This is a curriculum recommendation from "The Well Trained Mind"
by Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise
( I borrowed this book from my local library...FREE)
I was interested in purchasing a vocabulary curriculum series called "Vocabulary from Classical Roots".
It helps kids learn vocabulary by learning the Greek/Latin roots of words
and using the roots to decipher the meaning of the word
rather than memorizing lengthy definitions.
I went to the publisher website.
I clicked vocabulary and found the curriculum series.
When you get there on the right hand side is
"Free Resources."
Take a look...read carefully...YES!
Download samples for...FREE!!!
Time to party!
When you click the Free Resource link, this is what you see...
You can download!
Did I say it was time to party or what?!
Go to the "sample lesson" section.
Books go in the following order 4, 5, 6, A, B, C, D, E.
You can download 5, 6, A, C, E (missing 4, B, & D...not bad for free).
I got lucky and someone gave me B. So I'm only missing 2 books (4, D).
First of all...
getting all of this info for free is a steal.
I can hear some of you saying...but...it's not the whole book and the series is incomplete.
How can I use it as a curriculum?
I wrestled with this too until I figured it out.
What did I figure out?
1. You don't really need the whole book.
I'll explain why you don't need the whole book (continue reading).
2. You don't really need all the books.
Let's think about it from a flexible point of view. Would you or your kids "die" if you used an incomplete curriculum. No! We are so programmed to use something from beginning to end in fear that we are going to miss something in the middle. Take a look at the picture from the outside. Your kids use 5 out of the 8 books (and you don't have to pay a dime for it). Something that they may not have used or learned other wise. Is someone going to say, "'O my gosh?! You only used 5 out of the 8 books?!" No one is going to know...so...who cares if you didn't use all of the books? It's not math (where doing things out of order might cause a problem).
Ok..so now what do I do?
1. Download the table of contents and word lists for the books available.
2. I recommend that you retype the word list in lesson order (each word has a # next to it. it is the lesson number). Latter you will match this up with the table of contents. I said it was free...which means you will have to do a little work. I type out each book as I need it.
Here is the best part...
This is generally how all of the lessons are set up
root word introduction (for each group of words)
related words (words from the chapter that correlate with that root) and their definition
a few activities (synonym, antonym, incorrect usage, fill in the blank, etc.)
review at the end of every couple of chapters
as you can see...you can get away with out having the whole book.
Now what do I do?
Use it!
What do I do/How do I do it?
(we do 1-2 skills a day...varies by kid)
Read the words (together)
Copy/list the words
Group words with similarities together
Find the repeating pattern (root)
Find the definition/meaning of the root
Write the definitions for the list/chapter words (using a regular dictionary)
Look up synonyms & antonyms
Make flash cards (we break the words into prefix, root, suffix)
Practice the flashcards until all words are learned. We try to use the words in daily conversations.
Use each word in a sentence (written)
Play a game with the words
They don't move to the next set of words until they master the one they are on
One more piece of info.
If you noticed...skill #5 says to find the definition/meaning of the root. You will need a Greek/Latin root dictionary or some other sort of Greek/Latin resource. I initially started out using wikipedia as a resource. I have found it to be adequate. I have found a few other random resources (I printed them out so I don't remember where I got them from...sorry).
I'm not an expert at Greek or Latin...but I don't feel as if I need to be.
We work together and figure things out the best we can. Isn't that how the world works anyway?
happy vocabbing:)
