How do you keep language arts from dominating your day?

[creekmom]

Help! I know in ps, each core subject area has about an hour of time. My problem is that our language arts (writing, vocabulary, spelling, grammar, literature) is taking up too much of our day, and I need to figure out how to streamline it. The curricula we're using: WWS, Sadlier Oxford Vocabulary alternating with VFCR, spelling is on an "as needed" basis, Hake grammar, K-12 literary analysis. I love Hake, but my son dreads it bc it takes too long. K-12 is a good lit. course, but it also takes up a lot of time. I want language arts to be as easy as math - one book, open and go. Any advice? Thanks!!

[Matryoshka]

I don't know. I used to wonder how in heck they fit it all in in schools. Now that my dd is in school, I see that they... don't. The LA is appalling. Not much grammar, not much reading, not much writing, not much vocabulary, no spelling. They don't do it all in one day, they can't. They do it a bit at a time spread out and it takes them forever. It's December. Two paragraphs so far this year. Three chapters of Sadlier-Oxford vocab. Two books read. They've memorized a list of linking verbs, helping verbs, and learned about... oooh!... subjects and predicates.

 

I thought we weren't getting nearly enough done at home. Dd was resistant to LA (except grammar). I figured they couldn't be doing less. Silly me. I'm setting up an after school writing class with her old homeschool pals, afterschooling MCT grammar, and she has a monthly book club to flesh it all out. And I'm spending some time remediating her awful penmanship. So..basically exactly what she would have done if she'd stayed home, minus CEII vocab and spelling. Ha.

 

Grammar here is quick and painless - she knows the drill, so we just do a few MCT 4-level analyses per week and call it good. Every sentence covers all parts of speech, parts of the sentence, phrases and clauses, so it's comprehensive as well.

 

We ditched WWS because she was so resistant. Then she was resistant to writing anything. Hence school, and now the afterschool class. She does well with outside deadlines, otherwise writing just wouldn't happen, no matter how many hours we had in the day.

 

For my older dds in 7th and 8th, I streamlined writing by hiring a tutor (WriteGuide) - outside deadline again - and having them write across the curriculum, alternating a lit paper, a history paper, and a science paper. I'd pick and choose from the writing assignments in the LA curriculum. We did a few timed essays as well - 20 min. and done.

[TarynB]

I don't have much practical advice, but since my DS is also using Hake, I wanted to mention one thing. I just have him do every other question in the review sections, instead of every question, and I find that he's retaining just as well that way. Even with us reading through the new material and going over each practice question together, a total grammar lesson only takes about 15 - 20 minutes this way. Maybe you're already using Hake this way too, but just wanted to throw an idea out.

[ladyinthegarden]

We have been doing Hake's Grammar portion orally. We do the entire lesson. He reads it out loud to me, then he answers the practice orally. When he gets to something that needs spelled out like adding -ed or change the y to an -i and add ed, he orally clarifies that. I hate the teacher's manual though, because it would be easier for me to follow along with the student text added to the answer list. The bonus is that I've been able to immediately correct answers that are wrong, and explain why they are wrong and correct it on the spot. It saves a little time because I don't have to grade answers anymore, and it saves his hands from becoming too tired to practice writing.

 

When you think about it, one book of Hake's Grammar & Writing is probably more grammar lessons than an average school does in 2-3 years. Why make it harder than it has to be? Just my humble opinion. :coolgleamA:

[redsquirrel]

I use WWS2, Rod and Staff grammar, vocab from the classical roots and Kolbe lit. I find that we save a lot of time doing much of R&S orally. I also don't make him do every single problem. Oh goodness, no way. R&S is waaay overkill. And, we only do it two or three times a week.. I break up vocab into very short exercises every day. We don't do lit every day. We might take a week off between books/stories to give us time to catch up with grammar, lol.

 

WWS just takes the time it takes. It has lit and vocab woven into the program so that has precedence over everything else. Something like vocab or grammar will get pushed aside before WWS or Kolbe.

[AimeeM]

No practical advise here. We use Hake for both grammar and writing. DD hates language arts so she doesn't exactly spend time dallying over it. Lol.

