Anyone NOT use literature study guides....

[Mommamia]

Or, at least wait until high school to start? I remember reading an article about why study guides can sometimes stifle the student, but also wonder if they are required for high school?

 

If you do use them, what age do you start and which vendor ( progeny, etc) is your favorite?

 

Thank you!

[sweetpea3829]

Last year I used Progeny, Total Language Plus, and one other that escapes my memory.  I used them with my 3rd graders...however we did not use all of them, mostly just the discussion questions.  I found them to be a waste of time and money.  

 

 

[MerryAtHope]

I don't use them before high school--we mainly discuss what we are interested in. I did like reading Deconstructing Penguins though and felt that had some useful ideas for discussions. 

 

If I were to use study guides in the earlier grades, I would want it to be something I could pull questions from for discussion--not a lot of busy work, or something that focuses so much on analysis that the book wasn't fun to just read, you know? I think some lit guides do that--they're just too overwhelming. I'd occasionally like questions/info that enriched our enjoyment of the book. 

 

For example, when my kids read Sing Down the Moon, I asked them why that was the title, and they couldn't tell me at first. It was scheduled by Sonlight, so I went to their guide--which was more a comprehension guide than a lit guide and didn't help. I ended up reading the book, and found the title had a beautiful significance--and with a few questions I helped my children to discover the meaning. It really was exciting to them when they got it! 

 

So, I would have liked a handful of books to have that kind of info available for me to use in the K-8 years--but mostly we just read, enjoy, and talk about what interests or moves us.

 

And as far as high school goes...I don't do lit guides for every book there either. We do a few, so they can learn about the author and dig a bit deeper into some books--but I still let a lot be for enjoyment. We've used the free Glencoe guides online, info from Sparknotes occasionally, and LLATL Gold British Lit. I've liked all of these well enough. Can't say I've "loved" any or found "THE" resource for us though!

[Lori D.]

Lots of lit. guide ideas in this past thread: "Literature Guides". And, "What Is Literary Analysis and When to Teach it?" is SWB's answer to when/how to do literary analysis. :)

 

Very much like Merry in the post above -- in elementary grades, just read and enjoy, asking the occasional question for comprehension, or, what do you think will happen next, or what would you do if you were so-and-so. If you have a "crafty" student, then you might enjoy looking into an activity guide that expands exploration into the world of an enjoyed book with further reading about a history/science topic, making a craft or a food, and other activity ideas -- Lit Wits might be of interest.

 

No individual lit. guides until high school here. In grades 7-9, we did use things like the 1-year programs of Lightning Lit. 7 (for gr. 6-8) and LL8 (for gr. 7-9), Literary Lessons From the Lord of the Rings (for gr. 7-10), and resources such as Figuratively Speaking and Walch's Prose & Poetry, as gentle introductions into formal Literature studies and beginning literary analysis. Windows to the World (for gr. 9-12) was also very helpful to us in specifically teaching annotation, how to write a literary analysis essay using your annotations as support, and then covering some of the most frequently used literary elements.

 

When we used guides in high school for the background info on author/work/times, and as a springboard or a prompt into discussion, analysis, and writing about the work of Literature -- we skipped any "busywork" fill-in-the-blank aspects or comprehension questions. The further into high school we got, the less needed/useful guides became, as the students became more used to formal Literature.

 

In high school, in addition to google searches turning up info/guides for individual works, here are guides we found useful:

- Garlic Press Discovering Literature: Challenger level guides

- Parallel Shakespeare -- teacher guide and student workbook

- Brightest Invention of Heaven: Christian Guide to 6 Shakespeare Plays

- a few Progeny Press high school guides (quality/depth varies from good to not worth it)

- a few Portals to Literature guides

- a few The Great Books guided worldview discussion guides

- Glencoe Literature Library (free online)

- Sparknotes / Cliff's Notes (free online)

- Penguin teacher guides (free online)

[Mommamia]

Thank you. Very helpful, all!!

[Squawky Acres]

We just read lots of high-quality literature and talk about it.  I took enough literature courses in college to feel confident that I do not need a literature guide.  I can imagine they would be helpful for certain things we plan to read in later years -- maybe high school.

 

If a project occurs to me, we might do it.  Most recently, the kids had a lot of fun cutting cookies into halves and thirds and figuring out how much Baby Carrie should have received after reading "Little House in the Big Woods."

[Guest]

...

