Inside: Learn what copywork is and what great benefits your homeschooler gets when using it.
What if there was something your child could do every day for five to ten minutes and it could make a difference in school? Have you heard of copywork? If not, you may be wondering what is copywork?
It’s very popular with those who use the Charlotte Mason method, but I think it’s one of those tools that can cross over into any teaching style.
Copywork is a very simple concept. You provide your child with a great passage of literature, and he copies it onto a piece of paper.
Sounds way too easy, right? A lot is going on when your child is copying those words. There are amazing benefits from it that will show up over time.
Benefits of Copywork
Focus and Attention
Langauage Arts
Great Literature
Handwriting
Vocabulary
Short Yet Effective
Video of Results with Copywork from Creative Minds Homeschool
Read Want to Become a Better Writer? Copy the Work of Others! to find out the history of copywork and famous people who used it.
How Do I Select Copywork?
Depending on the age of your child, you will choose an appropriate length for him to copy. You can start with just a small sentence, and as he moves up in age, you can progress to paragraphs and short passages.
While you may want to try this with your preschool or kindergarten child, there are a few things to take into consideration such as his ability to concentrate and the fine motor skills he has developed. While this does train a child to focus better, he still may be too young to expect this kind of concentration from him.
Also, a child must have to proper pencil grip and be able to write with ease. If it is still taking him a lot of effort just to form letters, he will not be able to focus on the other details required of copywork. The foundational skills of handwriting must become automatic before he’s ready to move on.
Where to Find Good Copywork
There are a lot of places you can find good copywork. You can search the internet for quotes that apply to things such as character qualities you want to reinforce in your child. You can use scripture from the Bible. You can also purchase ready make copywork that many people have created to save yourself some time.
Fortunately For You Books is a company a friend and I have created that provides supplemental homeschool materials. We have written supplemental homeschool materials, and one of the products is copywork printables that are themed.
There’s a set for every month of the year (and more), which provides you with plenty of materials for your entire school year. If you are not interested in searching for your own passages, this may be something you want to consider.
I have a separate post which explains our Pockets of Copywork. There are pictures to demonstrate how to put them together. Each of our monthly themes is divided into four weeks with five sentences to copy each week. Your child will put together a pocket where his work can be stored. If you are interested in purchasing them, you can find them at Teachers Pay Teachers. They are priced very modestly at $2.99 each. However, my subscribers can try a Pockets of Copywork for FREE. Go to my Copywork Printables article and at the bottom there is a form to fill out to get your code.
It’s Worth a Try
So stop asking what is copywork and start doing it. Copywork has so many great benefits your child can gain in a just a few minutes a day. It’s definitely worth trying. The hardest decision is finding and choosing what you want to use.
I think this is an excellent method to teach children consistency in punctuation and detail. I really think this would help my so immensely.
How many times should they write. Out the same oasseave do you think before they become bored with it ? should they do a new passage each week ?
I actually have my children write a different passage every day. It can be also be done just a few times a week. And to keep it interesting, we do different themes that go along with the month.