[Cosmos]

Help! I know in ps, each core subject area has about an hour of time. My problem is that our language arts (writing, vocabulary, spelling, grammar, literature) is taking up too much of our day, and I need to figure out how to streamline it.

 

I consider literature (reading, discussion, learning literary devices) as a separate core subject from the rest of language arts. So literature gets one "slot" and composition/grammar/etc. get one "slot" in my planning. Of course that doesn't solve the problem! But it helped me come to terms with how to apportion our time. Two slots -- that's the only way it makes sense to me.

[5LittleMonkeys]

Dd13 does lit for 30-45 minutes a day, AG for about 20 minutes, Sadlier-Oxford for about 15, spelling is as needed basis (no formal program), and WWS takes anywhere from 20 minutes to 45. So, at the most she spends about 2 hours on LA per day. I don't think that's unreasonable. I don't think a complete LA program that could be completed in an hour would be enough for most middle school students.

 

How many hours per day are you spending on all LA components? If you're spending more than two hours perhaps you could arrange your schedule to only work on certain skills for a specific amount of time. I only schedule 20 minutes for AG, and only 15 for Sadlier since I'm not overly worried about her completing them by a certain time...only that she progresses steadily. Even with WWS, there are days that I will break the work up into two days if it seems she is going to spend more than 45 minutes or so on it. Once she works on one subject for too long she stops learning and just goes into "get it done" mode so it isn't worth it to have her push to get a whole assignment done at one sitting.

[Lori D.]

I'm assuming your DS is 8th/9th grade?

 

First, just to encourage you, many high schools schedule English (language arts) classes to run for about 75-90 every day. And then there is another hour or so each night of homework for reading and writing assignments. So LA takes up a lot of time in the higher grades, too.

 

But to help you streamline, I have two ideas:

 

1. I don't know as though as this would work with your choice of programs, BUT -- we did not do ALL the LA topics every day:

 

5x/week

- literature

 

4x/week

- writing

- spelling

 

3x/week

- grammar

 

2x/week

- vocabulary

 

- Often, spelling can be done in 4 days a week -- 3 for learning/practice, day 4 for test. If student gets it all right, then no spelling on day 5! And if student needs more practice, then the day 4 test is a helpful "pre-test" for what to focus on.

 

- Seriously, grammar can be learned in 3 days a week. And at the middle school level, a lot of the grammar mechanics are being practiced with the writing (via revising and proofing), so you can cut any unnecessary redundancy from the grammar program that is being covered with the writing. Maybe try assigning every other item in the grammar exercise, and see if fewer works as well. Or, do some orally and some written to speed it up.

 

- JMO, but vocabulary seems to stick best when learned in the context of the Literature; however a roots-based program is a great idea -- but again, can be just as effectively learned in just 2 days a week, maybe 3. Really don't need 5 days a week for a vocab. workbook -- it becomes mindless drill and kill, rather than seeing how the roots are really at work in real-life language and reading. (again, that's JMO)

 

 

2. Also, we worked in shorter, concentrated "bursts" -- about 20 minutes max. for a session of grammar (or spelling), and 30 minutes max for a session of writing. And if a lesson or assignment absolutely needed more than that, then we would break it into two 15- or 20-minute "power bursts", one in the morning and one in the afternoon. That worked especially well for writing.

 

 

One last thought -- can some of the Literature (the reading of the book) be done as listening to book on tape (in the car, in the evening, on the weekend, with earphones while doing yardwork or chores, or even as a family read-aloud, or as a special mom-and-son, or dad-and-son read-aloud? So, yes, it would be "homework", but done in a more flexible way (maybe in a very special fun way!), freeing up some of the day school hours...

 

 

BEST of luck as you move into those more time-consuming courses of middle school/high school! Warmest regards, Lori D.

[Karen in CO]

Have you considered alternating?

For instance, work on grammar for 3 weeks then do a book study incorporating some writing. Maybe an intensive word study for a week or a short poetry unit then back to grammar? You can add in SAT word of the day painlessly.

[Lily_Grace]

Ours is relatively painless.

