My daughter, who just turned six a few days ago, is
doing something I find interesting:

She doesn't read, doesn't try to read. But she writes.
She writes stories and writes in her journal.

In the car one day she wrote the words to one of my
favorites songs when I was a kid (I put in the spaces;
she runs it all together):

BUY BI MIS UMARCIN PIYE

DIV ME TO THE LEVE

BUT THE LEVE WUS DRY

THEM GDL BOYS WR DRICING WISCE AND RID
SINGINN THIS WL BE THE DAY THAT I DI TH W B TH DAY
THAT OL DI

Anyway, I just thought it seemed ... well, not what we
learned in college! :) .... to be writing before
reading, and I was curious if this was more common
than I thought, and/or what your experiences and
observations with that have been. I should add that it
doesn't bother or worry me in the least; I just find
it kind of fascinating.

Jenny

___________________________________________________________________________ _________
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-=- I was curious if this was more common
than I thought, and/or what your experiences and
observations with that have been.-=-

Holly did that but not as extensively or as well as your daughter!
But a little, she did, and she would ask us how to spell words, or  
she would tell us a short story, we'd write it down, and she would  
copy it out.  It was a few years before she could read.

Sandra

My son, Will, wrote lots and lots of 3-4 page illustrated books in the time
between 3 and 5.  He didn't read until 7.  I still have them.  Sometimes he
would dictate to me and I would write them, and sometimes he would write the
words and then tell me what they said.  He knew all the letters at that
point, but not necessarily what they sounded like.  Of course, he didn't
spell anything but very common words, like mom, dad, his brother's names,
and his name.  His name is Will, but when he wrote the word "will" he wrote
something else, I remember.

I didn't consider it writing so much as composing.  Your daughter was
writing something she didn't make up, though, and that's pretty cool and
certainly okay!

Karen

On 4/11/07, Jennifer <beanmom...@yahoo.com> wrote:

Yes,  my oldest who is 11 learnt to write spontaneously at a year and a half.  Some of his letters were invented(I didn't recognize them) but others mimicked "real" letters.(lol)  I am forever making lists & writing little thoughts or poems, and apparently this behaviour imprinted.  His first real letter was a "B".  I thought he was drawing a bumblebee<g> and got really excited as I thought his figure 8 was a beautiful creature.  

Needless to say other adults tried to get me to reveal my "secret" to his early writing, and didn't believe child-directed learning could produce those sorts of results.  He didn't know the names of the letters he drew and he learnt upper case and lower case simultaneously.  Your daughter seems to know phonetic spelling.  Natural learning is interesting that way.  My niece who is almost six seems to be learning how to write before she can read, too.  I always think writing is active and reading is passive, so some kids learn to write because that is who they are.

Marina

Fwiw, its common enought to be considered the norm amongst montessori
educators and other proponents of "developmentally appropriate early
childhood education". There's a teaching method called "write to
read", and the "whole language approach" encourages writing. I'm not
sure that has anything to do with unschooling, but its interesting.

I enjoy seeing what letters kids use to represent different sounds.
For awhile, Mo used "ch" to represent the sound she heard for "tr".
Since she used letter names as a guide to their sounds, she also used
"y" to represent the "w" sound for awhile. It was fun to decode her
spellings and think about spelling conventions in other languages, or
translating from other languages.

Ray didn't really play with letters and sounds the way Mo did - he
just asked for spellings o ver and over. He wasn't interested in
spelling "rules" either. He's a great speller, now - I often ask him
if I'm stuck trying to remember whether or not to double a letter or
which vowel combination to use. I tend to default to French, since I
*like* spelling rules and those are consistent. Screwy, but
consistent.

---Meredith (Mo 5, Ray 13)

On Apr 11, 2007, at 8:29 AM, Jennifer wrote:

Last time the subject came up several people mentioned their kids did  
this too -- and now several more :-)

Kat definitely did it. She wrote well before she could read.

I think, while they share common areas of the brain, I think they  
draw on different parts too. I know I often make spelling mistakes as  
I'm writing that are glaringly obvious when I read back over it.

One way of making sense of something is to use it and get feed back  
from the process and that's part of what's probably going on. Well  
the primary reason is that writing is a fun, intriguing puzzle :-)  
but the reason it's intriguing is because our brains find working  
through puzzles a useful way to learn.

