Words With Wings
  • marajoymarajoy
    Posts: 781
    (I apologize if there is already a post exclusively about this; I have not found it with the search function.)

    Is anyone familiar with this program? Given that it is written by Wilko Brouwers, I am sure it is FABULOUS, but I would like to know a bit more about it before ordering it for my youth choir. (Although I will probably end up ordering the instructor's manual regardless.)

    How are the lesson plans laid out? (How long would each lesson take, and how many lesson are there? If they are short, would it be easy to combine them into a longer class, and if they are long, would it be easy to divide them into multiple class times if needed?)

    What age level is it geared towards? (Elementary school? Junior high? High school? I imagine it's directed more at elementary school, so would it work with high schoolers, or does the material come across as juvenile?)

    Any other comments or reviews about it?
    Btw, there is currently no reviews of it on amazon, so it would be wonderful and great marketing for the product if anyone who already has it rated it and wrote a helpful review!
  • Charles in CenCA
    Posts: 2,416
    I started it this week, Joy. My impression thus far is that the workbook and the nature of the lesson plans in the teacher edition are targeted towards grades 2-4 according to the grade level vocabulary and progressive tasks. However, this is not to say that sequence of learning strategies could not be innovatively re-tooled for upper grades through the use of power point/Finale/and, in my case, the PBC.
    It's too early for me to assess an average time duration per lesson, but I don't think it's ideal to plan that it serves as the only component of a 40 minute weekly lesson, particular at the grade levels I mentioned. I also think it's cross-curricular in that it deals with literacy and comprehension skills, such as both phonetic, syllabic and definitive emphasis, spatial relationships, math (measurement), and symbiology. That's all I report as of this first week of classes. But I see it thus far as complementary towards what I've done in the past towards music literacy and the practicum of using chant at worship.
    Hope this helps, despite coming from a self-confessed "blabbermouth."
    Thanked by 1marajoy
  • marajoymarajoy
    Posts: 781
    Oh don't worry CCC... although you have a lot of posts, you have more "thanks" than some people who have MORE posts than you! ;-)
    (yes, I'm a creeper, hahaha...)
    Thanked by 1Charles in CenCA
  • WendiWendi
    Posts: 638
    CCC...when you retool it for the upper grades can you share with the rest of the class? Teaching the next generation is the most effective long term solution to restoring chant...at least IMHO
  • canadashcanadash
    Posts: 1,499
    "Bump"

    Any more thoughts on "Words with Wings"? I don't have the opportunity to take a course since I homeschool my children. Could I learn to teach this program on my own?
  • marajoymarajoy
    Posts: 781
    I've since looked through the instructor's edition, and there are 20 lessons, definitely aimed at grade-school students, and they all seem quite short, like you could do each one in 10 minutes. Canadash, the instructor's edition literally gives a script that the teacher is supposed to say (making it a little hard for me to see what is and is not in the student edition, which I don't have in front of me,) so yes, anyone could pretty much teach using the book even if they barely even knew chant!

    (I should look at it a bit more thoroughly to give a better review, but I'd almost rather wait til I use it, which is likely, before I review it more.)
    Thanked by 1canadash
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