BUT I think we've still got growing room. How do you all keep the lesson short AND effective?

[GinainMD]

We are using Rod and Staff for the second year and I truely believe that the lessons are most effective when I don't skimp on the oral review. I think this is really where the information "sticks." Since this part is done aloud it really doesn't take much time but it's easy to skip over things like this and discont their importance. This is in reference to R&S 2 and R&S3 so I'm not sure what the higher levels have as far as oral review. Just my opinion.

[lissiejo]

Thanks for posting this! Next year is my first year in R&S (level 2) and I can use all the help I can get!

[SouthernMrs]

We are using R&S Levels 4 and 5. The oral review is the cement that keeps them going. I never skimp on this part.

[holdinon]

I agree with the others on the oral reviews. Definitely worth the time on that part.

As far as the lesson itself, it depends on the child. My oldest is more visual, so she does best reading the lesson on her own and sort of "doing her own thing". During our meeting time, I do the oral review, check her written work and mark the ones for her to do for the next lesson. (I mark ones for her to do based on the type of assignment, but it's usually something like every other one). More times than not, she gets everything correct, and we just move on in this manner. Every so often, she doesn't understand something, so we of course will go over that together, reading through the lesson together if needed. With my next two, they are both more auditory, and do much better with me reading the lesson to them and discussing it with them. We do the lessons with them mostly orally, and the only thing they write is diagramming and the writing assignments. I do have them do more written work on the chapter reviews, and they like to consider those their "tests". My dd8 is just doing level 2, so we are doing it all together, but I'm thinking she's eventually going to prefer/do better doing more like her oldest sister.

Angie

[creekmama]

We're only in our first year of R & S, but what I've discovered so far is that doing as much orally as possible works best for us. My son is doing well with writing, and correct grammar seems to be coming quite naturally for him (perhaps due to copywork and the great books Carrie has chosen . However, he struggles with feeling overwhelmed and discouraged if he perceives that work is too difficult. So I make sure not to tax him with written work he doesn't need to do. If he's flying through a lesson and I know that he regularly uses the skill being taught correctly in his Science and History notebooks, I don't have him write anything out. This way when he does need the written practice, he does it with a better attitude and is more likely to learn the new skill.