For users of Michael Clay Thompson's language arts books, I have a question.

[Wendi]

With a sixth grader, would I start with the 5th-6th grade level book, or do I need to start at the beginning of the series? I'm looking at the grammar books (Grammar Island, Grammar Town, etc.).

 

Thanks!

 

Wendi

[Melissa B]

I find it very frustrating that Royal Fireworks Press does not have any sample pages of the actual assignments from any of the books!

 

The first level (Grammar Island) is an introduction, very basic and completely reviewed again in the second level. I wouldn't use it for any child over 4th grade. All four books can be easily skipped. There is a big jump from level one to level two.

 

I would only begin with the third level (Grammar Voyage) if the child has a solid background in grammar and labeling or diagramming sentences. The program will assume the student has been doing this for one or two years now and can easily label all parts of speech, the major parts of a sentence, several major phrases, clauses, and sentence types. All of these things are reviewed again in the third level with additional information added, but I think the third level would be a lot of information to process for a student that had never done any labeling or diagramming.

 

If I were using the whole program, I would base my final decision on where the student is in writing. The books really go together so if you are doing the whole program it is best to use all the books of the same level. Level two covers paragraph writing and beginning essay writing. Level three assumes the student can write a solid paragraph and is writing decent one page essays and continues to work through ways of improving the essay throughout the book. Essay Voyage has multiple assignments to choose from for each chapter and does have a few paragraph writing options in the first couple chapters. But to get the most out of the book a student should be writing solid paragraphs and capable of writing one page essays on a regular basis.

 

As a side note: Essay voyage has a geography focus. There is quite a bit of geography in the text and a majority of the assignments have a geography focus and include map work or research on different countries of the world.

[LanaTron]

I like what I see on the website, but I don't understand how this program actually works on a day-to-day basis. Is it easy to use, even for someone with very little background in teaching Lang. Arts? Does the parent/teacher have to come up with assignments? What would a week of work look like?

 

Sorry to Wendy for hijacking...

[Melissa B]

How it looks: years 1-3 (Island, Town, Voyage)

I have several of the upper books, but I haven't used them yet.

 

Grammar books:

 

Used only first term (9-12 weeks)

They only have a few assignments and a few suggestions for grammar games and such.

After finishing the book the rest of the year is spent in labeling sentences. We do one per day from the practice series and occasionally pull one from our literature reading as well.

We usually do grammar three days a week or so (but we do it over 12 weeks.)

 

Vocabulary books:

 

The first book is an introduction and very light. Each chapter does have a simile writing assignment (we just did them orally.) The next two books are quite a bit more difficult. You can use the vocab books in many ways as he describes in his intro. There are vocabulary tests for each lesson. We do vocab all year - two weeks per lesson (maybe three days per week.) The questions inside can be read by the student and thought about, discussed with the parent or used as writing assignments. It is completely up to you. I usually assign one writing assignment and discuss all of the questions with the student.

 

 

Poetry books:

 

I don't remember any assignments in the first book - other than discussion. By the second book though the student is writing poems on a regular basis. It is up to the teacher how many poems are written. I usually assign one poem every two weeks. This is the most difficult book to teach without some background in poetry and such. It does take time learning all of the terms well enough to know if the student is using them properly in writing his/her own poems. We usually do poetry two or three days a week all year.

 

Writing books:

 

These have the most assignments. We use the writing book 3-5 days a week beginning second term (after finishing the grammar book.) The first writing book has five to ten writing assignments to choose from for each chapter. The assignments in the first book are more creative writing. But they deal specifically with subject/verb agreement in sentences, use of adjectives and adverbs in a sentence, etc.

