Introduction to Spelling and Penmanship

We started Spelling & Penmanship this week!

So far in SWI we have reviewed the basics of morphology by looking at word sums (prefix, suffix, base) and the three suffixing convention flowcharts:

final consonant doubling

replaceable < e >

toggle < y > to < i >

Next week we will begin to have short lists of spelling practice words based on words that the children misspell over and over in their MLB rough drafts. We will study these words too using Structured Word Inquiry to see why they are spelled the way they are spelled. Our first list: they, their, they're

To make daily spelling practice more fun and fancy, we will be using our fountain pens! The children will also get to choose whether they want to practice writing their spelling words in Chancery Script or cursive (everyone had a cursive workbook last year so they already know the alphabet).

We started our Spelling with the childrens' own names! They took a pretest on Monday where they had to write their first and last names. They thought this was really fun!

Your Name Is a Song
by Jamilah Thompkins-Bigelow

In our plan book color coding, Penmanship is gold (for illuminated manuscripts), so everyone got a two pocket folder with gold metallic accents in which to store their spelling & penmanship papers.

I've written an online course on how to incorporate Chancery Script into either the Waldorf or Montessori curriculum. It also includes videos on how to form all of the letters. If you are interested, it is here:

2-DAY ONLINE COURSE:
Waldorf Main Lesson Block Planning: Lowercase Letters

Here are the supplies we use in the classroom for our fountain pen work:

Pilot Fountain Pen Medium Stainless Steel Nib - Metropolitan Collection


Pilot Fountain Pen Medium Stainless Steel Nib - Retro Pop Collection


refill fountain pen ink cartridges - black

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New Notebooks for a New School Year

I always enjoy purchasing supplies for a new school year, and this year I'm particularly pleased that I found Plan Books in three different sizes of Montessori penmanship paper and Math Journals in three different sizes of graph paper!

The three graph paper sizes are (from left to right) 1/2 inch, 1 cm, 1/4 inch.

AND Montessori penmanship paper in three sizes as well!

The notebooks will be perfect for our daily Plan Books! There is a print series (with a guide to print letters in the front) and a cursive series (with a guide to cursive letters in the front). The pink book has the widest lines, the blue book has the medium lines, and the green book has the narrowest lines. Montessori paper is wonderful for teaching Chancery Script as well.

On the first day of school, each child will have a chance to pick the set that is best for them. We have a mixed age homeschool environment (ages 7-13), so having a variety of paper sizes will accommodate everyone's needs.

I'm really pleased to offer these three options to the children, and to see what set they each choose!

links for small set:

plan book
math journal (1/4 inch)

links for medium set:

plan book
math journal (1 cm)

links for large set:

plan book
math journal (1/2 inch)

This post contains affiliate links to materials I truly use for homeschooling. Qualifying purchases provide me with revenue. Thank you for your support!

Chancery Script & Poetry

Notes from teaching Chancery Script in our Outdoor Classroom in Sep 2022.

After going through all of the lowercase letters, we practiced them by writing and illustrating short poems from Lemonade and Other Poems Squeezed from a Single Word by Bob Raczka. These poems work well because they use only a few letters, so the children aren't overwhelmed. And they're fun!

poem #1 - rain
we began with this poem because every letter stays within the x-space

poem #2 - ladybug
our second poem allowed us to practice the ascender and the descender

poem #3 - creative
after learning the remaining letters (diagonal downstroke and sibilant pair)

If you're working on penmanship with your child, I highly recommend this approach. There are also wonderful short poems in Here's A Little Poem: A Very First Book of Poetry compiled by Jane Yolen and Andrew Fusek Peters and Firefly July: A Year of Very Short Poems by Paul B. Janeczko.

This post contains affiliate links to materials I truly use for homeschooling. Qualifying purchases provide me with revenue. Thank you for your support!

Montessori Blue Line Paper

I adore this paper for practicing penmanship (here's my Ruzuku course for teaching Chancery Script with fountain pens). Here are some links!

We have a class set of these medium nib Pilot fountain pens and I love them!

My favorite plan book with Montessori lined paper:

Montessori Elementary Writing Journal
Grades 1, 2, 3

Nienhuis Montessori has SIX different sizes of blue line paper. Each pack comes with 500 sheets.

2 3/4 inches x 7 inches

Grade 1:
This size is nice for practicing letters or numbers and circling your favorite (the one you wrote the most beautifully).

4 1/4 inches x 5 1/2 inches

Grade 1:
This size is nice for writing a single word and drawing an image in the shape of the capital letter, as Waldorf does in the Capital Letters block.

4 inches x 8 1/2 inches

Grade 1:
This paper is perfect for a phrase or single sentence summary for the MLB. In grade 1, the children dictate what they want to say and I scribe for them. Then they copy my spelling when they write in their main lesson books.

2 inches x 8 1/2 inches

Grade 2:
Children use this paper for recording their Montessori math work. It is the perfect size for one math problem written horizontally from the Activity Sets
(Golden Bead Material or Stamp Game).

7 inches x 8 1/2 inches

Grades 2 & 3:
Children use this paper for writing their rough drafts for the Waldorf main lesson books. After writing their rough drafts they meet with me for an edit.

8 1/2 inches x 11 inches

Grades 2 & 3:
Some children prefer to create a rough draft of their illustrations as well as their written summaries, so they like to use this paper.

As children progress through third grade, their handwriting gets smaller and they want to write more, but they still need the support of the specially lined paper (in Montessori the colored bar is the x-space... it's brilliant for penmanship). So Nienhuis also has green line paper! Zac has just asked me to get some for our classroom because he needs to have the room to write a longer rough draft. With the green line paper, the 7 inch x 8 1/2 inch paper fits up to 8 lines of text (as opposed to 6) and the 8 1/x inch x 11 inch paper fits up to 7 lines of text (as opposed to 5).

This post contains affiliate links to materials I truly use for homeschooling. Qualifying purchases provide me with revenue. Thank you for your support!

Cursive Workbooks

I just had a student come to me today to say that he'd like to learn cursive. Cursive can be a lot of fun! I like the D'Nealian workbooks by Robyn Joyner:

Anne of Green Gables

The Hobbit

Charlotte's Web

Little Women

Narnia

Just choose whichever one you think would be most appealing to your child!

They are filled with traditional practice exercises plus fun quotes to copy from the books. She also did Aesop's Fables and The Wind in the Willows and, most recently, expanded on the Narnia theme to include The Magician's Nephew, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, The Horse and His Boy, Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, and The Silver Chair.

This post contains affiliate links to materials I truly use for homeschooling. Qualifying purchases provide me with revenue. Thank you for your support!