 

WWS - 30min-1h

Literature is taken in small bites, with a grammar piece that goes with. I'm not overly concerned about grammar. While I think it's necessary, it's not a subject that has as much information as math, for example. We do one or two grammar worksheets a day (usually a sentence diagramming sheet and one that focuses on a specific element) and constantly review. The literature reading and discussion takes about 45 minutes and the worksheets, 10. Vocab is through Critical Thinking Co. and is done in the form of Word Roots. Again, another 10-ish minutes. So that's about 2 hours of our day for LA, and then we have 1-2 for science, 1-2 for math, and 1 for history/social studies.

 

If we didn't have the tie ins with our lit program, I would either be using something from the Critical Thinking Co. again or the Harvey's Grammar book and workbook from Classical Writing. Both are short and painless.

[TarynB]

Literature is taken in small bites, with a grammar piece that goes with.

The literature reading and discussion takes about 45 minutes and the worksheets, 10.

 

Lily_Grace, what lit program are you using? Thanks!

[Lily_Grace]

We're using Learning Adventures, vol 3, along with Deconstructing Penguins to add to the literature. LA is an all in one unit study but it can be light for an 8th without supplementing. I do like the grammar, though, and the list of books. We realized with Moving Beyond The Page that my kid gets more out of unit studies than he does with separate subjects and this is the only unit study I found that keeps the history in order while tying in literature, music, art, grammar, and science.

[TarynB]

We're using Learning Adventures, vol 3, along with Deconstructing Penguins to add to the literature. LA is an all in one unit study but it can be light for an 8th without supplementing. I do like the grammar, though, and the list of books. We realized with Moving Beyond The Page that my kid gets more out of unit studies than he does with separate subjects and this is the only unit study I found that keeps the history in order while tying in literature, music, art, grammar, and science.

 

Thank you! This sounds great. Off to check it out! :)

[fluffybunny]

We spend 2 hours a day on Language Arts. We only do core subjects at home, plus logic and Omnibus. He attends a coop one day per week for the 'fun' subjects. So our routine usually goes like this;

 

9-10 Maths

10-12 Writing program and grammar

12-1pm Lunch

1pm Spelling and handwriting practice

1.30-3pm Logic or Omnibus

3-30pm Word Roots or Editor in Chief

[elegantlion]

I would also to solidify those skills before high school, when everything seems to take more time. We're running into that issue this year. We're doing grammar, vocabulary, writing instruction, and literature.

 

For us, literature is part of free reading time or history. I'm rotating vocabulary and grammar in 12 week cycles. Because ds has a rich vocabulary and not so great grammar skills, we may work on grammar all year.

 

Writing instruction is what eats our time. It's necessary because of how his skills progressed, but wow, I wish we could have done WWS a few years ago. At least with WWS, I feel like he's doing writing while receiving instruction. Some programs I've tried feel like practice in instruction and then you have to carve out more time for actual writing assignments.

[Susie in CA]

This year we are doing English 1.5 to 2 hours a day.

 

About one hour is spent on English which includes spelling, grammar and writing. We use Spelling Workout, Hake 7, and WWS. We simply rotate through them. The boys do 2 pages from SWO, one lesson in Hake, and one lesson in WWS. When they are done they simply start over at the beginning. Some days they actually make it through all three books; most days they don't. That's okay. We just pick up where we left off in the rotation the next day.

 

Literature get a separate slot in our schedule and takes us anywhere from 30 min to an hour. We read, discuss, sometimes write.

 

This has worked best for us. I should have done it this way a long time ago. One just never knows how long any particular lesson takes. This way it doesn't matter.

 

Hope this helps.

[ccolopy]

With a kid who's more inclined toward math and foreign languages, there's no way that we could cover every part of language arts every day, every year. We had a very grammar-focused year last year, so this year our emphasis is on writing. DS is using Oak Meadow English, which has a bit of everything (light grammar and vocab, more writing and literature), and WWS. He usually spends a little over an hour on English, but I would consider anything under two hours to be reasonable. How long is your son spending?

