ThelmaLou Posted June 16, 2009 Share Posted June 16, 2009 After about 2 months of no grammar (due to getting our house ready to sell), we picked up yesterday with Rod and Staff English 4 again. We started with Lesson 77 yesterday, then moved ahead with Lesson 78 and 79 today. We're doing everything orally right now. I quit just a few problems shy of completion when my son started crying and I was ready to pull his and my hair out. I know it's confusing. He's not getting it at *all*!!!!! He was struggling with the whole singular, singular possessive, plural, and plural possessive thing. Then we introduced Lesson 79 with possessive pronouns, which never use apostrophes, and it all fell apart. On numbers 1-8, he missed every. single. one. I'm forgetting that talking loudly and slowly still doesn't do the trick. Repeating the same thing over and over again doesn't work either. I told him we're putting it away for the day. I really don't want to do this again tomorrow, either. Aaargh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yslek Posted June 16, 2009 Share Posted June 16, 2009 :grouphug: I was in the same spot with B and long division a few months back. He pulled it out again a few days ago, and it seems to be going a lot better. Sometimes I think their brains just need to mature a bit. :tongue_smilie: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gingersmom Posted June 16, 2009 Share Posted June 16, 2009 How old is your son? I skipped a section of Easy Grammar because I knew my son was totally not ready for it. And most likely he would forget it by September. When stuff like that has happened to us I close up the book for a week to several weeks. Then I seek out other sources to teach the same thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThelmaLou Posted June 16, 2009 Author Share Posted June 16, 2009 He's 10 in 4th grade. I really need to try to ease back into this, even if it's slowly. He still has a ways to go to be ready to start English 5. I'd love to blow off the whole book, but I didn't ever do English 3 with him. This is his first year of Grammar, and I think we need to really finish strong, even if it's slow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Donna T. Posted June 16, 2009 Share Posted June 16, 2009 We only made it half way through R&S 3 when I decided my son had had one too many melt-downs. I switched him to FLL 3 (4th grade) and grammar became his favorite subject. He loved FLL 3 and will probably have a heart attack when I pull R&S back out for next year. I am going to try it again though. If it doesn't go well, I'll put him back in FLL 4. Hoping that doesn't happen as I have no idea what I'd do for writing! I really like the writing in R&S. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Donna T. Posted June 16, 2009 Share Posted June 16, 2009 He's 10 in 4th grade. I really need to try to ease back into this, even if it's slowly. He still has a ways to go to be ready to start English 5. I'd love to blow off the whole book, but I didn't ever do English 3 with him. This is his first year of Grammar, and I think we need to really finish strong, even if it's slow. Well, this is only my opinion, but I think R&S 4 is a tough beginning for grammar! I'd suggest possibly going back and doing 3 or planning to take two years on 4. You have plenty of time! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Suzannah Posted June 16, 2009 Share Posted June 16, 2009 Have you heard of Grammarland? Someone posted about it here a couple of months ago. At the time it was a free download. I downloaded it just 'cause I could. After looking it over I thought maybe dd would enjoy it, so we read it one day when she was looking for something to do. It's really cute. I have no idea how much she'll remember after summer break, but it certainly helps with visualization about what the parts of speech do. DS heard us reading it one day while he was playing a game. The next day he asked if we could read it. That TOTALLY surprised me. You might give it a try. http://books.google.com/books?id=iXgSAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA43&lpg=PA43&dq=free+grammarland&source=bl&ots=tyDJE1lizq&sig=uGevZvxGvrfg5Bs4Rs3d_RQayfA&hl=en&ei=YC44Sq3yA9PSlAftvKnwDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8#PPP10,M1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlockOfSillies Posted June 16, 2009 Share Posted June 16, 2009 I switched to FLL. I like the scope and sequence much better. Try going at a quick pace through FLL3 and FLL4. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Suzannah Posted June 17, 2009 Share Posted June 17, 2009 I switched to FLL. I like the scope and sequence much better. Try going at a quick pace through FLL3 and FLL4. Oh yes, FLL is great. I was thinking more alomg the lines of a supplement or a summer replacement before picking up again in the fall. Grammarland does have activities at the end of each chapter, but it's a story so the work just seems like a neat idea instead of work. At least, that's how my kids took it. I wasn't going to make them do any of the exercises but they wanted to. Good luck! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willow Posted June 17, 2009 Share Posted June 17, 2009 When this happens (and i have graduated 2 and it happened a lot over the years) we concentrated on one thing only. So for long division we practiced saying 4 hundred and twenty seven divided by 3 will be written out like this. and we would write out the sum correctly (yes one of mine needed to go this slowly sometimes:glare:) That is all we would do. We would write out sums! When we could do this cold we would then say "what do we do first?". We need to know how many times 3 goes into the first number. And we would practice writing out the sum AND then doing the first step. And so on. By the end of a month she could do them cold and never ever forgot how to do them, in fact she enjoyed long division because it was so easy! ;) We never had the same problems with grammar, but i would break it down just the same. Is this singular? is this plural? When that is perfect, move on ('perfect' is being able to do it cold, 3 days in a row) One small step at a time. I find so much curriculum introduces too much too fast....and then does it again next year and the next and the next..... We prefer to do it once and learn to do it properly, of course they need revision and reminders sometimes, but it is quicker this way in the long run I find, for my lot at any rate :001_smile:. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
katilac Posted June 17, 2009 Share Posted June 17, 2009 We only made it half way through R&S 3 when I decided my son had had one too many melt-downs. I switched him to FLL 3 (4th grade) and grammar became his favorite subject. He loved FLL 3 and will probably have a heart attack when I pull R&S back out for next year. I am going to try it again though. If it doesn't go well, I'll put him back in FLL 4. Hoping that doesn't happen as I have no idea what I'd do for writing! I really like the writing in R&S. Can I ask why you are planning to go back to R&S if FLL is going so well? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Testimony Posted June 17, 2009 Share Posted June 17, 2009 I cried just reading your post. Get Grammar-land! I did it with my son back in September '08. He loved grammar because of this program. It is a cute story. He was parsing by the end of the book. He actually understands the grammar in Prima Latina because of this book. I would highly suggest dropping Rod and Staff for awhile, do Grammar-land, and watch your child want to do grammar again. I love this book. I cannot stop telling people about it because my younger son who struggles grasped grammar. It is a great tool. Blessings in your homeschooling journey! Sincerely, Karen http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/testimony Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeterPan Posted June 18, 2009 Share Posted June 18, 2009 Burning the book can be very cathartic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThelmaLou Posted June 19, 2009 Author Share Posted June 19, 2009 I cried just reading your post. Get Grammar-land! I did it with my son back in September '08. He loved grammar because of this program. It is a cute story. He was parsing by the end of the book. He actually understands the grammar in Prima Latina because of this book. I would highly suggest dropping Rod and Staff for awhile, do Grammar-land, and watch your child want to do grammar again. I love this book. I cannot stop telling people about it because my younger son who struggles grasped grammar. It is a great tool. Blessings in your homeschooling journey! Sincerely, Karen www.homeschoolblogger.com/testimony I've never heard of it. Definitely going to check it out. We've put grammar away for several days. Thinking about getting it back out again today and just setting a timer to see how far we get. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnandtinagilbert Posted June 19, 2009 Share Posted June 19, 2009 We needed a bit of a break for dd this year from RS3 to RS4. I dropped it and went to Grammarland. We picked it back up and although she's doing ok, I never felt like she was really strong from RS. The older 3 are super strong and used RS -- go figure. So, I am actually totally switching gears for her next year to THe Phonics Road. That may not interest you, so I'm really here to give a "here, here" for Grammarland. LOVE IT! Printed it out and bound it so we can treasure it for a long time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jen+4dc Posted June 19, 2009 Share Posted June 19, 2009 Burning the book can be very cathartic. I love this!!!:rofl::smilielol5::rofl::smilielol5: My son is going to have a "Smash and Burn" party with his orthodontic headgear in 12 days!!! We've been planning it for 15 months. He's soooooooooooo excited!! He's got permission to use his Dad's hammer and chosen his desserts for the party already. Seriously.:D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Testimony Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 I've never heard of it. Definitely going to check it out. We've put grammar away for several days. Thinking about getting it back out again today and just setting a timer to see how far we get. Click here That will take you to the book. You can check it out! Blessings in you homeschooling journey! Sincerely, Karen http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/testimony Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jill- OK Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 I've pretty much done R&S a year "behind" grade level and, in the early years, more on whiteboard than on paper. With my oldest two (about a year apart in age), I combined, and did Rod and Staff at the approximate level of the youngest (who was "advanced"). Ditto about the whiteboard. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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