So far, six of the kiddos in this picture love to write.
(The littlest one is still learning her ABC’s…)
Six of them have won young author awards for creative nonfiction.
And six of them have been raised on Sonlight Language Arts.
Half of these kiddos are mine, half belong to my dear friend. She and I have been friends for our entire motherhood and our children have grown up side by side. This spring, her girls wrote and illustrated outstanding picture books for the local library’s Young Author’s competition. They won 1st, 1st, and Honorable Mention.
Imagine!
100% of her students are incredible, thoughtful, creative writers! This points to one incredible teacher.
So I asked, “What’s your secret to raising such good writers??”
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Her answer: “Sonlight Language Arts.”
She said it’s as simple as following the curriculum. She doesn’t rush things, she doesn’t skip much. She simply progresses through the curriculum day upon day.
Then, she mentioned three specific benefits of the Sonlight Language Arts curriculum:
First, the read-alouds spark her daughters’ imaginations, build their vocabulary, and teach them effective sentence structure. Through the read-alouds and readers, her girls spend hours with excellent writers.
Secondly, the gentle Language Arts assignments build clear, precise communicators. Step by step, day by day, grain of sand by grain of sand. Again, she doesn’t rush things, she doesn’t skip much.
And finally, she took Sonlight seriously when it encouraged her to be the scribe for her creative children in their early years. As her spunky first and second graders imagined new civilizations, or created uses for a ball of string, or rattled off a list of words that describe the sunset, she’d write down their words and read them back aloud.
(Sonlight encourages young children to develop the skill of handwriting through handwriting curriculum and dictation, but wants to help kids to create and write stories without the complication and hardship of handwriting. It’s a brilliant plan!)
These days, her girls can handwrite easily, so they keep their notebooks close by and are constantly writing, writing, writing.
May the young authors continue creating, writing, and contributing to the world. Thank you, Sonlight Language Arts, for the gentle, solid, effective start.