[PeterPan]

At this level, BJU has them doing grammar OR lit. So I think at some point you need to either parcel them out to 2-3 days each or alternate semesters. Personally, I'm wishing we had done AG last year. We didn't and it would have made this year with BJU (9) really fast. As is, we've decided just to set a timer, work 5 minutes a day, and let the book end when we're done. The lit 9 wasn't worth much, and the other lit 9 I have isn't radically better. I think it could be dumped if you've done even a modicum of basic discussion together and just read. Besides, you're getting into lit writing by the end of WWS. The separate lit curriculum just isn't the valuable. At some point you have to think what *more valuable* thing the curriculum is keeping you from doing.

[lewelma]

LA for my math/science boy includes:

WWS (1 - 1.5 hours 4 days per week)

Literature (1 hour per day to read, 7 days per week)

 

He has finished grammar, so he just reviews it when he is proofreading his composition.

Spelling is done on the spot when he is proofreading. "Memorize it now." He has mastered the rules.

Vocabulary: he gets this from reading good lit. And lots of it.

Literature discussions: we do this about 2 times per term for an hour. He writes about lit in WWS.

 

Ruth in NZ

[LindaOz]

We alternate LA components - not everything is done every day. Generally, we do spelling 3x a week, and grammar 2x. Reading/literautre is every day, but writing may or may not have a separate time slot in a day because they may have done plenty of writing in another area that day, eg: history. A sample schedule for us may be something like this..... (it varies from time to time)

 

Mon: spelling, assigned reading, dictation

Tues: grammar, assigned reading, free writing

Wed: spelling, assigned reading, written narration

Thurs: grammar, assigned reading, free writing

Fri: spelling, assigned reading, dictation

 

My kids also have free reading time in the afternoon.

[mom31257]

We spend 2 hours a day on Language Arts. We only do core subjects at home, plus logic and Omnibus. He attends a coop one day per week for the 'fun' subjects. So our routine usually goes like this;

 

9-10 Maths

10-12 Writing program and grammar

12-1pm Lunch

1pm Spelling and handwriting practice

1.30-3pm Logic or Omnibus

3-30pm Word Roots or Editor in Chief

 

 

Spelling, vocabulary, and grammar editing would still fee like language arts to me, which means 3 hours a day. May I ask how you keep your child's attention for 2 hours on grammar and writing? Do you take any kind of break, or is that 2 hours straight?

[fluffybunny]

May I ask how you keep your child's attention for 2 hours on grammar and writing? Do you take any kind of break, or is that 2 hours straight?

 

 

Sometimes I allow a short break, but I actually find breaks make his concentration worse, which goes against common wisdom!

 

What I do, though, is change places; ie we do the reading instructions on the sofa, the he moves to the table to do his typing, then we move back to the sofa to do grammar, or the kitchen bench. Currently his grammar program is the MCT 4 level sentence analysis, which usually takes about 10 minutes. His spelling program, Phonetic Zoo, only takes 10mins a day (I highly recommend it!).

[creekmom]

Thank you!!! I should have asked this question years ago! You've all given such great advice. I need to read through it all again and take notes. One change I've already implemented is having them do only 1/2 of the review in Hake. My kids were thrilled and want to thank those of you who suggested it! I'm glad to have the Christmas break to really think through the changes I need to make.

 

A few days ago I posted about my oldest wanting to go to middle school after Christmas. One of the comments he made was, "It would be nice to be done at 6 or 7:00 at night!" :( There are days he's not finished at 9:00 p.m., but a lot of times, it's bc he's goofed off and procrastinated doing his work. Regardless, after that comment I realized I needed to rethink his schedule. Language arts usually ends up taking at least 3 hours (some of that time is bc he loses focus). We decided to wait about ps until high school (possibly). I'm hopeful that the rest of the year will be less stressful for both of us!

[Lori D.]

A few days ago I posted about my oldest wanting to go to middle school after Christmas. One of the comments he made was, "It would be nice to be done at 6 or 7:00 at night!" :(

 

 

Ouch! I think he may be disappointed to discover that the reality is, what with sitting in school all day, he'll be doing homework until 9pm quite often... Can you have him talk with a few students who can give him an idea of what it will be like? Most of the high school students I know locally, whether public or private school, have school until 3pm, have sports or other extracurriculars several days/evenings of the week, and so are busy with homework until 9-10pm every night, plus part of the weekend -- esp. Sunday nights!