And, now that I'm turning it over, I'm thinking writing is a lot  
easier than reading. With writing, you're transcribing thoughts in  
your head. With reading, you not only have to recognize the words  
(and sometimes the letters if the font is odd), but you have to pull  
up some kind of meaning for each word or phrase and let those  
meanings swirl about in your brain until you've gathered enough to  
assemble into the picture the author is trying to create in your  
head. Think about reading:

red

You don't get a specific image, just the idea that something will be  
red. (Though it could mean Communist or something like that but  
usually you're brain doesn't drift that far unless there have been  
previous clues that's what the subject is.) Then:

fat

Is fat a noun? Are we talking about "red fat" (whatever that might be  
-- we assume the rest of the text will explain.) Are we talking about  
the fat that's cut off meat? Are we talking about fat meaning plump?

juicy

Though juicy usually has something to do with liquid, it still  
doesn't give a clear picture. But your brain is probably prepared for  
several words that could fit.

worms.

Finally there's a complete picture. We're always doing that as we  
read. We build up a picture, tear down parts, build new pieces on.  
It's complex! And while most people's bodies are passive, the brain  
sure wouldn't think so! ;-)

Joyce

  On Apr 11, 2007, at 8:29 AM, Jennifer wrote:

    to be writing before

    reading, and I was curious if this was more common

    than I thought

  Last time the subject came up several people mentioned their kids did this too -- and now several more :-)

  Kat definitely did it. She wrote well before she could read.>>>

  *****My kids  wrote before they could read, right now my 7 & 8 yr olds are in the process of reading. What I mean by that is they recognize many words, my ds has quite a sight word recognition and dd is one who sounds words out. They both can write many words by memory and they often ask how to spell something or they just copy words that they see. I actually thought it was typical, I mean they  wrote their own name long before they can read any words. My 4 yr old has tried to form letters and he gets frustrated because they don't look the way he wants, he hasn't tried to write anything lately.

  Stephanie in TN

  Kieran 11, Brennan 8, Cassandra 7, Jared 4

  www.learningthroughliving-stephanie.blogspot.com

  "There is no difference between living and learning...it is impossible and misleading and harmful to think of them as being separate"
  ~John Holt in "What Do I Do  Monday"

""worms.""

Ewww.... I was not thinking worms!! Steak actually.  So you can imagine how it was when I was tasting the words in my mind.
Elissa

"What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare."
-- from "Leisure," by W.H. Davies

Alaska, age 5, does this -- he's been writing for about 2 years. He
knows the letter sounds and how to write them (both self taught at his
own will). He's been figuring out how to put words together, where to
put spaces, etc. He writes notes, directions and makes lists of things
all the time. He hasn't decoded an entire song yet (!) but he's
determined to use writing to communicate his ideas and desires.

Mehalje, on the other hand, is a voracious reader but is just
beginning to shown interest in writing. She makes signs to place on
her bedroom door and draws comics that have characters speaking in
those little bubbles. She asks us to spell words occasionally but is
very creative at finding examples of the words she wants to use
(magazine covers, DVD cases, book titles). She is fiercely independent
and has a perfectionist side that would rather not do something than
do it "wrong".

-- Susan

That's great. She wants to make her mark! She sees all these magical
words written all over, words that tell adults what to do, words that
consume the attention of adults, and she wants a piece of that action!
Some of my children were also interested in writing before reading. In
a house with four children, it's an important skill to be able to
create a sign that says "Keep Out!"

My youngest (Lilly) learned to write before she learned to read.  Writing to
her pen pals (her older cousins at that time) was her motivation for
learning to write and I read the letters to her that they wrote back.  

It was very different from the way her older sister Leigh learned to read.
Leigh was interested in letters from the time she was very small and knew
them all by the time she was 2.5 along with all the sounds that go with
them.  She loved to play letter games and also loved to play geography
games.

Lilly had NO interest in playing letter games at all.  She learned her
letters when she wanted to write to her pen pals and I would point to each
letter that she needed to make in order to write what she wanted to say and
she would copy it down.

Interesting thing is that they learned to read at almost the same age.
(Recognizing common words and sounding out things)  Leigh's early letter
recognition made little difference in her ability to read and Lilly's lack
of letter recognition didn't hold her back at all.  Then they both
progressed at a similar pace as they were exposed to more of the written
word.  I find it all very interesting.

Angela Shaw
game-enthusi...@adelphia.net
Life is Good!

Rosie did it, too. A lot. Interesting, too, was that she couldn't  
really read it back even after she was the one who wrote it down,  
herself.

-pam
Relay for Life
http://www.acsevents.org/relay/ca/longbeach/pamsoroosh

On Apr 11, 2007, at 5:42 AM, Sandra Dodd wrote: