What Language/Grammar Program have you Loved/Hated

[Denise Allen]

Share what you loved or hated that you have tried...

[Whereneverever]

I feel guilty for saying this here, but both WWE and FLL were flops here. I was so prepared to love them that we kept pushing onward and through, and it never got better. We stuck with them a whole year.

 

It was too easy and redundant for my little girl, and we were already a grade level over her age.

 

Sorry, SWB!

[Kuovonne]

I think that there have already been lots of posts about people loving MCT.

[Wee Pip]

I loved BJU English, up until this year when I bumped dd up 1 grade level (she was excelling and the work was too easy). Now we're sort of struggling a bit. I've noticed that BJU 5 combines topics all on one page, and that's partly what's causing the problem (not sure what gr 4 is like, since we skipped it). Otherwise, I do enjoy BJU English. It's short and easy, and most of it is explained on the workbook page. I like the pictures, bright colors, and themes. I like simple and colorful. I just wonder if we missed something in BJU 4, having skipped it:confused:.

Every time I look at Rod & Staff, I start to hyperventilate. I just know I could never use it. So that would be on my "hate" list. However, the kids have had such terrible attitudes lately, I've been tempted to lock them in a room with Rod & Staff for 2 weeks as punishment. Just as long as *I* don't have to look at it, we should be OK:lol:

[robsiew]

This has been one area I've floundered in a bit... here's what we've used and my appraisal of it... remember this is just our experience...

 

Easy Grammar (too easy and boring... same thing page after page)

 

Growing With Grammar (Liked this, but don't put kids on it independently and never check for comprehension. My kids were able to fill in the blanks all correctly without knowing a single thing about what they were supposed to have learned! The upper levels are too redundant for my taste.)

 

Analytical Grammar Jr. (I liked this, but it's very intensive. I dropped it because it was a bit too detailed for my non-detailed son... lots of parsing. Also, it's a short course. It wasn't going to last long enough for how long I'd like to do grammar. It also moved very fast. I think it would be great for an older student who hasn't had much grammar and you're trying to catch up)

 

Rod and Staff English (This is what I can say I love! We are going to stick with this for the long haul. A lot is review for my older ds who got all the previous grammars you've seen listed, but in the long run, I think it's going to be the winner. It is rigorous, yet not so rigorous that it leaves you in the dust. Good explanations of everything. It's also a reusable text so I don't need to buy it again! It's easy for us to do it orally or written.)

 

First Language Lessons (I do like 1 and 2 which I'm using with my 1st grader... we started it the second 1/2 of K, he's learning a lot and I know it will provide a great base for him. I'm not so sure of the 3rd and 4th level though. I think it may be too repetitive for this ds. I'm thinking I may put him in R&S for 2nd grade.

[Denise Allen]

I think that there have already been lots of posts about people loving MCT.

 

I have only recently heard of this. I have searched on here and have not found a whole lot about it. Maybe some of the posts were not tagged?

[Crimson Wife]

FLL 1/2 condensed to a single year, and started whenever the child is a fluent reader. Then alternating Michael Clay Thompson's LA program with the Don Killgallon books.

[Poke Salad Annie]

We use and have always adored Sheldon's Primary Language Lessons. I downloaded this from googlebooks.com, then printed it at home and had it wire bound at Office Depot. I love it. It includes grammar and introduces writing skills in a gentle way. We do some of it orally, and some on a dry-erase board. The writing exercises are very good, and I've yet to hear a complaint about grammar study.

 

We are also adding in Maxwell's Introductory Lessons in Grammar, also free at googlebooks.com.

[5LittleMonkeys]

Liked Easy Grammar while in use...hated it once I realized that dds forgot more than they learned.

 

Switched to Rod and Staff...we all love, love, love it! It is thorough in what it teaches and how it teaches.

[Kuovonne]

I think that there have already been lots of posts about people loving MCT.

I have only recently heard of this. I have searched on here and have not found a whole lot about it. Maybe some of the posts were not tagged?

 

There have been numerous threads about MCT. Many of the might not be tagged. Try doing a search for MCT only in post titles. Some of the most informative posts are probably a year old or older. Here is one to get you started.

[krisperry]

Flops:

Easy Grammar

FLL

Sonlight LA 4

 

Ok:

WWE

Meaningful Composition

Sonlight LA K

HWOT

 

Good:

Rod & Staff (prefer CLE)

CLE (will use this again, full grammar every other year)

Wordsmith Apprentice (will likely use again)

Igniting Your Writing (will use again)

Caesar's English (will use again)

 

Hits:

Sonlight Readers - all levels

MCT Town Series

Grammar with a Giggle

 

Over the Moon -

Sonlight Readers - 6

MCT Poetry

One Year Adventure Novel

[Denise Allen]

There have been numerous threads about MCT. Many of the might not be tagged. Try doing a search for MCT only in post titles. Some of the most informative posts are probably a year old or older. Here is one to get you started.

 

Thank you very much! I would like to check this program out. I did just find some other mentions of it on here (they were using the names of the levels/books so I didn't know what they were till I read).

 

Thanks again :)

[EKS]

Love MCT. Hated K12.

[Homeschooling6]

Didn't like:

Rod and Staff English (wanted to love it)

FLL 3 & 4 (was hoping this would be the one)

 

Not sure:

Analytical Grammar (I'm keeping it and may use it as a one year High School Course)

 

Bob Jones Grammar and Writing (I think it wast the TM that I didn't like)

 

Meaningful Composition

 

Liked:

 

CLE (used it last year but decided to go with Saxon Grammar this year)

 

Character Quality Language Arts (This was good but there was too much on a page for my ds)

 

Primary Language Lessons (I think I would have used this if it was in a workbook format)

 

 

I liked these, but at the time I was a curriculum hopper :tongue_smilie:

Queen's Homeschool.

Climbing to Good English

Growing with Grammar

Writing Tales

 

Igniting Your Writing

 

This year we are using:

 

Going on our second year using Phonics Road with my two middle ds :thumbup:

 

I have always liked ILL (Intermediate Language Lessons) but didn't use it because we like workbooks. Now that my sis reformatted into a workbook we are using it.

 

This year we are using:

Learning Language Arts Through Literature (Really liking what I see. We just started this)

 

Saxon Grammar (this is our main grammar program)

Edited September 15, 2010 by Homeschooling6

[Denise Allen]

I love reading what you all are trying and using. Nothing is "clicking" with me for sure (I am leaning toward something), but your experiences are helping out. :)

[mjpeter]

This is my first year homeschooling, but so far my older sons are doing well with Rod & Staff (they actually don't hate it :001_smile:).

 

My younger son is willingly working through FLL 1&2. I do mix it up a bit when I know he's mastered a concept, or when he needs to work on one.

[apCrazy4Jesus]

I did not like BJU(used English 2 & 3). Ds was able to perfectly fill in the blanks, score A's on the tests and easily forget EVERYTHING.

 

CLE was ok (used LA 3), but the truth is something that spirals yearly doesn't need to spiral daily. This approach made it hard for things to stick.

 

We love FLL 1/2! It is short & sweet, and ds2 was always excited to do it. I am happy to say that Ds3 is responding in the same manner. It truly has created some sweet homeschool bonding time.

 

We LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Rod & Staff(doing 3 & 5). I Just can't say enough about it. It is so easy to adjust depending on how much practice your child needs on a specific topic. I also love that it is mastery, perfect for grammar. Also, things are really sticking for my dss.

[lauracolumbus]

My kids beg for R&S b/c we do it on the white board and they take turns diagramming. They also like MCT, but I'm going to finish out R&S before returning to MCT.

 

FLL 1/2 was good. Not so sure yet about 3. Might start her w/R&S 3 if it doesn't pick up.

[Denise Allen]

I did not like BJU(used English 2 & 3). Ds was able to perfectly fill in the blanks, score A's on the tests and easily forget EVERYTHING.

 

CLE was ok (used LA 3), but the truth is something that spirals yearly doesn't need to spiral daily. This approach made it hard for things to stick.

 

We love FLL 1/2! It is short & sweet, and ds2 was always excited to do it. I am happy to say that Ds3 is responding in the same manner. It truly has created some sweet homeschool bonding time.

