Easy Grammar Ultimate Series: 180 Daily Teaching Lessons

Oddly enough, my oldest son loved grammar.  In fact, it was one of his favorite subjects.  We used Rod and Staff to lay the foundation.  It was a thorough program, but not always easy to finish in a year.  The Easy Grammar Ultimate Series: 180 Daily Teaching Lessons seemed like a good substitute.  We examined the grade 11 text.  After a couple of lessons, Kingman complained that, "Nothing is clear.  You have to make assumptions."  I think coming from a curriculum that explains each concept in depth to one with succinct explanations may have been a big jump.  Upon closer examination, I discovered that concepts are explained well enough.  They are straight to the point with 1-4 practice questions.  This program was created to get you through what you need to know about grammar quickly.

If you are familiar with Daily Grams, you will probably have an idea of how this works.  In fact, the writers of the curriculum suggest using the text as a review book.  I would agree.  If you are finished with grammar study in your homeschool, but want to keep those grammar skills fresh as your juniors and seniors prepare for Accuplacer or CLEP exams, The Easy Grammar Ultimate Series: 180 Daily Teaching Lessons is a great review guide.

If you just want to review a specific aspect of grammar, the table of contents breaks it all down.  For example, under the lesson on colons there are exercises on use with a bibliography, divided, words, lists, ratios and more.  So you can zero in and be specific.

Another great way to use this guide would be through oral activities.  We used to do it all the time with Rod & Staff because there were just so many exercises.  To get  through them, we would do half orally.  The Easy Grammar Ultimate Series makes it easy as each lesson should only last 10 minutes.  Everyone has 10 minutes to review grammar orally.

Because the text is laid out in such an organized fashion, it makes it easy to jump around.  But the author suggests moving in sequence. It all depends upon how you plan to use the guide.  If you are a fan of Daily Grams, then I think you'll like this.  But I would suggest combining it with another grammar curriculum to round out a complete language arts program.  The Easy Grammar Ultimate Series is a part of complete homeschool curriculum for 11th graders.  For more information, click here.

Beginning Word Roots: A Review

Everything has a beginning.  This is how we began our study of root words.  Trees have roots and so do words, I explained to Lionheart, who wondered aloud, "why do I have to do this!?"  I wanted him to understand that the key to unlocking the meaning of new and unfamiliar words is understanding their roots.  Sharing this tidbit made teaching this abstract concept a bit more relevant to his young life.

Word Roots, published the by Critical Thinking Company, was our first adventure into vocabulary study.  More efficient than studying random lists of vocabulary words, Word Roots, instead focuses on prefixes, suffixes and roots.  Understanding the meaning of a specific prefix or suffix helps unlock far more words and their meanings.  For example, in Lesson 15, the root word "port," which means to carry, is the focus.  Pair "port" with the prefixes "ex, im, sup, trans," and 4 more words are decoded.  I encouraged Lionheart to treat it like detective work to make it fun!

The first 3 lessons of the text focus on prefixes, suffixes and roots, separately.  Each concept is defined, followed by simple exercises for practice.  The layout is nice and there is plenty of white space and a few illustrations so as not to overwhelm.  Other exercises include drawing a line from the word to its picture representation, defining the words, and filling in the blank with the correct word.

Lessons 4-7 focus on prefixes and roots, while lessons 8-11 focus on roots and suffixes. Breaking up the concepts in this way decreased confusion for Lionheart and allowed for plenty of practice to attain mastery.

Lessons 12-24 combine all three concepts: prefixes, roots and suffixes.  There are 10 reviews  that increase in difficulty as the child progresses.  One review includes matching the word with the correct meaning and creating words by combining the correct prefix and root word. Another review involves circling the correctly spelled word, for example:  fertile, fertill and furtile. By the last review, the child is asked to write a complete sentence using a word from the choice box.  I expect Lionheart to be pretty challenged by this exercise, especially given the choice of words, which includes "revivify."  I had to look that one up myself!

By the end of the book, with a little hard work, Lionheart should have expanded his vocabulary and  be able to use his knowledge of prefixes and suffixes to decode new words like vivacious, when broken down means viv (live, live) and acious (having the quality of).

Word Roots is a part of the Timberdoodle 4th-6th grade homeschool curriculum package.

Curriculum Plans for 2012-2013

My Man-child, usually very serious, letting loose.

2012-2013 Curriculum Choices for KingMan

Okay, I'll admit it.  This is one of my favorite aspects of homeschooling -- getting ready for the new year.  It's almost like the nesting phase right before you give birth.  I love all of the back to school sales, the used curriculum e-mails flying all over listservs, and especially the homeschool conferences.  Now that all of that has settled down a bit, I was able to meditate on our plans.  Here are our curriculum choices  for the 2012-2013 year.

Time4Learning

LionHeart loves to be like his big brother King Man and that includes computer time.  So I went searching for an online curriculum that would make the most of his time on the computer.  An e-mail question to my local homeschool group resulted in several recommendations for Time4Learning.  I wanted something that would engage him and teach at the same time.  It's a comprehensive online program covering all subjects.  Now when I'm busy working with my older son, I won't feel guilty about LionHeart being on the computer. He's a pretty computer savvy little guy so boring games won't hold his attention. 

As a member of Time4Learning, I have been given the opportunity to review their program and share my experiences. While I was compensated, this review was not written or edited by Time4Learning and my opinion is entirely my own. For more information, check out their standards-based curriculum or learn how to write your own curriculum review.