Copywork and Handwriting

[dalynnrmc]

I was blessed to be able to attend the recent HSIZ hosting of SWB in College Station. At that time, SWB said that she would suggest doing a daily handwriting program in addition to the copywork with which we are already familiar.

YAY, good, because that's what I was planning on doing! :tongue_smilie:

A little bit of background for our situation -
My son is 9yo. He attended ps from pk through 1st grade, and that first year of homeschooling I did a lot of hit-and-miss, trial-and-error type things. I only decided to follow a more classical approach about a year ago.

He's also dealing with some fine motor skill issues. In ps 1st grade, he was coming home with F's on his handwriting and art. :001_huh: We moved very slowly with handwriting, trying several different things, and the best improvement I've seen both in the handwriting itself and in his attitude towards writing in general was when we switched to a more D'Nealian/Italic type style.

For his copywork this year, we'll be using the beta MOH1 language arts copywork, 3 times a week.

Here's my question(s):
How much of a "handwriting program" would you have the child do daily? I'm considering having ds do the MOH LA copywork 3 times weekly, and then doing a page of handwriting workbook 2 times weekly.

This past semester, I tried having him do a journal. He found no joy in it; it became like pulling teeth, and I decided to not continue that practice this next semester.

I might consider having him do a page of handwriting EVERY day (we'll be on a 4 day schedule), but think it would be a good idea to NOT have him do that at the same sit-down as his copywork. Maybe, an after lunch warm-up with one or the other... or something. After his beloved math lesson, maybe. ;)


What do you think? TIA!

[Sharon H in IL]

This really surprises me. I wouldn't think SWB would advocate both handwriting AND copywork, when your handwriting can be something copy-worthy, and related to your other studies.

And this in addition to a writing program?

That's a lot of writing. It would cause a full-scale revolt around here for my pencil-allergic sons.

I personally need to fold things together to get the school day finished in a reasonable amount of time and to avoid making the children hate education. I want it to be challenging, yes, but not discouraging.

OK, that doesn't answer your question! :001_huh: If you're going to separate copywork and handwriting, I do think spreading things out would be a good idea. Hands can cramp up and muscles get tight while children are concentrating hard on getting the letters onto paper. Charlotte Mason always advocated giving children variety in their lessons to avoid boredom.

Last year my 11 yo did a page of copywork, from print text, writing in cursive. We had to work up to that much because we started the year only doing a few sentences at a time. Painful process, that.

But his speed and fluidity progressed, although beauty was not his strong point. Maybe that's the point of a separate handwriting course. He has always been more of a sprinter when doing his schoolwork. He develops pride in a job well done a bit later, so I'm not worried about the beauty, yet.

[*anj*]

I'm so glad you asked this question because I had a similar one earlier today. I taught my two older kids using the Classically Cursive (http://www.veritaspress.com/prodinfo.asp?number=000022&variation=&aitem=1&mitem=4) books. I've already purchased new volumes so that they can continue to hone their skills. My ds11 really, really needs the practice. Anyway, I was wondering if I actually need to give them copywork in addition to the practice that's in CC. I'm almost ready to take the plunge and pay for Startwrite to use for the two younger kids, (and make my own copywork pages) but I'm not sure I want to pay that much for something that will only be used by two of my kids.

What to do? What to do?
I'll wait and see how people respond to you. :lurk5:

[Suzanne in ABQ]

I didn't usually do a handwriting program and copywork the same day. My son, especially, would have detested it.

I used Handwriting Without Tears, and the workbooks for each level only took a couple months to complete (doing about 10 minutes a day). For the rest of the year, I'd give them copywork that was relevant to our studies, usually a sentence or a stanza from whatever we were memorizing at the time. I made copywork pages using Educational Fontware with blank lines between every model line. My kids enjoyed their copywork because they were familiar with the material. In some cases, the copywork reinforced their memorization, and other times, they copied easily because they already had the material memorized. Either way, it was always a positive experience.

When we finished the HWT series, we switched to A Reason For Handwriting. They enjoy that program because there is a copywork page at the end of every weeks lessons, and scripture is always relevant. :) We don't do as much memorization now that they're older, but I still make copywork pages for my son when we do. My dd doesn't need the copywork pages anymore. She just copies directly into her copybook from the sources (via Classical Writing).

