Language Arts, advanced 5th grader (next year)

[mamamoose]

We bought Easy Grammar 4 this year, and she's doing great in it. But...its BORING!!! I love grammar and am bored to tears with the repetition and black on white of the pages. I am going to keep her going on it, but its not even all that practical. There is no application for it, and while I am trying to fill in the gaps, she is my easy learner and I have a full plate with my other two younger kids. She is going into 5th next year and I'm trying to figure out where to go from here. I would really like a language arts curriculum, so she can go along at her own pace without a lot of help from me except to correct. I love the idea of Charlotte Mason and we are trying to do it, but honestly, I feel completely tapped out!

 

Thanks!

 

 

[sunshineslp]

Have you looked at CLE?

 

 

Homeschooling mama of 4... Preschool 3, preschool 4, 1st, and 2nd:)

[Holly]

We like ELTL.  It's a cross between Charlotte Mason and classical.  It's mostly independent.  I just make sure the lesson gets completed & looked over and listen to an occasional narration.

[Laura Corin]

My bright English learners did well with Galore Park - it's light on grammar, but both of my boys picked most grammar up from reading good books.

 

The book for a bright 5th grader would normally be So Your Really Want to Learn English Book 1; samples here:

 

http://www.galorepark.co.uk/Product?Product=9781905735518

 

horriblebooks.com sells the books in the US.

[SilverMoon]

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Edited May 16 by SilverMoon

[Ellie]

We bought Easy Grammar 4 this year, and she's doing great in it. But...its BORING!!! I love grammar and am bored to tears with the repetition and black on white of the pages. I am going to keep her going on it, but its not even all that practical. There is no application for it, and while I am trying to fill in the gaps, she is my easy learner and I have a full plate with my other two younger kids. She is going into 5th next year and I'm trying to figure out where to go from here. I would really like a language arts curriculum, so she can go along at her own pace without a lot of help from me except to correct. I love the idea of Charlotte Mason and we are trying to do it, but honestly, I feel completely tapped out!

 

Thanks!

 

So, are you wanting grammar and writing and literature and spelling/vocabulary? Or only grammar?

 

Easy Grammar was our favorite. ;-) But even so, I wouldn't do it every year. Next year you could focus on writing and literature, and the following year add Easy Grammar Plus and be done with it.

 

You could buy a comprehensive English such as Rod and Staff Publishers' English, which would be a complete grammar and writing, plus lots of other stuff. :-) CLE would be the same thing (grammar plus writing). In either case, you'd still need to do something for literature, and spelling or vocabulary (unless you already have that covered).

 

Or you could do Writing Strands, or Wordsmith Apprentice, plus some Progeny Press study guides. You don't *have* to do grammar again, but if you think you need to, there's Ridgewood Grammar, which uses grammar to improve writing.

[Momto6inIN]

Last year in 5th my DD:

• Read 12 high quality classic children's books that went along with our history studies and wrote a short one paragraph summary of each
• Completed a lit guide for one of the books (skipping the vocab sections)
• Did about 15 minutes of AAS 4x/week
• Easy Grammar Grade 5
• Wordsmith Apprentice and then created a family newspaper to send out to family and friends
• Wordly Wise Grade 5

It was a pretty easy language arts year (for me ;). Like you, I was not impressed with Easy Grammar, so for my next DD I will likely use Fix-It Grammar instead, probably books 1 & 2, before heading on to Analytical Grammar in 6th-8th, which my 2 DS's have really enjoyed and learned a lot from.

[mamamoose]

We like ELTL.  It's a cross between Charlotte Mason and classical.  It's mostly independent.  I just make sure the lesson gets completed & looked over and listen to an occasional narration.

ELTL?

[mamamoose]

My bright English learners did well with Galore Park - it's light on grammar, but both of my boys picked most grammar up from reading good books.

 

The book for a bright 5th grader would normally be So Your Really Want to Learn English Book 1; samples here:

 

http://www.galorepark.co.uk/Product?Product=9781905735518

 

horriblebooks.com sells the books in the US.

This looks fun! 

[mamamoose]

So, are you wanting grammar and writing and literature and spelling/vocabulary? Or only grammar?

 

Easy Grammar was our favorite. ;-) But even so, I wouldn't do it every year. Next year you could focus on writing and literature, and the following year add Easy Grammar Plus and be done with it.

 

You could buy a comprehensive English such as Rod and Staff Publishers' English, which would be a complete grammar and writing, plus lots of other stuff. :-) CLE would be the same thing (grammar plus writing). In either case, you'd still need to do something for literature, and spelling or vocabulary (unless you already have that covered).

 

Or you could do Writing Strands, or Wordsmith Apprentice, plus some Progeny Press study guides. You don't *have* to do grammar again, but if you think you need to, there's Ridgewood Grammar, which uses grammar to improve writing.

