spiral grammar?

[ktgrok]

So, my son, it seems, needs review or he doesn't retain anything. He just shoves it right out of his pretty head, with the idea that he will never need nouns, or fractions, or whatever, ever again. Which leads to never REALLY moving ahead. Is there a language arts program with lots of constant review? Mainly grammar/usage/punctuation.

[Paige]

I consider Climbing to Good English to be spiral. We use it and my girls don't handle spiral well so I have to skip around to make it more of a mastery program.

[AimeeM]

Hake

[Woodland Mist Academy]

I second Hake.

[justLisa]

Hake does. It starts with 2 vocab words, then a new concept, and then a review section with previous topics. Along with some pick the word that fits the sentence type. So it really is not much writing, but it reviews quite a bit.

[Angie in VA]

This site says levels 4-8 are now available, but sends you here to get them.

 

CBD has Hake too.

[PeterPan]

After your math thread where we were exploring spiral vs. leaping to get there, I want to suggest to you sort of a contradictory approach. Just because kids don't remember the terms or definitions (what we think of as grammar) DOESN'T mean they're weak at language in general. Remind me, but doesn't your boy test pretty well on LA? When we got our np eval, that was one of the things the np commented on, that he was surprised just how verbal she was and how good her scores were there.

 

So I wouldn't treat him as if EVERYTHING is weak. He may actually be really strong verbally, and it's just the specific school skill of naming the part of speech (and of course the infamous punctuation, lol) that's not so hot. When I looked at those Hake 8 samples right now, I saw it trying to do both. And it's a LOT of review in the lessons, or at least what would be a lot for my kid. In my dd's ideal world, grammar is 10 minutes, in and out. With Shurley we were able to keep it that way. It's getting a lot harder at the higher levels. Maybe it would have been with AG (which has the virtue of teaching a lot upfront and then having them review it with short tasks to keep things fresh), but we never plunked out for it.

 

I think, in general, when you have a bright kid who's not clicking with grammar, it's a good idea to do a touch of each (spiral and big picture). I would do the spiral, absolutely. We did Shurley for years, and it was fabulous for her. But also do something that lets him explore language in a more sophisticated, holistic way that fits how he thinks. It's kind of complementary, because you're introducing the grammar more simplistically (like TT does math!) and then applying it to more stimulating situations that you know hit more where he thinks at. For that, we're enjoying Killgallon. In earlier years, the grammar in CW and WT served that purpose for us.

 

So there are lots of ways to get there, but I would consider a balance like that. You might find that if you take that step into something with some more holistic, applied grammar, that he actually is quite intuitive and creative with it. It might open up some good ways of thought for him. It has always surprised me how my dd can seem to waffle on identifying an adverb but be SO good with imitating sentence patterns and creatively APPLYING the grammar. You don't want to hold them back from the latter just because they're crunchy at the former. It's just like the math. So yeah, he'll probably need something more straightforward to help the basics stick. I haven't used it, but Winston is supposed to be the bees' knees for adhd boys. It uses manipulatives and labels for sentence parsing. I'm all for diagramming, but that's easy to add into any program. We always use a whiteboard for our grammar. I never ever just sit her down and say do it. (Well almost never, lol.) I try to sit down and do say 3 out of the 10 exercises with her, then we might pick one to diagram. All that is on the whiteboard. And yes, 3 out of 10. Do less, but do it with total engagement. Shurley grammar has only *3 sentences* a day for all their levels and they get fabulous results. You don't need long marathon sessions. You need really SHORT sessions where he actually engages for just a couple minutes. And you need the whiteboard and kinesthetic and color and some humor. Make magnet labels for the parts of speech. Pizzazz it up and do whatever it takes. When he's laughing, he's making neural connections. When he's stressed, the chemicals totally stop the connectors.

 

So don't equate his struggles with needing to kill him on grammar. He doesn't actually need to. Just itsy bitsy doses every day where he's actually focused. And if you pick a curriculum that doesn't spiral, no biggee, just make sure you parse ALL the words in those 3-5 sentences you do.

 

I can check which Killgallon we're doing. I can't remember if it's the middle school or high school. If he's not nailing nouns, I would back up to the elementary book. The one we're doing is crunchy hard. You want it EASY. Stress impedes learning.

Edited November 1, 2012 by OhElizabeth

[ktgrok]

thank you! You are right, he IS intuitively good with the verbal end of things. Thanks for reminding me. We actually have taken a year off of doing a formal grammar program, as I felt we had other struggles this year. So we are doing Essentials In Writing, which does a grammar review in the first part of the year, then progresses into writing sentences, then paragraphs, etc. I think that will work well this year, and then I'll explore something else for next year, Killgallon is one of the things I almost buy every year, lol. Thanks.

[SnMomof7]

CLE LA is spiral-based, we are (much to my surprise) finding we LIKE spiral based programs here...despite all my mastery-based philosophies at the beginning of our journey :).

[Woodland Mist Academy]

Hake

 

If that doesn't do it, nothing will. It reviews, reviews, and reviews with every.single.chapter. It's ridiculous.

 

LOL!

[Chrysalis Academy]

Well, this may be a little contrarian and totally irrelevant to your OP (hope not!) but maybe it isn't that he needs spiral (i.e. more and more review at the same depth), maybe he needs different, with more depth? I'm speaking from my own experience here, my dd was flying through FLL4 effortlessly (which should have been my first clue something was wrong) but I realized after several months that she had almost no retention. Turns out it was easy and predictable enough that she could cruise through the exercises with her brain disengaged - thus nothing seemed to "stick". Once we bailed on FLL and started doing grammar via deeper, language rich materials that forced her to think, she was able to learn the material quickly and apply it across contexts, and retention has been excellent.

 

For us, those materials were Grammar Land and MCT language arts. I've looked at KISS grammar and I think we could have gotten a similar result using that, although we haven't tried it as of yet. Anyway, just a thought! Best of luck figuring it out.

[Woodland Mist Academy]

My answer changes if you decide you are not looking for spiral. ;)

 

Rose and others have made some good points.

[Mom0012]

I've used CLE and Hake, which are both spiral, for my grammar-challenged son. He did terribly with CLE, but has had great success with Hake. This is his 3rd year using it and he's just flying through it now.

 

Lisa