Jane Austen 8th grade???

[pixie36]

Ok my first post on these boards but have been lurking for quite some time :001_smile:

 

We pulled our daughter out of 6th grade last Feb. and started homeschooling YIKES!! This year she wanted to try Romeo and Juliet and lets just say it was a big bust. Next year I was thinking of doing Jane Austen books for the year, she loves anything with romance and falling in love. I havent read any of these books but just the short plots on spark notes, and these seem to fit what she would be interested in.

 

My question is an 8th grader capable of really understanding these books??? I would probably just use spark notes unless there is something else out there that would work as well???

 

I am still trying to find our way, and any help on this would be greatly appreciated for this topic!!!

 

Thanks!

[Liza Q]

My oldest read and enjoyed Pride and Prejudice at 13 but my 2nd daughter was not ready till she was closer to 15. She would have understood the plot, of course, but she was not able to enjoy the language till she was a little older. I think it really depends on the child!

 

If she likes romance I would try something like Little Women or the Anne of Green Gables book before I moved to something by Jane Austen.

 

If you are really set on Austen, start with Northanger Abbey - it is really funny!

[regentrude]

My DD read and enjoyed Jane Austen's novels in 7th grade. She understood them well enough to love the books and get the humor. Are there underlying cultural things she did not fully appreciate? Probably, especially since we have not studied the period in history yet. But it was well worth it.

She read Pride and Prejudice, Emma, Sense and Sensibility. We watched all three as movies and saw P&P on stage as a live play. She wrote one essay about her favorite character in Jane Austen's novels.

We do not do quizzes on content and do not analyze the literary devices - we just read the books and enjoy them and talk about them.

[Laura Corin]

It depends what she is used to reading. Has she been reading classic children's books, which use relatively complex language? Authors like Louisa May Alcott, E Nesbit, C S Lewis, Elizabeth Goudge, Frances Hodgson Burnett? If she is not used to reading period English, I would spend a year enjoying reading these kinds of texts before diving into Jane Austen in high school.

 

Best wishes

 

Laura

[Beth in SW WA]

My dd has read many of them in middle school. Big Austen fans here.

[Kfamily]

I think, if she is really motivated and interested then Jane Austen's books would be fine. I do agree with previous posters that it would be important to me that she is able to read the complex language well before reading them, but we all approach things differently. In general, I find that waiting either for genuine interest or ability to be in place before reading most books pays off in the end. I have been building my own dd's ability up the last couple of years and I'll include some ideas that worked for us. Dd loves to read romantic books and poetry too.

 

In 6th, she read books written by Edith Nesbit, Elizabeth Goudge and Frances H. Burnett as Laura suggested. We also read The Courtship of Miles Standish by Henry W. Longfellow together. This is a longer narrative poem, but it is not as long as a typical book. We used a free study guide from Google books to go along with it. It was a great introduction to reading poetry, reading more complex works and introducing some literary terms such as metaphors, etc. We didn't do all of the work in the guide, but did do about 3/4 of it. It is a romantic poem. If you're interested, I could hunt around and found the pdf for this that could be downloaded.

 

In 7th grade, she read Anne of Green Gables and Little Women as Liza Q. suggested. She also began (and we are still reading now) Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott. She really loves this one and it is also full of adventure and romance. The language is tricky at first, but as with any work like this, it gets easier as you keep reading. Dd and I read Ivanhoe together as well. Reading some of these together, at least to start, might be helpful. She also read Tales From Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb which is a great introduction to Shakespeare if your dd hasn't had a lot of exposure to Shakespeare yet.

 

Now, in 8th grade she is reading The Lord of the Rings trilogy which has some romance (well, if you watch the movies :D too). I think the movies have more of that than the actual books. We are reading Fierce Wars and Faithful Loves and she really likes this book. And yes, this book has romance too. She loves poetry by Keats, Longfellow and Tennyson who have plenty of romantic poems to enjoy. She loves Shakespeare too, but this came with time and exposure. We will be reading Shakespeare's sonnets next term and she is looking forward to this too.

 

Hope this helps a little.

[pixie36]

Thanks to you all for taking time to comment. She hasnt really read any of those authors so I think I'll take the rest of this year and have her read some of the books by the authors you mentioned. Then I'll see where we are at come next fall.

 

Thanks again for your input it has given me a lot to consider on what she is currently reading :)

[Angjune]

I will agree with the other posters that it really depends on your child. My daughter is not as voracious a reader as my son but was capable or reading Austen. She is in 8th grade this year and early in the year she read Anne of Green Gables and now she is reading Pride and Prejudice. After she's done I plan on renting the movie so we can watch together.

[Hedgehog]

She is in 8th grade this year and early in the year she read Anne of Green Gables and now she is reading Pride and Prejudice. After she's done I plan on renting the movie so we can watch together.

 

That's a great incentive - I've done that myself - have them read the book first, with the promise of watching the movie when they've finished the book!

[Night Elf]

My 8th grader is reading Edgar Allan Poe right now for a Grade 6-8 Literature class. I'd rather be helping with Jane Austen. The Poe stories don't always make sense to us.

[katilac]

That's a great incentive - I've done that myself - have them read the book first, with the promise of watching the movie when they've finished the book!

 

Now for the all important question - which version will you watch?

[Veritaserum]

I was your dd's age when I picked up Jane Austen. I love her books. There are some good movie adaptations of them, too. BBC is the best for Pride and Prejudice. I think the Emma Thompson version of Sense and Sensiility is pretty good (the book is better), and Gwenyth Paltrow's Emma is good, too. I loved the version of Persuasion that aired on Masterpiece Theater. It was a BBC version, I think.

[amtmcm]

This year she wanted to try Romeo and Juliet and lets just say it was a big bust. Next year I was thinking of doing Jane Austen books for the year, she loves anything with romance and falling in love. I havent read any of these books but just the short plots on spark notes, and these seem to fit what she would be interested in.

 

 

 

Learning Language Arts through Literature (LLATL) Green Edition includes an outstanding introduction to Shakespeare through reading Much Ado About Nothing. It really got my DD started on the right foot with Shakespeare and she has since read Taming of the Shrew and will be reading Henry V, Midsummer Night Dream and Richard III with Omnibus this year .

 

LLATL Green costs about $25, so it's a little pricey to buy just for a Shakespeare unit, but the book contains several literature studies, including a 6 week poetry unit that is also outstanding.

 

As for Jane Austen, I personally would start with Emma for an 8th grader, but all of her books are lovely.