 

We LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Rod & Staff(doing 3 & 5). I Just can't say enough about it. It is so easy to adjust depending on how much practice your child needs on a specific topic. I also love that it is mastery, perfect for grammar. Also, things are really sticking for my dss.

 

Thanks for your post. Rod & Staff is one thing I am looking to switch to after using Abeka from the beginning (for language). I ordered the samples from R & S- I am excited to take a look at them.

[Guest texasswans]

Oh! Thank you for the Sheldon's Language Lessons heads up! I have downloaded it and love it.

[Ellie]

Hated Winston Grammar.:glare:

[angela&4boys]

We love Rod and Staff, but use it mostly orally! :thumbup:

 

I also really liked FLL 1/2.

 

We've had great success over several years with the CM Method of narration as well as copy work. Susan Wise Bauer's A Plan for Writing lectures have also been very helpful with the skills of outlining and summarizing.

 

We've also used some dictation over the years. One ds is using HOD's dictation in his studies, and I see the fruits.

 

Two ds's used Winston Grammar with great success.

 

Love/hate...

 

Easy Grammar, IEW, and FLL 3 and 4.

Edited November 1, 2010 by angela&4boys

[74Heaven]

Love, love, love Shurley English!

Despise, despise, despise Easy Grammar!

 

Lisaj, mom to 5

[mom31257]

:lurk5:

[MtnTeaching]

- I thought I liked "Exercises in Grammar" which was what K12 used at one point (don't know if they still do). That was until Standardized test time came around and both kids bombed. It was disjointed and the kids didn't retain a thing.

 

- Then we tried Easy Grammar. I'm not sure what the kids learned because I was in a coma from boredom every time it was pulled off the shelf. (Having said that - the whole "learn the prepositions first" has actually been very helpful.

 

- Finally, we've been doing Analytical Grammar - both Jr. and regular. The kids seem to like it and I love it because I'm nerdy enough to really like the diagramming.

 

The best thing, though, has been my constant chatting about grammar as they actually do their writing or read an interesting piece of literature. It really helps the connection, rather than the random "find the adjectives in the sentence" assignments.

[Mom0012]

I've tried Shurley, Easy Grammar, Evan Moore's Paragraph Editing, CLE and Saxon and I will say that I absolutely love Saxon because my son is doing so well with it, it covers a ton of material with lots of repetition and it is fairly painless since I have him write in the book. I also love that every problem has the lesson number written next to it, so instead of just guessing or writing the wrong answer, my son can go back and look at the lesson for that problem if he needs help which further reinforces his learning. He pointed out the past participle in on of his sentences in his IEW writing yesterday just out of the blue. It has been a huge boost to his self esteem.

 

I also love the copywork/dictation portion. It happens to dovetail with what we are learning this year -- American History. I use it very differently than how I use WWE with my daughter. My son copies the passage on Monday and then we study the punctuation together and he finds any words he doesn't know how to spell. Each day, he quickly studies the passage, sometimes pointing out the punctuation and spelling to me. Then, on Friday, I dictate it a part at a time and he is so proud because he can do it after years of struggling with dictation.

 

Lastly, I like that the vocabulary so far has been geographical terms. He hasn't had a ton of formal geography and finds the terms interesting. He was really excited when he found a picture of an atoll in the children's encyclopedia the other day while he was looking up something else.

 

Can you tell I am very happy with this progam? We don't use the journal writing or the main writing portion of the program because he takes an IEW class and I figure between that and the dictation and copywork, we are doing enough.

 

For my daughter, I am using CLE, which is okay. I do really like the sweet feel of it and she picks up and applies what she learns from it, so we will continue with that for her.

 

 

Lisa

Edited October 30, 2010 by LisaTheresa

[boscopup]

I have only recently heard of this. I have searched on here and have not found a whole lot about it. Maybe some of the posts were not tagged?

 

Use Google to search the forums. You'll get better results for the 3-letter abbreviations. Type the following in the google search box:

 

mct site:welltrainedmind.com

 

The above will get you a lot of good results (note that it will also get MCT in the signatures, but usually it gets the subject lines first).

[Testimony]

I am loving right now Rod and Staff 6. Love the writing explanations. I like Rod and Staff. I want more.

 

We love Growing with Grammar 5. We had no problems with this one.

We loved First Language Lessons 3 for my younger son only. Never did it with my older son.

 

We liked KISS grammar, but the lay out was confusing. I had to use it with Kellog and Reid's grammar to help me. It is a good grammar program just hard to figure out how to teach.

 

Our all time favorite grammar program that we would use over and over again if you let us: Grammar Land!!!:thumbup:

 

We love Writing Tales for teaching writing for grades 3-5. Both of my boys enjoyed writing because of this program. Both of them benefitted from its simple format.

 

We hated Classical Writing. We did Homer A and B and quit. This curriculum is :eek: The format is very confusing. It is not user friendly. You have to go to this level then go to that level and then back to another level. I stopped after Homer B lesson 13. My older son despised writing. I was so upset about this. He use to write little stories when he was 5 years old. Now, I couldn't even get him to lift a pencil after this curriculum. A nuclear physicist teaching writing is that a kicker. I go to an amateur writers' group. The leader has three books published. I learned more about writing from her than anyone. I use her teaching for my older son, but Rod and Staff is doing a great job of teaching him how to write a paragraph much better than Classical Writing.:thumbdown:

 

Blessings,

Karen

http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/testimony

[Guest Cheryl in SoCal]

Grammar is one subject that I've found what I liked without having to try too much.

 

Didn't like:

Alpha Omega LIFEPAC's Grades 1-2 (booooooring!!!)

 

Love:

Shurley English Levels 3-7 (JUST the grammar portions)

Analytical Grammar (started this year for review and to learn diagramming)

 

I plan on using the same Shurley English to Analytical Grammer sequence with my younger crew as well. Shurley will be done through out Elementary and Jr High years and Analytical Grammer in High School.

[Matryoshka]

Wanted to like but sat unused:

English for the Thoughtful Child

PLL/ILL

 

Used for years but with very low retention:

Word Roots

 

Like:

Editor in Chief

Punctuation Puzzlers

WWE

Killgallon Sentence Composing

Easy Grammar (only for one year - I couldn't imagine doing it more than once, as it pretty much repeats the same stuff year after year)

 

Love:

MCT (whole shebang - writing/grammar/vocab/poetry)

Deconstructing Penguins (for lit analysis)

 

We're using LLit 8 this year, which I think is going to be a hit, but we're still just starting the second unit, so I'll reserve judgement. ;)

[Catherine]

My son even took an online class for awhile. Though he liked the teacher, the program itself just didn't work for us.

 

I agree with the PP who pointed out that it's not user friendly. When we tried CW ourselves, I just could not figure out all the component parts and how to make them work together.

[Mama2Many4]

Didn't like Seton English, With all the Saints and Cathedrals talk for Nouns, Common Nouns, Proper Nouns, he just wasn't getting it. We dropped that and went to the revised new version of Voyages in English, which was okay but not the type of English we were looking for. We started FLL and WWE last week and LOVE it so far!

[lionfamily1999]

Both of my older dc were removed from ps (at different times). Older ds started hsing halfway through 2nd grade, Dd started a few weeks ago.

 

Neither had the faintest clue about parts of speech. Their speaking grammar is fine, but writing...... it was terrible. And the best part is, I HAD NO IDEA, their grades were excellent. Both had teachers that were overjoyed with their writing/grammar skills :glare:

 

First Language Lessons has been a God send. Poor Dd is stuck doing fourth grade grammar with ds, thankfully she enjoys FLL (I need to change my sig), but (like ds) she is irritated to find that she knows next to nothing about the mechanics of our language.

 

So, First Language Lessons :hurray:

[siloam]

 

We hated Classical Writing. We did Homer A and B and quit. This curriculum is :eek: The format is very confusing. It is not user friendly. You have to go to this level then go to that level and then back to another level. I stopped after Homer B lesson 13. My older son despised writing. I was so upset about this. He use to write little stories when he was 5 years old. Now, I couldn't even get him to lift a pencil after this curriculum. A nuclear physicist teaching writing is that a kicker. I go to an amateur writers' group. The leader has three books published. I learned more about writing from her than anyone. I use her teaching for my older son, but Rod and Staff is doing a great job of teaching him how to write a paragraph much better than Classical Writing.:thumbdown:

 

Though to be fair Homer isn't trying to teach paragraphs, it is teaching outlining and summarizing as well as grammar fluency. Diogenes teaches paragraphs and essays.

