SS #25: To Pre-Read or Not to Pre-Read (Why Is It Even a Question?)

Today’s episode was recorded when we had the joy of all being together in the same room (along with our friend, Dawn Garrett) for the Scholé Sisters Leadership Retreat in Portland. We had so much fun! We hope you enjoy this episode, even though there are a couple places where the sound is sub-par. (What can we say? We were all sharing one mic!)

Today’s topic is pre-reading. We talked about why to do it, how to let your personal goals lead the process, when to do it, and more!

 

 

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14 Comments

  1. I want to thank whoever mentioned that “good is better than perfect”. We have three kids who will be doing AO (two are currently school age) and the idea of even reading one year of books was daunting – because the way I look at it, I have to thoroughly read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest, as well as make notes. I was despairing . . . until it dawned on me, “Hey, you don’t have to read everything perfectly the first time you try this.” Thanks for sharing your experiences with this!

  2. I have to start by saying I think it’s hilarious that you linked “Driving Miss Daisy”, just because you ladies made a joke about it in relation to Mason’s carriage driver! LOL That’s why I love listening to you.
    Anyway, I just listened to the podcast–actually, to be honest, I’m 15 minutes from the end, but that’s all I could fit in while driving lol. I’m so inspired to be more disciplined and schedule in pre-reading because boy, I’m behind. And I need to take advantage of this being a sort of light year with my Y5 students, and get it done. I know I can do it if I make a plan.
    I really badly wanted to jump in and share what I do when I DO preread. I have a rectangular index card storage box–bought it at Staples or Amazon or something. This thing is about 8″ long/deep. I make index card “narration” cards for books. So I put at the top the page numbers it’s covering. I make columns for important words and dates–for history it’s usually PEOPLE, PLACES, THINGS (inventions, documents, ideas, etc), and TIMELINE. I jot down as I read. Then under that I put any questions that came up in my mind, things I would like them to delve more into if they don’t cover it in narration. Sometimes, I’ll include a special project or activity–something simple like add the places mentioned to a map, look up the Crystal Palace and tell what you learned about it, copy either the quote from Ben Franklin or the one from Thomas Jefferson, etc. Things like that.
    There are filing tabs in the index card box, and so all the cards are labeled by book. This works great because if I forget to get it out for them, they can just go to the box and find their card. I’m not super consistent so there are gaps, but I know by the time my youngest is up there the gaps will be filled.
    Anyway, just wanted to share my system. 😀 Thanks again ladies for the inspiration and reminder of why this is important!

  3. Oh my goodness! Your index card system sounds *amazing*!! And I love physical things — I love paper — so it’d work for me better than, say, keeping computer files (which I then lose or forget about and then remake ahhhh!!!)…

  7. So I have to ask… how do you find the time? With four kids (12 months to 9 years), it’s all I can do to meet everyone’s basic needs and keep the littlest one from getting into trouble! I love to read, but there’s just not much time left at the end of the day.

  8. For me, I have times set aside that happen to work really well. So, for example, youth group on Wednesday nights. It’s impractical to drive them, go home, and drive back to pick them up, so I drop them off and go to a nearby Starbucks for 2.5 hours. Same thing Sunday evenings when my 15yo has Greek class — I spend 3 hours at the same Starbucks. I *only* read for my oldest child. Sometimes, I do decide that I don’t have time for certain books. It’s happened before. This term, however, they all seem to fit in my 2 sessions as long as I really concentrate and I don’t spend much time on anything else (except perhaps scribbling a quote in my commonplace book).

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  10. Some great thoughts, but the endless laughing about buying a slave made me cringe. Slavery is demoralizing and barbaric, not “Teeheehee! So weird!”

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