I thought I posted this on the forum but can’t find it. If I did, I’m sorry for repeating myself.
I have two questions (probably more later) about Master The Code. Does it have a spelling component? I asked our “tutor” and she said that it does. What she suggested is that if a word looks wrong then substitute the “chunks” similar to the ones in the group that sound the same and your brain would tell you which one is right. The problem I have with this is that my son doesn’t realize when he has made a mistake. He spells the word so it is phonetically correct and to him it is correct. For example, the other day he spelled girl “gerl” and pretty “pritty”. If Master The Code doesn’t have anything better than what I described does anyone have any suggestions to help with spelling?
The other question I have is does Master The Code have more supplemental reading material than what comes in the manual? If not, is there any material out there I can use to supplement what is being taught in Master The Code? I think it would be important to focus on reading more of what is being taught than the 3 or 4 pages we get with each lesson.
So far PACE and Master The Code have seemed to help my son with attention, processing and reading. We are about halfway through the program. There are so many things that just seem to be coming together. He puts his name on his papers, he turns them in. He doesn’t forget to bring his books home so he can do his homework and his grades are better. He feels better about himself and school because he is successful and he doesn’t need so much help from me to keep him on track. It is such a change from last year when he continually got poor grades and complained about how stupid he was and how he hated school. Last year was a constant struggle. This year things seem to be going much better.
It has been interesting to watch my son take up the challenges presented by PACE. He is constantly trying to master the levels and move on. He sees that it is helping him and is really working to get better. I noticed he works much harder for the “tutor” than he does for me. But his tutor isn’t trying to be mom and tutor either.
Nancy3
Your original post is on the “Homeschooling an LD Child” board. I made some comments there.
Nancy
I’ve never met a program that had enough practice :-) I”m always making up practice sentences, or rreviving the ones we’ve practiced before. Re-reading the practice pages would be a good idea (unless there’s too much resistance to it - I’d negotiate to at least try it for three times, because the better fluency and flow could just feel good :-))
This is true to the third power when it comes to spelling. I’ve got some strategies for practicing spelling on my site in the “reading and spelling” section (http://www.resourceroom.net/readspell/index.asp) that I incorporate into the daily lesson.
And yea, there’s a real benefit to having the tutor not be the mom sometimes.