 

It is probably obvious that I love Classical Writing (CW). I do so because it is so concrete and because it delays original writing till it has built up a fluency with writing skills. These are skills I never learned, that natural writers just seemed to magically have and I love seeing my kids master. Yes it could be more user friendly.

 

FLL 1/2 worked well, but I rarely followed the script. Nice it is there for those who need it but I just looked at the goal for the day and met it in my own way.

 

WWE this was magic for my dd who couldn't summarize. Now I continue to use it because it is easy and gets the job done.

 

Sonlight LA- I don't like the new version because they halved the dictation, which is what made the old version wonderful. Never liked the creative writing, it is developmentally inappropriate, unless you have a gifted child or the time to pull the answers out of your child. I have neither of the latter two so it didn't work here. The spiral grammar also doesn't work well here, but it isn't horrendous at the K-2 levels I used it. My kids all knew how to spot synonyms, but between covering the terms they would forget what synonym means. They mastered the concepts, but not the terms. They all do much better with mastery based systems, but my kids are very concrete, logical, sequential learners.

 

Junior Analytical Grammar/Analytical Grammar-LOVE it! First time I ever got grammar in my life. I always got stuck on finding the subject and predicate. I am so concrete and sequential that I would never consider eliminating articles, adjectives, prepositional phrases, ect... first then finding those parts. There were just too many nouns to choose from, till I did JAG, which first eliminates much of the sentence before requiring you to find the subject and predicate. That said it does move a little quickly and my kids do half of an assignment a day.

 

Bravewriter/Writer's Jungle-love it for shifting how I thought of writing, but as a program it didn't fit. Would buy and read it again.

 

The Arrow-Not bad but a bit light, and again is more spiral than mastery based.

 

That is all I can remember right not, but I am sure I have forgotten something. :D

 

Heather

[kristavws]

Every time I look at Rod & Staff, I start to hyperventilate. I just know I could never use it. So that would be on my "hate" list. However, the kids have had such terrible attitudes lately, I've been tempted to lock them in a room with Rod & Staff for 2 weeks as punishment. Just as long as *I* don't have to look at it, we should be OK:lol:

 

My oldest WOULD view having to use Rod and Staff as a punishment. I tried it with him in the second grade. I think it is a really solid program, but he HATED (yes in all caps) it. This is the child that never complains about anything school related. He developed an extreme dislike of grammar as a result of using this program. We dropped it, and started using MCT. I can not say enough good things about this program, and my son really enjoys using it. I have seen wonderful progress. For fun, my son also uses Editor in Chief.

 

For grades 1 and 2, I really think FLL 1/2 is a nice, gentle introduction to grammar.

 

For writing, we are using WWE.

 

Krista

[txhomemom]

FLL: Did not care for the scripted nature of it.

 

Sequential Spelling: The word lists were too long and the way it taught seemed weird (I probably just did not give it enough of a chance)

 

K12 Language Arts: Did not like this as well because of the overly scripted nature and it being too teacher intensive. I also did not like the way they taught phonics and did not care for their use of workbooks for LA in the younger years. I would have liked it more if there had been more of an interactive component online geared towards the child.

[HollyDay]

Did not like:

AOP Lifepacs English/Grammar

Easy Grammar

Rod and Staff

Write Shop

Meaningful Comp

LLATL elementary

 

Really liked:

Winston (as far as it goes)

Analytical Grammar

Highway to English Grammar

Editor in Chief

Word Roots

Jump In

Analytical Grammar's The Essay

Figuratively Speaking

Walch Toolbox: Prose and Poetry

LLATL High School

 

Sort of liked - or liked for a time but not enough to do it year after year:

Growing with Grammar - loved it 1 year, found it too repetitive the next year

Abeka - loved it 1 year - found it too repetitive the next year

BJU - loved it for 3 years, but just got tired of it.

