HeWillSoar Posted August 25, 2014 Share Posted August 25, 2014 Hi everyone! We are having a great first day of homeschooling! Yay!!! My son is so happy to not be going back to public school that he was very cooperative--even wanted to start early! He's loving taking breaks and getting to go spend time with the dog. One thing I'm not liking is the 180 Days Easy Grammar. It seems to jump around too much to really learn any one thing. What attracted me is that is it short and I thought that would be great for my son to just practice a little each day. What else would you recommend for a 13 year old for grammar? We did Khan today to brush up on his math skills and that is going very well. We both feel good about the progress there and I was confident in helping him with the instruction provided. We did the first WWS and it went pretty well. It's hard to tell with that if it's going to be a good program and where it's really heading. For Notgrass Civics, I just read it out loud today but I think I'm going to start having him use the outlining from WWS with that. Thanks everyone for all of your help thus far! How are things going for everyone else? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom22ns Posted August 25, 2014 Share Posted August 25, 2014 Did you mean to post that on the Learning Challenges board? If so, what is his learning challenge? It might help determine what people recommend. If he doesn't have one, you might want to re-post on the middle school board. As far as Grammar, both my kids liked Easy Grammar, although I've never seen the 180 days thing. I followed EG with Analytical Grammar for dd. I think the diagramming helped it stick a bit better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HeWillSoar Posted August 25, 2014 Author Share Posted August 25, 2014 Yes, he has an IEP for working memory delay and processing speed delay, and he has Aspergers. He is capable of learning the material. I just need to sit with him and guide him because he gets off track easily. This is our first year homeschooling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1shortmomto4 Posted August 25, 2014 Share Posted August 25, 2014 Does he have a pretty good grasp of grammar at this point? If the answer is yes that I'd change the focus of practicing grammar that is out of context and put it back into actual writing. Last year I had an EPS workbook that had the child edit 5 sentences per day and it practiced all kinds of skills - grammar, punctuation, etc. I was shocked that it worked so well when the year end testing came and he scored a perfect score (never happened before). This year I'm going to use IEW's Fix It and that might be a great option. Now, I will say that I spent two years doing the FLL early levels (yes, he was 12 when we started) but it cemented into his brain and he still remembers the rules but if I had spent one second more diagramming anything we would have had a serious breakdown. I think I'm going to try Junior Analytical Grammar with my youngest because it also has a DVD (the AG has one, too) to get the basics covered and then just work on reviewing the grammar/punctuation, etc. over the years versus heavy duty grammar lessons year after year after year. My dd took her college placement tests (she's dyslexic) and she scored a perfect score on her English tests and the work required for the placement tests was editing sentences. I had her use a Prufrock press book her senior year which had her editing a sentence each day. I just can't see going back to the drill of a program like R&S or even EG (I've used this for my oldest and he never retained other than blocking out prep. phrases. You might just try things from a different angle - those kids with short working memory do so much better with quick lessons each day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HeWillSoar Posted August 26, 2014 Author Share Posted August 26, 2014 Thank you Heidi, This is great information. He does not have a good grasp on grammar at all but I think I have decided to just forgo it right now and concentrate on other things. Our first day was very full and I think I need to scale back some. I did pick up the older version of Fix-It Grammar so maybe we can try that out soon. Right now we are also doing WWS and a unit on The Giver, and Vocabulary from Classical Roots as well. So perhaps grammar can wait a little bit but I will definitely revisit this and check out your suggestions. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1shortmomto4 Posted August 26, 2014 Share Posted August 26, 2014 I'm not sure that I'd be adding in the Vocab from Classical Roots - I've used this with my older two and it was a bomb! What I did see where these visual cards (500 in a set) that helped with vocab by creating a visual connection to the words but for the life of me I can't remember the author. I'm going to pick up for my Freshman who has severe dyslexia/low memory. Short lessons are so key in helping these kids gain success. I know they have to be able to do more as they approach the college scene but slow and steady.