I am wanting an entire LA curriculum, but maybe that's just wishful thinking at this age?

[Ellie]

I am wanting an entire LA curriculum, but maybe that's just wishful thinking at this age?

 

"Language arts" includes the following:

 

beginning phonics instruction

penmanship

grammar

composition

spelling/vocabulary

reading/literature

 

It is not easy to get all of those components in one place. It is why publishers such as ABeka, BJUP, Rod and Staff, and others have multiple products. For example, R&S has four series which cover all components of English: Bible Nurture and Reader series (plus upper level readers), Building Christian English series, Spelling by Sound and Structure series, Penmanship for Christian Writing series.

[mamamoose]

"Language arts" includes the following:

 

beginning phonics instruction

penmanship

grammar

composition

spelling/vocabulary

reading/literature

 

It is not easy to get all of those components in one place. It is why publishers such as ABeka, BJUP, Rod and Staff, and others have multiple products. For example, R&S has four series which cover all components of English: Bible Nurture and Reader series (plus upper level readers), Building Christian English series, Spelling by Sound and Structure series, Penmanship for Christian Writing series.

Okay, well maybe I just have to put it all together for her anyway. that's okay, but I sort of liked how the public school handled it--the reading selection had vocabulary words which were also spelling words, and I can do some of that on my own, but as I said, I'm trying to minimize my prep work.

[Ellie]

Okay, well maybe I just have to put it all together for her anyway. that's okay, but I sort of liked how the public school handled it--the reading selection had vocabulary words which were also spelling words, and I can do some of that on my own, but as I said, I'm trying to minimize my prep work.

 

Many school textbooks do that because the children are not taught comprehensive, complete phonics, and so the words are introduced in the activities, then used in the reading selections, which, BTW, tend not to be really interesting.

 

There's Learning Language Arts Through Literature, and Total Language Plus, both of which are supposed to be comprehensive "language arts."

[SilverMoon]

If you liked that ps program well enough you could most likely find it from used booksellers, like Amazon or Half Price Books.

 

 

FWIW, my 5th grader's grammar and spelling books are completely open and go with zero prep work, and she is responsible enough to grade her own work (except for tests obviously). The lessons are short and efficient. She reads high quality children's literature daily, and we discuss it later. We don't do separate vocab study, because this literature is teaching her gobs and it would be redundant. Her writing is the most Mom-dependent, as it's honing a skill rather than learning a particular course of concepts. If you need something more open and go for composition perhaps look at Wordsmith Apprentice or Igniting Your Writing.

[Laura Corin]

Okay, well maybe I just have to put it all together for her anyway. that's okay, but I sort of liked how the public school handled it--the reading selection had vocabulary words which were also spelling words, and I can do some of that on my own, but as I said, I'm trying to minimize my prep work.

 

I don't think that's impossible - as in the Galore Park texts, which start from good literature and extract spelling and vocabulary from it.  Is your child an intuitive speller who just needs to work on a few wrinkles?  Is there a need for further phonics at this stage?  Not every child has the same needs and there's no requirement that they grind through things they already know.

 

[mamamoose]

I don't think that's impossible - as in the Galore Park texts, which start from good literature and extract spelling and vocabulary from it.  Is your child an intuitive speller who just needs to work on a few wrinkles?  Is there a need for further phonics at this stage?  Not every child has the same needs and there's no requirement that they grind through things they already know.

 

 

She is a great speller, but since she hasn't been doing actual spelling, I do feel her spelling has declined slightly. I don't really think she needs a great spelling program, necessarily. She doesn't need phonics at all...her mistakes are mostly silly mistakes that most adults make as well. Her grammar is the biggest detriment to her writing, and the public school hasn't taught her much of anything, with regards to punctuation and grammar, at all. There was no copywork to speak of, and any writing they did was not corrected for grammar. She is therefore very confused on a lot of it. She reads like an adult, but her comprehension is still only about a year and a half ahead of her grade level, but honestly, I can't keep up with her reading and still have prep time for the other kids, so doing any comprehension "testing" is difficult. I really like the Reading Detective series because they use real life book excerpts for all of it, and there's both fictional and factual examples. I think I can stick with that, but maybe all I am really looking for is writing, and grammar.

[Momto4inSoCal]

Mosdos press has a lot what you want included. It has a reading book that goes through stories and literary elements. It also has a workbook that covers vocabulary, graphic organizers and mini writing assignments. The selections are from real books not made up short stories and it includes comprehension questions. You could order a grade up if you feel she can handle it. Their is a big jump in that series from 5th to 6th grade. You would still need to add grammar. There are a lot of stand alone grammar curriculum to pick from: Fix It- short fairly independent

Growing with grammar

Analytical Grammar (or jr) what we went with

Winston Grammar

Easy Grammar

Edited March 12, 2016 by Momto4inSoCal