 

Maybe if you can get your homeschool schedule "tamed" so for all of the spring semester school is done by 3-4pm every day, the desire for PS will wane! ;)

[Deee]

I have a reluctant writer (he composes writings happily, but loathes the physical act of writing) so I kill two birds with one stone. We do our writing in history - read, take notes/outline, compose summary, he copies into book and illustrates (we have come from a Steiner model). He's interested in the content, so this helps him stay motivated. There is no way he would sit through 3 hrs of language arts (or even WWS + history writing), and neither would I. Language arts (grammar, some composition eg Kilgallon) is 30mins/day. Reading is extra - he's a book worm and we read aloud twice a day, as well as in science and history. I loathe written comprehension work so that's never going to happen at our house, but we do discuss a lot.

Danielle

[Reya]

I actually push grammar (20 min) and spelling (20 min) hard at the beginning and finish those up COMPLETELY early on, before we start doing real composition.

 

Composition (30 min) takes their place, and I lengthen lit (to 1 hr).

 

So all language arts is 1.5 hours per day, max.

[kalanamak]

I don't. When kiddo didn't have the mental fortitude to do so much LA we did much more history and science and art. Now that his brain has clicked on a little further, I am concentrating on LA. I try to keep a finger in every pie, but I definitely surf: I ride the wave that is rising.

[MerryAtHope]

Help! I know in ps, each core subject area has about an hour of time. My problem is that our language arts (writing, vocabulary, spelling, grammar, literature) is taking up too much of our day, and I need to figure out how to streamline it. The curricula we're using: WWS, Sadlier Oxford Vocabulary alternating with VFCR, spelling is on an "as needed" basis, Hake grammar, K-12 literary analysis. I love Hake, but my son dreads it bc it takes too long. K-12 is a good lit. course, but it also takes up a lot of time. I want language arts to be as easy as math - one book, open and go. Any advice? Thanks!!

 

 

The short answer is...time limits rather than quantity.

 

For an upper elementary or junior high student, I think 90 minutes of LA is a good goal. 30 minutes of reading, and then 60 minutes to focus on your priority subjects. For us it would break down this way:

 

20 minutes spelling

30 minutes grammar OR writing

10 minutes discussion time/additional instruction (could be for narration, going over a paper together, etc...)

 

You don't have to do grammar AND writing every day, week, month, or even year. You can do units focusing on each, alternate days, alternate years...whatever you want to do. If you have a program that incorporates both together that works for you, great. But set a workable, doable goal, and then stick to it.

 

Here's a blog on Planning Language Arts Simplified.

 

I also believe that reading aloud, even to older kids, has a lot of value, and we continue to read aloud for 20-30 minutes each evening. This affords great discussions, vocabulary building, character training and talks, leads into literary discussions--all kinds of benefits.

 

HTH some! Merry :-)

[2_girls_mommy]

Here are my thoughts from my own middle school years:

 

In 6th and 7th grade I had 2 hours daily of L.A. Officially the first hour was "English" and that was our grammar. The 2nd hour was "writing." There was no literature or spelling. I am sure that vocabulary was covered in the English and writing hour, but am not fully sure of that. Our grammar was solid though. We had the same teacher both hours, so topics overlapped as well I am sure.

 

There was no foreign language offered as an elective in my middle school, but there was a teacher that gave private lessons (to a group) before school twice a week. So I had my foreign language lessons twice a week before school on top of a full 7 hour day. One of those hours was homeroom.

 

Then I belonged to a "writer's club." Our L.A. teacher had it as an extra curricular. We met once a week after school. I don't remember exactly what we did in that club, but I am sure extra writing exercises of some sort..

 

So that meant on some days I had 4 hours of L.A. including the 2 hours of extra curricular Spanish and Writer's club. So I would say that L.A. did dominate my day for the first two years of middle school, on top of a full load of the regular stuff: music, p.e, science, history, and math.

 

When I am wondering how to fit it all in for my dd, I think about the fact that I had extracurricular academics in middle school too in order to get it all in, and it is ok. (The year I didn't do Writer's club, I competed in math counts which meant staying after school to do math practice getting ready for the competition. Not L.A. but another example of extra curricular academics beyond the regular school day.)

