FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Answers from the author, Barbara Beers:

How is your curriculum different from The Writing Road to Reading by Romalda Spalding?

     I am indeed grateful to Romalda Spalding, Anna Gillingham, and Oma Riggs for continuing the work of Dr. Samuel Orton in systematizing the English language. Dr. Orton battled the “whole-word” method as it grew to be the preferred method of teaching reading in the early years of the 20th century. These three women kept his work alive and developed their own “flavors” of his method during the last 40 years.

     The criticism of the Orton-Gillingham method, the Spalding method, and the Riggs method, even by those convinced of the need for a multi-sensory phonics approach, has been the extensive teacher preparation to be able to teach. Most teachers spend a minimum of 60 hours in training and then more weeks in preparation of their notebooks to understand and implement these curricula.

     With the birth and growth of the home school movement during the past 25 years came an ever-growing number of moms becoming teachers of their children for the first time. Most do not have the time or resources to spend on extensive training. Those hearty souls that have tried to simplify the method actually ended up writing their own books, larger and more complicated than the originals.

     Many of us over the past 15-20 years have shared with other moms the Orton method by giving 1-day, 5-day, or 10-day workshops showing moms how to get started teaching their children to read, write, and spell. But in the 10years that I have been sharing The LATIN Road to English Grammar across the country, I have yet to meet more than a handful of moms who have finished the study. Once their children start reading, they move on to other subjects. That is why many children are good readers, minimal or poor spellers, and hate to write. They have not been taught long enough to build balanced skills in spelling, writing and reading.

     What I offer you that is different from anyone else is The PHONICS Road to Spelling and Reading - the only Orton-inspired phonics course to take the burden of preparation off you, the parent/teacher, by providing complete teacher training on video from start to finish, showing you what to teach, when to teach, and how to teach it. And your notebook is completed for you so your preparation time is minimal. Everything you need to learn and teach is provided for you to give you the confidence to interact with your child and the resources to teach him to spell, write, read, and prepare both of you with grammar and composition for The LATIN Road to English Grammar.

How long will we spend on a lesson each day?

A day’s lesson should take no more than an hour a day for beginners (ages 5/6). As they progress in building the language, some days may go a little longer. But you will find that a day’s lesson can be segmented into a few 15minute activities during the day.

     For example, we might spend 15 minutes in the morning drilling our sounds and practicing writing. After lunch we might spend another 15 minutes learning to spell and practice writing the 4 or 5 words for that day. When the student begins reading he will spend another 15 minutes reading aloud to you. Later in the afternoon the student might spend another 15 minutes writing his final work into his notebook. There are also times for using the skills we learn in fun games and activities. Although there is a routine to our days, what the student is learning does not have to be dull because he is totally engaged in the process.

I have an older student who reads okay but does not spell well and hates to write. Is there an age too old to start this study? In which level do I begin?

     Having students who can read but not spell well is not an unusual thing these days. Most reading programs, even so-called phonics programs, are basically a re-worked look-say method with a little phonics thrown in. Centered on pictures, games, and workbooks, their goal is to help students memorize words until they build a sufficient vocabulary to read the books necessary for each grade. For students with good memories, this may work in the early years when the words are somewhat simple. But spelling problems usually show up about 4th/5th grade when a student needs a vocabulary larger than he has been able to memorize up to that time. If a student does not know the components of English and the rules of spelling, he literally has no clue how to read and spell new, complicated words. This is probably where you find yourself now.

     You ask if there is an age too old to begin. Not really. I have taught students from 5 years to adult and most ages in between. No matter the age, if a student is lacking the foundations of English, why would you continue trying to build skills on a shaky foundation? There are many families who have students between the ages of 8 and 12 who have chosen to take their students through my program at an accelerated pace to gain the skills they have missed. Many of these older students are able to study through Levels One and Two in a year or less with a parent or teacher willing to work with them, and are ready for the building of more complicated words in Levels Three and Four along with the rich literature studies, composition, and intro to Latin. Many of the adults are actually learning why English is built the way it is for the first time also.

     Let me give you my personal testimony. When I first learned this method over 20 years ago, I was so impressed with the logical systematic approach to spelling, writing, and reading, that I stopped all the subjects (except math and Bible) that I was doing at that time with my two older children and took them through the whole study in just2 years. You have to understand that my son was in 5th grade, an excellent speller and reader with beautiful and writing, and my daughter was in 3rd grade with no particular problems. But unlike any other program, I saw that this method would teach them WHY English is built the way it is and would lead to the best foundational skills in English. I never regretted that decision although there were some who thought I was crazy. But because of this foundation, we were able to go on to study Latin at a time when almost no one was studying Latin younger than high school. And from that study I was able to write The LATIN Road to English Grammar.

     The main question everyone asks is, Where do I start with a student that is not in kindergarten or first grade? Unfortunately, you cannot jump into The PHONICS Road study in the middle, because each level builds upon the previous one(s). For example, about 3/4 of the spelling rules are introduced in Level One along with many of the foundational explanations that I do not necessarily repeat in later levels. Although we spend some time reviewing each year, I do not reteach everything each year. So, every student needs to begin at Level One. The reason an older student struggles is that he is lacking skills, either due to lack of information, not enough practice, or an incorrect view of English. We must retrain his brain to build the English language from its smallest components to the whole.

     Of course, families who have older struggling students most often have younger children that need my program anyway, so purchasing the Curriculum Set makes sense for them. They just accelerate the older student(s) through the schedule to catch up to grade level, letting them use their own notebooks, paper, pencils, and readers, and letting the younger student use the student materials that come with the set.

     If your struggling older student is the only one you need to teach, I can make available the teacher materials for Levels One and Two without the student packages. This means that you would provide your student with his own notebook, paper, pencils, pens, and readers. You could buy the Level One Foremans’ Construction Guide (teacher’s completed notebook with the 10 DVDs) and the drill cards for a reduced rate: $169(instead of $199). If you are serious about catching him up at a faster pace, you can buy the Foremans’ Construction Guide for both Levels One AND Two at the same time at a further reduced price: $299 for both years, a total of 20 DVDs and both completed notebooks. I would include at no extra cost the custom Building Code and Framing Code pages for your student. With Levels Three and Four, even the older student needs the student package that comes in those Curriculum Sets because of the complicated spelling words, extended grammar, composition, and literature studies included.

How come your price is higher than other Orton/Spalding programs?

     I am actually very proud that I have been able to keep the price of The PHONICS Road program affordable. What parents and teachers have to realize is that this is not just another Orton/Spalding book with a list of spelling words and a few notebook pages. This is their entire language arts curriculum including the readers for each year- spelling, writing (penmanship), English grammar, composition (with work in the dictionary and thesaurus), quality literature studies, and introduction to Latin. I know of no other Spalding teacher who teaches you about the clues and histories of words that do not seem to follow our English spelling rules and provide the whys behind English spelling. Then rather than writing all this information in a book or books to navigate, I have modeled the entire program on DVDs so any mom can teach like the best Spalding teachers.

     Getting 10 DVDs for $199 is not a bad deal, but a parent/teacher also gets the completed teacher’s notebook, all the student pages, readers, and extras for that price. And the teacher’s part of the curriculum is totally reusable for any number of students. The only cost for an extra student is $69 which includes some components that he will use throughout the 4-year study. This is really not overpriced for six language arts subjects.

     I am sorry that some might decide not to use my program because of the expense. I know that they will have to piece together many different curricula to get all that I offer and will end up spending as much or more. And they will not get the individual help in teaching that the DVDs have to offer.