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HeWillSoar Posted August 26, 2014 Author Share Posted August 26, 2014 He seems to be doing ok with Vocab from Classical Roots so far, but we are only two days in. I'm not sure that I am teaching it well, but I am working it with him, and vocabulary is one of his strengths. It's weird because he struggles to spell and write but the words that comes out of this child's mouth and the ideas he come up with are amazing. He is also coming from public school where you are basically just thrown in so I think he's seeing this as a picnic so far. But he is actually learning! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom22ns Posted August 30, 2014 Share Posted August 30, 2014 One thing I'm not liking is the 180 Days Easy Grammar. It seems to jump around too much to really learn any one thing. What attracted me is that is it short and I thought that would be great for my son to just practice a little each day. What else would you recommend for a 13 year old for grammar? So now I feel like I totally lied to you. I went in my dd's room, and there was 180 Days Easy Grammar! :lol: She is doing it as part of an online class. She hates it too! I would suggest you switch to Easy Grammar Plus. The 180 lessons seems like a review with the assumption you can already do it. There is little instruction and dd who is now pretty good at grammar is finding it confusing. Easy Grammar Plus was a good catch all level. The lessons are not as short, but they are still short and he can actually understand it. Far less frustrating. I don't have any problem with skipping grammar for the moment either. I just thought I'd give you a suggestion for when you are ready to restart. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaybee Posted August 31, 2014 Share Posted August 31, 2014 I'm not sure that I'd be adding in the Vocab from Classical Roots - I've used this with my older two and it was a bomb! What I did see where these visual cards (500 in a set) that helped with vocab by creating a visual connection to the words but for the life of me I can't remember the author. I'm going to pick up for my Freshman who has severe dyslexia/low memory. Short lessons are so key in helping these kids gain success. I know they have to be able to do more as they approach the college scene but slow and steady.... These are called Marie's Words. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=marie%27s%20words I use these with my boys (13 and 11) together every morning. We just do it verbally, adding 5/week, and reviewing often. It is a rather painless way to help grow vocabulary. Because we aren't using the words in other activities, we continue that review. Sometimes I give examples of when we might use the word, and occasionally we will hear one of the words out somewhere, and my boys will perk up and grin at me. My younger has dyslexia/language issues, and having him do a vocab workbook of some kind would be pretty painful, and possibly not worth the time for what he would get from it. At least for now, I am concentrating on other issues with language while still trying to help him grow in this area. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1shortmomto4 Posted August 31, 2014 Share Posted August 31, 2014 Those were the cards that I had seen Jaybee - thank you for posting the link!!! Awesome. My youngest, 11, is a visual spatial learner and he'll have those cards memorized the first time he sees them but I thought it might help my dyslexic older kiddo, too, without all the drudgery of writing; I'll save that skill for another subject! :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HeWillSoar Posted August 31, 2014 Author Share Posted August 31, 2014 So now I feel like I totally lied to you. I went in my dd's room, and there was 180 Days Easy Grammar! :lol: She is doing it as part of an online class. She hates it too! I would suggest you switch to Easy Grammar Plus. The 180 lessons seems like a review with the assumption you can already do it. There is little instruction and dd who is now pretty good at grammar is finding it confusing. Easy Grammar Plus was a good catch all level. The lessons are not as short, but they are still short and he can actually understand it. Far less frustrating. I don't have any problem with skipping grammar for the moment either. I just thought I'd give you a suggestion for when you are ready to restart. Ok yeah, that is what I found with 180 days. It seems like it is more of a review. I bought it at a fair because a mom was raving about it but my son (and me) needs more instruction than what is offered and it does just jump from one thing to the next. I was considering the Rod and Staff English that seems to be recommended here a lot but I will go to the homeschool store we have in town and look at it, and also the one you suggested. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HeWillSoar Posted August 31, 2014 Author Share Posted August 31, 2014 I think what I'll do is when we are in between reading books, we can do a week or grammar here and there. Oh, and I also have that Fix-It grammar so we can try that too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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