Why are we doing Dwyer and All About Spelling?

I recently received a question from a reader who is a fellow homeschooler and a good friend, asking me why I would be going through the Dwyer Reading Scheme, when All About Spelling covers all the phonetic rules and wouldn't the same results be expected at the end of the AAS program?

The Dwyer Reading Scheme is exactly as the name implies, a Scheme for Reading.  To me, Reading  is a different skill that requires different thinking capabilities when compared to the Spelling skill.  In our house, the approach to learning is based on Montessori and it is widely believed in the Montessori world and I have found true in our case too, is that writing comes before reading.  So D has been in a sensitive period for writing for a long time. With all the exercises that we covered using the Dwyer Scheme, her spelling was purely phonetic.  Even with learning the spelling variations (Reading Folders work) in the Dwyer Scheme, I found that the child learns that a phonogram can be spelt differently, but the strategy of when to use what was missing.  I can give you two examples to explain this:

1. Double letters that are used to spell words like "off", "dress", "smell", etc.: Reading these words need no extra knowledge other than knowing the sounds "f", "s" or "l" makes and that two "f"s, "s"s or "l"s still make the same sound.  But while writing these words, how do we know when to double and when not to? This is the key that is addressed using the AAS program.  In this  program there are various rules that the child learns and is taught when to use them.  
2. The sound of "/k/" at the end of a word: "c", "ck" and "k" make the same sound, so while reading this does not make a difference, so nothing special is there in the Dwyer Scheme to address this.  Then again while writing and trying to spell a word which one do you use? Again AAS addresses this and teaches the rule.

There are many more examples I can give, but I think you get the point.  I personally am a fairly decent speller but my skills come from years of practice.  I don't know a lot of these rules for correct spelling and I am learning as we go along with the AAS program!  

So, since AAS seems to address all the variations and teaches all the rules, why not stick with just AAS, why go through the Dwyer scheme too? As I have mentioned before you need not know all these rules to read. It is enough if you know the phonograms, their variations and sight/puzzle words. So once you go through the Dwyer scheme, even though the child might not know all the rules to spelling, he/she can explode into the world of reading.  This is what happened in our case and D is much more open and confident in reading, now that we have gone through all the reading folders.  As for spelling, we completed, Level 1 in AAS and are now a couple of lessons into Level 2.  

Hope this explanation clears the need for use of both the Dwyer Reading Scheme as well as the AAS program.  I wanted to post my answer to the question on this blog so that it helps other parents having similar questions.  I am not paid or compensated by AAS, I bought both the levels from their site!  I just love this program for spelling as much as I love the Dwyer Scheme for reading!

I am linking this post up to Montessori Monday.

Blending Montessori and Non Montessori Approaches

I started writing a reply to one of the comments I received on the Dwyer Post and figured that I would rather write a post about it. The question was how I was blending the Montessori Dwyer Approach to the All About Spelling program that we are doing and how we are accomplishing all this with a curious 18 month old toddler in the same house!

The answer is that we are not really blending the approaches. The days that we really get into our school room during my toddler's nap time is when I do presentations as there is no way I can do presentations with constant interruptions from M. I usually plan any new presentations over the weekend and present it early in the week either on Monday or Tuesday during M's nap. Then D is free to choose the work anytime we are in the school room. The beauty of the Dwyer approach is that other than the "Reading Folders" portion there is not much preparation in terms of materials, so it was/is a perfect fit for us.

I am NOT using the All About Spelling program for phonic instruction, but rather for spelling and handwriting work. As of now, D is breezing through Level 1 of the program as this is covers all CVC words, initial blends, ending blends and use of c vs k, most of which we have extensively covered in the Sound Games and Moveable Alphabet works. We are taking it very slow and focussing on the dictation recommended in the program with D actually writing out 4-5 words that I dictate to her. We do this twice or thrice a week for 10 mins at a time. At this time we are just focussing on D listening to the word, segmenting it in her head and trying to figure out the correct symbols and translating that to actual writing. As to why I am doing this program, this is for myself. The days that we never get to the school room, we still spend 10 mins on this and this gives ME the satisfaction that I am doing something with D instead of wasting the whole day doing nothing. This is not much work for me at all, as each lesson is scripted and I just follow that.

