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Tuesday, December 19, 2006

She's a Visual Learner

Yikes. I knew that see preferred some things visual but I had Camille tagged as an auditory learner for most of this school year. My fellow WTMers enlightened me regarding our problems with narration- saying that it might be contributed to the fact she's not an auditory learner.

I guess those Jim Weiss cd's won't be needed, although *I* still want them. I can't justify getting them just because I want them though. It pains me not to be able to utilize something so wonderful but I am very grateful I didn't invest in them yet or the Story of the World audio cds! What stumps me is that she loves for me to record some of our memorizations on cassette tape where she can listen and repeat with the tape. Thinking about it, she usually has the item halfway memorized when she does the tape.

We did a little test to see if the Jim Weiss cd's are completely out of the picture or not- we talked about it (Camille and I) and she said that if she can draw a picture while listening or in a coloring book, she'd try her best to listen. She's such a doll!
It didn't work. She colored a beautiful picture from the Ancient Egypt Dover coloring book but didn't absorb much from the Jim Weiss cd, Egyptian Treasures.

I did get the History Scribe notebooking files for history and biographies to beef-up our history notebook, now I realize what a great buy they were for her. This makes our history notebook more like a workbook- something she needs as a visual learner. We also have charts on our walls, I guess I'll need to invest in those with the money I was going to spend on Jim Weiss.

Since she's visual this means all the wonderful things like Classical Kids cds, Jim Weiss' cds, pretty much all audio files don't do it for her. Urgh. I'm glad to know this but it's a little disheartening. Thankfully I haven't spent too much money on these items but I also guess that I need to cancel our membership to Simply Audiobooks. This is a little hard for me, I enjoy audiobooks. Nobody reads to me anymore. : ( Yeah, I know- "get over it, Jessica." I am very grateful to know what my dd's learning style is at this point. Hopefully by utilizing this fact we can finally avoid some of the more frustrating moments in our daily lessons.

The dvds that I picked up at Sam's Club are going to be invaluable to us. I'm going to learn all I can about having a visual learner, including the struggles they have and what obstacles need to be overcome. First, I need to modify my Rainbow Resource wishlist and see how much money we're going to save by not purchasing the Jim Weiss cds. LOL. I'm still going to get the coloring books so that she can color while I read-aloud to her if she chooses.

 

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

What test? Why can't she learn both ways?

Don't forget to check your library for those Weiss CDs, then you don't have to spend the money.

How old is she, Jess?

Jessica said...

Monica,
She's 6 to be 7 when we start using next year's curricula. Our library doesn't have them and our library system doesn't provide audio/video via interlibrary loan.

BUT we do have United Streaming so that's a major bonus. I'm sure she'll eventually like audiobooks in some capacity and we will work on utilizing all learning styles but for her age, I really want to focus on what will help her now.

:)
Jessica

Anonymous said...

Jessica,
She is still very young. Developing narration skill takes time; more than just a school year. I have a very visual learner and a very auditory one and a kinesthetic. They are as different as night and day. My auditory learner can narrate almost word for word what she hears. My visual learner can not do this, but she has learned to strengthen her auditory skills and she narrates beautifully. My experiences in the teaching profession and now, as a homeschooler, have convinced me that the whole modality issue is overrated. Yes, people have different strengths and weaknesses in these areas, but I don't think this means we should alter our teaching methods to accommodate them as much as it means that we need to work on strengthening those weak areas so that the child is well rounded in her learning skills. Anyway, just wanted to encourage you to use many teaching methods and not to hone in on just the visual.

I see you have moved to blogger. I did, too. I haven't announced it yet; am still working on moving my posts. Is there an easier way than just one by one?

warmly,
lindafay

Kendra Fletcher said...

Both my firstborn son and I are visual learners and we still both love to listen to Mr. Weiss. My son actually devours books on tape, but he also draws, constructs, or otherwise stays busy while he's listening.

I am the same- although visual, if I can be knitting I retain much more than if I just have to sit and listen. What might seem like rudeness to some is actually helping me to be a better listener. Now if only I could get away with knitting during the sermon...

Jessica said...

Kendra,
Oh I wish she would gain something from listening to audiobooks! She liked the Magic Treehouse b/c I had the audiobook and book where she could follow along in the book.

I'm going to bypass Jim Weiss for next year with the exception of Galileo and the Stargazers since it's dual history/science. I think this might change with time but for right now I'd rather not waste the money. I think I'm keeping my subscription to Simply Audiobooks, so I'm not giving up completely!