CW - liked it but was too teacher intensive, too time consuming

Ignite Your Writing - good program as far as it goes

Jensen's Format Writing - boring but good material

Lightening Lit 7 - okay program, did not ignite a passion for literature

Queen's Language Lessons - liked their elementary and secondary material - not liking their high school as much.

[crazymom4]

My girls planned a "Burn the Rod and Staff Books Party" and I'm not kidding :lol:...it was a well laid plan....needless to say we stopped using that last year....I like the idea...my girls DETESTED it!

[CarrieF]

We just recently started MCT LA and absolutely LOVE it. It is very creatively done and holds the interest of both my cerebral academic AND my totally kinesthetic sons. Can't say enough good about it. : )

[Mommy22alyns]

I really, really liked FLL 1/2. We did have to condense a lot and we made it through both in one year. But I liked them.

 

However... I hated FLL 3. It was just flat, dry, boring.

 

Sorry!

[Jamee]

Junior Analytical Grammar/Analytical Grammar-LOVE it! First time I ever got grammar in my life. I always got stuck on finding the subject and predicate. I am so concrete and sequential that I would never consider eliminating articles, adjectives, prepositional phrases, ect... first then finding those parts. There were just too many nouns to choose from, till I did JAG, which first eliminates much of the sentence before requiring you to find the subject and predicate. That said it does move a little quickly and my kids do half of an assignment a day.

 

Heather

 

So glad to hear this, I've been anxiously awaiting the arrival of JAG for DS. I'm hoping it will help him to finally "get it."

[plimsoll]

We have used a number of grammar and writing programs, and we gained something from each of them.

 

Grammar

=======

Easy Grammar: We used one book (4th or 5th grade, I forget which). The main thing gained was learning to identify and ignore prepositional phrases when searching for the rest of the parts of speech and when identifying the subject and the predicate.

 

Junior Analytical Grammar (JAG): This worked very well after Easy Grammar. It teaches diagramming and grammar.

 

Saxon Grammar and Writing: We used this alongside JAG, since this provided usage, syntax, synonyms, vocabulary, and other aspects of mechanics besides just the grammar we were getting in JAG. We ignore the writing component and just use the grammar and vocabulary sections. After the 5th grade book, it seems to get very repetitive (we are currently using the 6th grade book). So we do several chapters in a sitting, only doing those exercises covering new material or covering material in which my son requires more practice.

 

Writing

======

IEW: We have a love/hate relationship with IEW. We have done Student Intensive A, Ancient History-Based Writing Lessons, and we are now doing SICC B. My son finds it very formulaic, but it does improve his writing. This will probably be our last IEW foray for some time, since we plan to focus more on CW once we are done with SICC B.

 

CW: We really, really like the underlying philosophy of CW. We freely skip vocabulary and grammar material which we are getting elsewhere, using the program only for writing. We are currently working our way through Homer and through Poetry for Beginners. In Homer, we focus primarily upon the six-sentence shuffle. We look forward to advancing to the next level in CW, since everyone says Homer is the toughest and least user-friendly of the levels.

 

Writing Tales: We used Writing Tales rather than CW Aesop, because we found it more enjoyable and because the grammar and vocabulary were not as elementary. Eventually, we dropped the vocabulary and grammar exercises altogether and simply outlined, narrated, rewrote, and revised the stories. So the way that we used the program, we could have used either of these two programs.

 

Imitation in Writing: Medieval Legends - more summarizing and retelling of stories. Very good if you happen to be covering the Middle Ages in history, as well. But note that this is just retelling of stories, very much along the lines of what is done in Writing Tales and CW Aesop.

 

Poetry

=====

Imitation in Writing: Poetry Primer -- this was great. We really enjoyed it and my son learned a lot. We did it in 5th grade. There was some poetry writing, but mostly we used it for analyzing meter, identifying figures of speech, etc.

 

CW Poetry books - we are using these along with CW. So far they are fun and educational. As with all the programs we use, we take what is useful to us and skip things that we cover elsewhere.

 

We also spend some time just reading poetry out loud, alternating readers.