Edited July 14, 2016 by Guest

[FO4UR]

I do not do literature guides.

 

I'm picky about the questions being of a synthetic nature rather than quizzing.   We read a chapter, write a narration, discuss.

[Carol in Cal.]

I did  not teach reading comprehension in the usual "What color was Jenny's dress?" sense of the term.

Instead we read tons of books, saw live plays, and talked about them.

I modelled summarization and assigned it.

I taught literary terms and used them in conversations about the books and plays we experienced.

We used Junior Great Books in a coop for several years, and I hosted a monthly literature discussion group for 5-7th graders for a couple of years.

And I started assigning literary papers based on the logic stage questions in WTM in the 4th or 5th grade.

Although I did purchase some literary guides, we never used them.  (Come to think of it, I really should sell them off.)

DD entered brick and mortar school for ninth grade, testing immediately into honors English and history, and writing far ahead of grade level.  FWIW.  Classical education works, regardless of whether curricula are used for it.

[SilverMoon]

.

Edited September 23, 2023 by SilverMoon

[palmettomom]

This post makes me feel so much better!  I haven't done any lit guides with my rising 7th grader yet for fear of squeezing what joy of reading he has out of him.  My concern is preparing him for writing about literature.  He absolutely hates to write anything, so we do a lot of things orally.  He even came up with a symbol for his name so he wouldn't have to waste time writing it.  :001_rolleyes: He is very intuitive and will discuss books some, I'm just worried about the writing.

[EKT]

We do not! But...I used to be a high school English teacher (before I had children and left work to stay home/homeschool), so maybe I'm just super comfortable with teaching literature in general? My kids are little (8 and 5), and we read tons and tons of novels and picture books, and for us, we simply enjoy the books! We talk about the books in depth and my children are very comfortable using words like "character" and "setting" when discussing books, so my focus in these early years is just on enjoying the story and cultivating a deep love for literature. (I think beating each story to death by asking them to write out answers to questions, etc., would put a huge damper on their enjoyment. I suspect, for example, they would be put off by formal questions, or even purposely start seeking out short books with fewer chapters if they knew there would be questions at the end of each chapter, etc.)

 

I do always ask them questions as we read (to informally assess comprehension) and we'll often discuss how the characters feel, etc., but we do nothing formal or written. (And if they don't understand something, they immediately stop me and ask, "Wait, which character said that?" or whatever.) It works really, really well for us! (Plus, I feel my older DD gets plenty of writing practice through all the narrations she does in all her other subjects and through WWE, FLL, etc., so I feel no pressure for her to write specifically about literature.) What has surprised me most is the constant connections my kids make, all on their own. All the time, they'll shout out things like, "Mary Lennox is so much like X character in X book!" Or, "The setting in this book reminds me so much of X book!" And then they'll go off on a happy tangent discussing the books naturally, without me needing to draw any predetermined answers out of them. So, I feel like they're inherently doing all the thinking of a literature guide, without experiencing any of the negative associations. That's what I really care about at this age--that my girls are thinking deeply about the books we read, identifying with the characters, and really enjoying the richness of the story.

 

Long story short, we simply read great books, stop to savor beautiful sentences, and discuss whatever comes up, in a natural way. Thus far, my girls LOVE books and reading and I'm hoping to keep it that way. :-)

[Desert Strawberry]

No guides here. We use literature lists and high quality read-alouds. We handle lit in a totally organic and pleasing way. If I need copywork or art inspiration or whatever, I draw from our literature. I involve them in the reading and engage them in active listening. That's it. 

 

Down the road, in high school, we might do something more formal, but I'm not sure yet. My oldest is just starting 7th in July and I don't want to clog up his schedule with it. There are other topics he needs right now. 

[HS Mom in NC]

Not until high school.  We just read and discuss great literature until then.

[Another Lynn]

Me.

 

Literature Study Guides? -  Shoot me now. 

[hollyhock]

I don't. And I don't think I will in high school either, if I can help it. SWB has some great suggestions on how to do literature in her Literature Analysis audio lecture. She really makes it sound simple and doable. I always hated dissecting books in high school and it always made me hate the book itself, so I want to do something different with my own kids.

[HS Mom in NC]

In high school we enjoyed The Greenleaf Guide for Ancient Literature.  Now there's a Medieval one too.

http://www.greenleafpress.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=pubs_product_book_info&cPath=56&products_id=982