I think your plan of alternating days is a good idea if your ds knows all his letters already. If he doesn't, then I would plan on doing the handwriting program everyday until it's completed, and then do the copywork every day. I've not seen the copywork book you are planning to use, but I don't think it would have worked for us. I believe the reason my kids enjoy copywork is because it is relevant to their other studies. I could be wrong about that, though.

[Parrothead]

I do both with dd. She does her copy work in print, and has cursive practice. Well, she will when I get the worksheets printed off.

I'm hoping that by the end of the year I can have her do all writing in cursive.

[Christine]

Can we do copywork / handwriting at the same go? (Can't we use our copywork as our handwriting?)

That was my plan. . .does this mean it won't work?

[Suzanne in ABQ]

Once your child knows how to form all the letters, then you can definitely use copywork for handwriting practice. If they only know how to form some of the letters, then the copywork needs to only contain those letters. It would be frustrating for the child to try to learn to form the letters correctly in his copywork when he hasn't been shown the correct way of forming the letters.

I've had the best success waiting on the copywork until we finished a handwriting book. Then, switching over to copywork. We did this with manuscript, and then again with cursive. I'm sure there are more than one way to skin this cat, though!

ETA: I should have made it clearer (I said it in a previous post, but not here) that we did a handwriting book at the beginning of every school year, then switched to copywork for the remainder of the year. We used Handwriting Without Tears, and the books aren't very long.

[Alenee]

Have I missed something? I stopped doing copywork with my 4th grader this year because we started IEW. Should I be continuing copywork at this stage? She needs no help with handwriting....we're doing Liguistic Development Through Poetry Memorization from IEW. Is copywork really necessary anymore with these others?

[Suzanne in ABQ]

My 7th grade dd does copywork as part of Classical Writing. She copies entire passages, in perfect cursive, into her "Copy book", and she loves every minute of it!

My 5th grade ds, on the other hand, doesn't do separate copywork. After finishing HWT cursive, I put him in A Reason For Handwriting. Each week has 3 days of letter formation instruction and practice, then the 4th day is copying a scripture from the Bible. They provide a model, written in cursive, and he copies it onto a separate paper. I don't do additional copywork with him because he hate writing, and copywork isn't a battlefield I want to die on.

Some people feel it's very important, though, to reinforce proper grammar, punctuation, capitalization, spelling and syntax. It's a very "classical" way to approach these areas, and it kills several birds with one stone. It would certainly be beneficial at any age (I even find I retain material better when I write it with my own hand), but it's not necessary.

[dalynnrmc]

Thank you all for responding!

IMO, no, a 4th grader normally wouldn't be doing copywork, but we didn't start the classical method until 3rd grade AND we are dealing with fine motor skill issues. I hope to move quickly through copywork and into dictation of decent length by the end of the school year. He's ready, or poised to BE ready I guess, but needs to go through the steps (however quickly) to really BE there.

He's kind of strange in that he LIKES finishing workbooks. He fought me tooth and nail when we did handwriting in a workbook before, but when we switched to copywork, though he didn't give me NEAR the problems with copywork as he'd done the workbook, he started to ASK for a workbook. So, I think the solution might be to have him do just a little in a workbook to satisfy that need, and then let him have "a reason" for the rest of the practice.
He's also strange in that he really doesn't need much help in the areas of grammar, punctuation, syntax, etc. He's such a rule freak that those things are ingrained in him at this point; he corrects even me sometimes! (And then he explains that this word is that part of speech, and you can't do this with that part of speech, that it should be HERE, after THAT part of speech. :shock: He's 9!!)
So really, the copywork *IS* mostly handwriting practice for him. Teaching his muscles to do the correct thing so that I can read his work.


Anyway. I was kind of surprised to hear SWB say that too, though it relieved me. I think we'll take a kind of CM approach with the workbook (I know that sounded funny, LOL!), and let him do a perfect line or something, and then move to the copywork. We'll likely do only 2 workbook pages a week, and I'll have to find what works better for him: a single line or two from the workbook each day and then copywork later in the day, or copywork some days and a whole workbook page (with 3-5 perfecton different days.


This is a great thread, thanks! I'll likely re-read it this week, as we'll be starting school next week. :)