 

Vocabulary

=========

Vocabulary in Action: series from Loyola Press. We are very happy with this series. We also keep a vocabulary notebook, where my son writes down definitions and sample sentences. Just recently, for selected words, we have started copying quotations from Bartlett’s Quotations that demonstrate the words’ usages in literary contexts.

 

Reading

=======

We jump all over the place and read widely in many genres. In addition to our other reading, we are also are using selections from the “good books list” at the Great Books Academy. We will use a revised version of their “book report form” for book reports. (Similar forms can be found in other places, or you can devise one yourself.)

 

“Teaching the Classics”, by Adam and Missy Andrews, provides a good framework for discussing the books read. Adapt freely whatever subset of it works for you - there is no need to discuss every single question about every single book or story read. This would remove much of the joy of reading good books.

 

When discussing literature with my son, we use it both as a way of interactively thinking about the books, as well as enforcing the use of correct grammar in speaking. Many of the questions in the book could also be assigned as writing topics -- I will probably do this as he grows older.

 

We try to avoid what Charlotte Mason would have referred to as twaddle.

 

Future Plans

==========

Moving forward, our plan is to stick with CW through high school.

 

We plan to use Saxon Grammar again next year, along with Analytical Grammar. After that, we will use more high school-level books like Warriner’s and various books on usage and style, along with a few revision practice workbooks (like IEW’s Fix-It series).

 

There are a number of online PSAT and SAT prep courses out there, and we plan to take them when the time comes.

 

We plan to use Norton’s Essential Literary Terms as a text for a year or so, somewhere around 8th-10th grades.

 

We may take a one-semester or year-long course on LTOW in 9th grade (one is offered by Memoria Press), as well a course on the 5-paragraph essay, if at some point it seems necessary.

[mcconnellboys]

I would absolutely have used FLL if upper levels had been out when I needed it. I did use the first book and liked it. After that, I used R&S and Primary Language Lessons/Intermediate Language Lessons. R&S was okay for second and better for third (or maybe I got used to it). I really love PLL/ILL.

 

I used Abeka all the way through (fourth through ninth grades) with my older son and it served him well. I moved my younger son into it for the A,B,C series but he just wasn't really internalizing the grammar or getting any better at it while using it. So I tried to move back to R&S 7 this year and *really* hated it! I've never, ever switched curriculums during a school year, but I had to this time. I ordered Easy Grammar Plus on a recommendation from a friend and have begun using it with my son now. It seems to be working out well thus far. So I think Abeka is fine for language arts oriented kids (as with Writing Strands for natural writers), but kids who are not so great with language arts may need something else....

[Joyofsixreboot]

We didn't like WWE or FLL. I liked R&S but ds balked and balked. He likes CLE and I can live with it. He has shown improvement and retention which is all I can ask from a program and the fact he doesn't whine about it is a plus in the bargain.

[johnandtinagilbert]

Never really got into English for the Thoughtful Child. Tried to implement it, but I don't think any of us were CMish enough at the time.

 

Got nothin' out of Abeka grammar, grade 1 or 2...by nothin' I mean no retention

 

Alpha Omega.....I second the booooooring.

 

RS got nicknamed Rotten Staff in my house. It works amazingly well but is also booooring.

 

Like FFL (1st edition) the memorization was great. Found it repeated a little too much for our loving, though.

 

We also love Grammar Land and actually read it for fun on a regular basis!

 

I love the Phonics Road. Complete. Easy to implement. Solid. Suits classical and CM perspectives (in some ways CM, anyways).

 

We also have gotten some good use out of an old middle school "primer" type book I got at a book sale. It works wonders for extra practice.

 

Liked Daily Grams as a review.

 

Like Editor and Chief or Student Editor as practice and review in middle school to accompany our grammar/latin study.

Edited November 1, 2010 by johnandtinagilbert

[birchbark]

Loved

The Sentence Family

HoD's language arts incorporating R&S for grammar (doing most of the exercises orally or on the markerboard)

 

Just okay

FLL

Writing Tales

[helena]

We love

PLL/ILL

Cozy Grammar/Punctuation

and have been using them for years.