Homework

Dear Kay,

Introduction

In this letter I’ve promised to talk about homework, that is, whatever your student can do between Club sessions to reinforce what you are doing with him during them.

Starting to Plan for Homework

Bearing in mind what I have told you about the importance of the physical act of writing, the most useful activity would be writing, of whatever nature. If your student is equal to writing a diary, that would be best of all. Just a few words each day about his job, his family, his friends, his leisure time; any of these gives you an insight into his interests and his level of communication.

Initially, do not attempt to deal with his spelling wholesale. The important thing is to discuss the content and its significance to him. It has been said, "There is no poverty of experience, only of linguistic experience". In other words, if we don’t talk about things, or think about them, then there is a sense in which they do not happen for us.

Verbal or Visual

It has also been said that only 15% of the population are verbal in their thoughts, the other 85% are visual. This may or may not be true and I am sure that you and I do a lot of verbal thinking. So our experience is largely internalised in a linguistic fashion. But is it so for your student? Think about it.

More on Planning

Back to homework: encourage your student to practice the words from his indexed notebook. It isn’t necessary to use pen or pencil. Tracing on the table or on his knee is quite sufficient and if he is alone then the larger the movement the better. If he wants to use paper and pen then that is fine!

The old instruction to correct spelling mistakes - "Write it three times!" - was soundly based. Discourage any tendency to recite spellings. I cannot emphasis this strongly enough. When you recite a spelling, the effect on your memory is similar to that of packing goods in a box: the last in is first out. Hence, reversals, which are regarded as a common symptom of dyslexia, of which I shall have something to say in a later letter.

How To Use a Tape Recorder

Homework is something that can continue the relationship that builds between you and your student, a relationship on which our work is founded. If he has a cassette player, and many people do, or have access to one, then between you choose a text that interests him. Don’t worry if the text is too difficult for him, it is only necessary that he should have a genuine interest in the subject matter. Then record some of it for him. There should be a tape-recorder in your Club. Or perhaps you have one of your own and can do the recording at home.

The advantage of this is similar to the benefit of your reading aloud to him. The voice is that of his very own tutor, it is your voice. As he scans the text while listening he will make the association between the text and the meaning. I repeat, between the text and the meaning; the association with the sound is at this time secondary. That will come later, when we deal with phonics as such. Phonics is not the first skill, it is the last, the skill that sets us free to voyage alone through uncharted seas of writing or print.

Other Options

What else can we offer as homework? Once your student is alerted to the possibility he will become more aware of print around him and on television, and may bring words to you that he has noticed, particularly words of which he has understood the meaning. There are ample opportunities on television, in the programmes and even more in the advertising, to collect words or phrases or short sentences. An even richer source, I should imagine, although one that is a closed book to me, is in the words of popular songs.

Another kind of homework is a worksheet. This may take the form of sentences with gaps and a choice of words to fill the gaps. Or a short sentence broken into pieces, which the student is asked to assemble in the right order. The list is endless and can be supplemented by worksheets that we can produce for you.

And Finally

Another source of material for writing, (whether during the session or as homework), can be a discussion of the student’s activities or those of your own. For example, there may be exotic experiences such as the visit by his church choir, of which he is a member, to foreign parts; alternatively, a description of your own holiday may fire his imagination.

From time to time Clubs organise outings, which are a fruitful source of discussion and writing topics, especially if followed up by viewing and possibly mounting in an album, of photographs taken at the time or culled from publicity.

If the imagination fails, choose a topic from a wish-list - holidays, jobs, meals, clothes, what would I do if I won the lottery etc.

My next letter will be devoted to the need to balance the activities of a Club session.

Gladys Glascoe