The second book has twenty assignments and there isn't a choice of assignments like in the first book. This book doesn't have the creative writing aspect of the first book. (The first book will say things like - write a story where one character can only use one word subjects and one character can only use one word predicates, etc.) The second book is focused on improving the paragraph and all of the assignments are geared to that. I think two of the twenty assignments were essays. The third writing book has assignments at the end of each chapter to choose from. There are usually six or seven. About half are related to geography and require map work or research. There are usually a couple that are "what do you think" type questions that could have any length response. He provides many examples from famous writers and these questions will often ask the student specific questions about a writer or questions about what was learned in the chapter. And one or two that are more paragraph focused, such as write three paragraphs one this way, one that way, etc. At the back, the essay book has a short section on how he teachs the book and how he grades the essays.

 

 

 

With the possible exception of the poetry books, I think the books are easy to teach without an extensive language arts background. I do think the practice books are very helpful to those (like me) who are not completely confident in the correct labeling of sentences. I only purchase the teacher's version of the practice book and write one sentence each day on our white board.

 

All of the books build nicely upon each other and we have been very happy with the results of this curriculum. I am eagerly anticipating the next writing book - due out soon!

[Wendi]

Sounds like I should start with Level Two.

 

Wendi:001_smile:

[LanaTron]

First, thank you for such a thorough response! That really helped quite a bit. Now, though, I want to scrap all my LA plans for the fall and use MCT! Maybe next year...

 

I do have one other question: can the books be used independently? Say, if I only wanted to use the writing books, can they be used without the grammar and other books?

 

Thanks,

Lana

[Melissa B]

Yes, at least up through the third level (Voyage) each of the books can be used independently. You will see the occasional reference to the other books but the books do not rely on each other. The only reason you would want to do all books on the same level is for simplicity. The words studied in vocabulary will show up again in the writing book, etc. I would have to double check, but you may not need to be on the same level in poetry. I do not remember any reference to the other three books. But the writing book will have sentences to label that go back to what was learned in grammar and things like that. IF I were doing the whole series I would keep my grammar, vocabulary and writing at the same level. But each book easily stands alone.

[LaurieinCA]

Hi Melissa,

 

Thank you for all of your wonderful, detailed advice on MCT! I just ordered the Grammar Town series, with all the accompanying books. My question: what supplements will I need for a complete language arts program? I notice you are also using Classical Writing and Calvert/ Sequential Spelling. Will I need to supplement writing and spelling? How about vocabulary?

I have a 4th and a 5th grader who are working about 1-2 grades ahead in language arts (with the exception of spelling, which is H.S. level). Thanks!

 

Laurie

[Melissa B]

Hi Laurie,

 

I added spelling because my dd10 struggles with spelling. Dd8 does the Calvert spelling for fun - she likes the stories she can write at the end of each lesson. Sequential Spelling is again for my dd10 but all three of my girls do it together. (Dd 4 was very pleased that she spelled the first four words correct today. It is unlikely that I will assign spelling to her as a required subject.) I consider spelling to be an "as needed" subject. It does not sound like you will need it. The root and stem work done in Caesar's English is an excellent source for spelling without adding any curriculum.

 

If you ordered Caesar's English you will not need to add any further vocabulary.

 

I add writing because both dd10 and dd8 love to write and enjoy working on their writing techniques. I like the Classical Writing program, and I like that I do not feel we need to cover every lesson because our main writing curriculum is MCT and CW is merely supplementary. Many of the assignments and things learned in MCT can be applied to writing in other subjects. (My biggest issue with Classical Writing is that the subject matter really doesn't transfer well to other subjects - at least in the early books.) I consider the MCT writing program to be complete and any additional writing curriculum completely optional.

[LaurieinCA]

Thank you, Melissa! Your responses on this board have been instrumental in my trying MCT - I really appreciate your insight!

 

Laurie

[Wendi]

Do I need the TM and practice book?

 

Wendi

[jamnkats]

Do I need the TM and practice book?

 

Wendi

 

bumping this to add my voice to this question.

[nmoira]

 

Do I need the TM and practice book?

Do you mean the student copy and the teacher's copy of the practice books? You need the TM, but the student copy is optional... convenient, but optional.