While we are at this, I would also like to describe the Right Start Math program and how we are doing that. This program is very hands on just like the Montessori math work. The one difference is how there is emphasis as seeing numbers under 10 as 5 + x. I don't follow the scripted lessons to the dot from the manual and instead try focus on one skill try to present it the montessori way. For example, addition and subtraction under 10 is taught by means of the whole-part circle combination initially using the abacus. So after making sure D understood the concept via a presentation, I left a couple of problems and the abacus on the math shelf free for her to choose. We are still continuing with the Montessori Golden beads, I am just trying to cover any gaps (concepts like the whole-part circle combinations) through the program.

It is a lot of work and there are tons of great ideas out there. I wish we could do much much more, but I am happy that I am providing a happy and nurturing and inspiring environment for the kids to grow and learn in. We are just doing what is working for us now. Sure there are days when we don't do anything at all and there are days when we speed faster than a missile and learn so much more. If I had only one child and the time to let her learn everything by herself then I would only do Montessori based home-schooling. Since the reality is much different, I have these additional programs that we do just to make sure we are covering everything and lets face it, it is a lot less preparation on my part. I still try and follow the Montessori principles by following what D is interested in and letting her take the lead and tweak anything and everything into a Montessori learning experience!

Things that are not Montessori in our Kingdom

We've added three new items to our regular school routine and the three are not specifically montessori.  I wanted something different but at the same time something really close to the montessori principles.  I liked what I saw about these and here they are:

1. All about spelling - Level 1
2. RightStart Mathematics - Level B
3. FIAR Volume 1

All About Spelling - Level 1

So far we love this program!  We do a quick 5-10 minute lesson every other day or at least twice a week.  D is breezing through the first 10 or so lessons as it is the basic pink series stuff.  I love how it is hands on just like Montessori.  It has blue and red letter tiles that are used to spell out words.  D has such an enthusiasm for spelling words that this program is perfect to teach her the rules for spelling.

RightStart Mathematics - Level B

As much as I love Montessori Math, with a curious toddler around it is becoming increasingly difficult for us to get into the school room and get un-interrupted time to work on stuff.  RightStart was developed by a Montessori Teacher and uses almost the same Montessori concrete approach to learning math.  Another awesome feature that I love about this program is how the concepts are re-inforced by playing games instead of putting the child through various repetition worksheets.  D definitely is not a worksheet gal. So far we are loving this and we are going very slow, every other day or just twice a week.  D asks most of the times to play games and I love how she is learning!

Five in a Row- Volume 1

I first came across FIAR here.  I love Laura and was intrigued, so I went on the website to find out what FIAR was all about.  You basically read from a collection of carefully chosen books and you do this for five consecutive days.  Each day after reading the story you can decide to do one or more activities in different subject areas.  There is no set list of activities and this gives the flexibility to do all or just a few. I tried out just one story first and D was so enthusiastic about it.  If you go to the FIAR forums the common practice is to create one lap book per book you read and collect all the activities you did for the week there.  I like that we can look back to see how and what we did!  What I most love about this program is the awesome collection of books.  This has introduced us to a new wonderful set of books and has made us think about books and their contents in ways I would have never been able to do so myself.  Another plus is that because of the flexibility of this program, what I do is put together some trays based on the book we are rowing and let D work at it at her pace.  Once she is done, I save it for her lap book.  For now our local library has almost all of the books in Volume 1 and for those that aren't available locally we use the inter-library loan feature and get at it.

Another awesome thing about doing FIAR is that we are reading so much more now that M is so interested in reading too.  Anytime D and I read a book, M wants me to read her, her books! It is so cute when she gets her books and climbs onto my lap ready to read!  She never did that before!

The biggest advantage to doing all three of the above is that we don't have to always get into the school room to do schooling.  With M getting increasingly curious about D's work, it is very difficult for us to do schooling when she is awake.  We do these on our dining table well out of reach of M.  I usually give something interesting to engage M and spend the 10 - 15 mins that we get to do our stuff.  I have a small area setup in the kitchen near the dining area dedicated to storing these materials.  I love that I don't have to prepare stuff before hand, just need to open the manual and start our lesson!  I am hoping that once M gets a little bigger and once I am able to set some rules with her, we will spend more time in the school room and get back to full fledged montessori.  For now this is working for us and D seems interested and happy.  We are still continuing with Montessori based stuff in other subject areas and finding time to work on these as time permits!  D is only four and I love how homeschooling is giving us the flexibility to adapt our learning methodologies to our current lifestyle!