Learning how to read and spell has changed several times over the past years. We have tried a variety of ways to spell and help Boo Bear to feel confident in his spelling. A new product we were able to try out teaches another way that we both enjoy. The Dynamic Literacy program we reviewed was their WordBuild: Foundations, Level 1.
The system is focused more on the meanings of words your child already knows than on them learning the word in syllables or letters. Typically we have taught to look at the word broken up in syllables or even going from one letter to the next. Dynamic Literacy uses a process called Morphemes where you focus on the meanings of the words in your larger compound word than the traditional way.
With their combo edition we received the Foundations Level 1 teachers book, student edition and the basic student activity book.
This set is used for those starting out in grades 2nd-5th. It can also be used for remedial work if it is needed for those in higher grades.
Teacher's Edition:
This is your guide through the program. Each day's lessons are planned out for you and it makes it easy to teach your child. You work on one prefix or suffix each week. The lesson plans go day by day and list the activities, a script for you to say and the answers to the pages your students are working on. It gives you ideas on discussion and how to "make connections" with other words in language.
The teacher's book also offers checkups that you can give your child throughout the program. You'll also find a comprehensive course checkup at the end of the book. You'll also find a list at the end of each week's lesson giving you even more words that go with that particular suffix or prefix you're working on.
I love it when a curriculum comes with lesson plans for me. It makes my life that much easier when I can just follow along in the book with what lessons it's teaching. It takes the stress out of figuring it out for me and helps me know how to teach it correctly.
Basic Student Activity Book:
This is the first place you start when you work with Foundations Level 1. This basic book offers a gentle way to introduce compound words to your children. If you haven't worked with them before this is a very nice way to help them get the idea of how it all works. This book only has 20 pages as it's just the beginning introduction to the system.
Teacher's Edition:
This is your guide through the program. Each day's lessons are planned out for you and it makes it easy to teach your child. You work on one prefix or suffix each week. The lesson plans go day by day and list the activities, a script for you to say and the answers to the pages your students are working on. It gives you ideas on discussion and how to "make connections" with other words in language.
The teacher's book also offers checkups that you can give your child throughout the program. You'll also find a comprehensive course checkup at the end of the book. You'll also find a list at the end of each week's lesson giving you even more words that go with that particular suffix or prefix you're working on.
I love it when a curriculum comes with lesson plans for me. It makes my life that much easier when I can just follow along in the book with what lessons it's teaching. It takes the stress out of figuring it out for me and helps me know how to teach it correctly.
Basic Student Activity Book:
This is the first place you start when you work with Foundations Level 1. This basic book offers a gentle way to introduce compound words to your children. If you haven't worked with them before this is a very nice way to help them get the idea of how it all works. This book only has 20 pages as it's just the beginning introduction to the system.
Student Activity Book:
This is the major part of the curriculum itself. This book offers over 180 pages of lessons that cover 30 of the prefix, suffix combination words. Your child will have daily activities to help them discover the meanings of the vocabulary words they are studying without them really realizing what they are doing. Each week's lesson offers a variety of ways for them to work with that week's selection and learn how it works with other words to change the meanings. Activities include things such as:
- Word Searches
- Magic Squares
- Affix Adders
- And others!
How we used it:
The lessons are planned out for a five day week. We combined two days of work to shorten ours to a four day week as we usually school for just four days. We started out with the basic student activity book as the guide suggests. We ended up not doing the entire book as they tell you if your child finds that too easy to move on to the student book.
Each week we started out with our new prefix and worked on the daily lessons. My son really likes the word searches. I myself enjoyed the magic squares as they remind me of a Sudoku type game. If you do not want to combine the days work, you'll have enough lessons for one per day.
The first day of the lesson starts out with your new prefix or suffix for the week. You work on putting this word with other words in the Square and seeing what you come up with. You learn how the words come together to make a new word. The following lessons reiterate what you learned. We enjoyed the different activities each day. That way it doesn't get old or you feel like you're in a rut with your vocabulary/spelling time.
The company has so kindly offered a discount code for my readers to get a chance to try out this amazing vocabulary curriculum. You can enter the code ourjourney to receive a 25% discount on purchasing the books or to get 10% off of the online program.
Be sure to check the other reviews by clicking below and discover other amazing selections from Dynamic Literacy.
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