 

My dd is reading quality literature and discussing, doing 2 foreign languages, religion, and art, all things I didn't have in middle school. Plus she does scouts which requires work at home and time away from home and dance classes a couple of times a week. Those are all things that I didn't even have in middle school, though I had daily P.E. a semester a year. The dance classes would be the equivalent of that. I realize it is a balancing act and that it is going to take a long time. My education took a long time daily to get it all in. So does hers.

[LindaOz]

I know I posted above, but I've still been thinking about this discussion.

 

Currently, I am finding that it works really well to have our first block of working time as our 'literacy' time. I like the term 'literacy' because, to me, it feels more like we are working toward the grand goal of being literate (proficient in reading and writing), rather than treating each LA component as its own entity.

 

So, in this time I aim to cover 3 things each day: 1) writing, 2) skill instruction in either spelling or grammar, and 3) reading. We have a 90 minute block or time between when we begin schoolwork and when we break for morning tea. My 12, 10 and 8yo meet at the table at about 9am and they start with writing. At the moment they are all working on their own chapter book so I've let them just flow with that a bit. But this writing time could also include dictation, written narration, free writing, or some other writing activity. When they have done with their writing, they each move to the skill area they are working on that day, either spelling or grammar depending on the day. Thirdly, as that is finished, they each go off to read their assigned reading (ds8 still reads to me on the couch). Then it's 10:30 and time for a morning tea break - LA or literacy done and dusted for the day. They free read in the afternoon and we have after lunch read-aloud together but the formal part is all over in the morning.

 

For some reason, having this designated time for literacy seems to keep things contained yet flowing smoothly for us. When I tried to include too many LA components in a day and divide them up at different times of the day, it often felt like I was always pushing someone to get the next thing done. It could sometimes get hard to remember the grand goal of having my kids become 'writers' and 'readers'.

 

I don't know if this makes much sense now that I've tried to type it out, but I just thought I'd share how we do our LA and manage to have it not dominate the whole day.

[Cosmos]

For some reason, having this designated time for literacy seems to keep things contained yet flowing smoothly for us. When I tried to include too many LA components in a day and divide them up at different times of the day, it often felt like I was also pushing someone to get the next thing done. It could sometimes get hard to remember the grand goal of having my kids become 'writers' and 'readers'.

 

 

I have found the same. Too many "little" things add up. Lately I've been experimenting with focusing on just one aspect for a longer session rather than everything each day. So recently we did several days of JUST grammar during "literacy time", then we focused on a WWS lesson for a few days. Then we worked on some literary analysis for a couple of days. This seems to suit ds well. Short sessions of 15-20 minutes don't seem to work as well as 45-60 minutes. He's old enough that we can work hard on grammar for a week and then skip it for a week or two without him forgetting things.

[Mom22ns]

My kids spent 2 hours/day on LA up through 8th grade. The ability to read and communicate effectively is the very top of my list for a well educated person.

 

In high school we transition. Grammar is finished. Writing is no longer instructed, it is just done. Spelling is long gone. The kids do lots of reading and writing. I add in a vocabulary program just because I do. Language Arts finally takes a similar amount of time to all the other single credit subjects 60-90 min/day.

[NicoleMarie]

We focus on writing during two- 6 week units for the year. The rest of the time I incorporate writing assignments based on her history and science assignments. The other parts of ELA (grammar/ vocabulary) are done daily for 45 minutes. I use Houghton Mifflin English 8 because 1.) grammar never changes and 2.) I taught from it for years in the classroom so I tweak it as needed for an 11yo.

[Cosmos]

We focus on writing during two- 6 week units for the year. The rest of the time I incorporate writing assignments based on her history and science assignments. The other parts of ELA (grammar/ vocabulary) are done daily for 45 minutes. I use Houghton Mifflin English 8 because 1.) grammar never changes and 2.) I taught from it for years in the classroom so I tweak it as needed for an 11yo.

 

 

That's an interesting plan and one I haven't heard before. Thanks for sharing.