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SAT grammar (Writing) portion


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So would the hive recommend a certain grammar program in high school that will also take care of this section of SAT? Or is it better to just use test prep when time is right? 

I have WTM new grammar program but it’s just not a good fit. It’s simply too much. I am not sure what I am looking for, but not a program that takes considerable daily time (Rod & Stuff, I am looking at you). I want something simple and to the point. 

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1 hour ago, Roadrunner said:

So would the hive recommend a certain grammar program in high school that will also take care of this section of SAT? Or is it better to just use test prep when time is right? 

I have WTM new grammar program but it’s just not a good fit. It’s simply too much. I am not sure what I am looking for, but not a program that takes considerable daily time (Rod & Stuff, I am looking at you). I want something simple and to the point. 

My kids went through the MCT program in elementary and middle school.  It was not time consuming.  They completed one sentence a day in the sentence workbook (can't remember the name now, but they analyzed the daily sentence using the 4-level analysis). This prepared them for the grammar section on the SAT.

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I don't recommend spending time on a grammar program in high school if you don't have to.
If you are just looking for SAT grammar, then examine the questions missed (or guessed) on practice tests. If they are telling you that the kid doesn't have a good grasp of things like punctuation usage, parallel construction, or subject-verb agreement, I'd just use targeted test prep. 

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37 minutes ago, alewife said:

My kids went through the MCT program in elementary and middle school.  It was not time consuming.  They completed one sentence a day in the sentence workbook (can't remember the name now, but they analyzed the daily sentence using the 4-level analysis). This prepared them for the grammar section on the SAT.

 

We have done MCT. Our experience has been different. This type of practice (identifying and naming parts of speech, sentence, clause) hasn’t really materialized into what I wanted. 

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We used Killgallon high school, in middle school. We did it orally, one chapter per month.  We would try to find these more advanced items in our reading and his writing.  We had already done MCT for the basics in primary school.  The SAT is more of a test of mental quickness and endurance, than of actual content.  So make sure you focus on those things by doing practice tests closer to test time.  My ds with this approach got a perfect score on the grammar portion. 

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We had done Abeka grammar in middle school and just kept up some grammar with Easy Grammar in ninth and tenth. But for the SAT I went through a practice test and looked at what was tested. It was a very narrow subset of what's covered in a complete grammar course. Then we just reviewed those topics before the SAT. 

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20 hours ago, RootAnn said:

I don't recommend spending time on a grammar program in high school if you don't have to.
If you are just looking for SAT grammar, then examine the questions missed (or guessed) on practice tests. If they are telling you that the kid doesn't have a good grasp of things like punctuation usage, parallel construction, or subject-verb agreement, I'd just use targeted test prep. 

 

Once again, I'm on Team RootAnn. Personally, I'd do a practice section or two to determine what, if anything, is an issue. Then I'd either do targeted practice on problem areas, or assign 15-30 minutes per week on Khan Academy for general test prep.

 

Edit: If I recall correctly, OP, your son is younger. We did Analytical Grammar in 7th grade, and that was the end of grammar instruction for us. I highly recommend it.

Edited by JoJosMom
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We did not spend any time on formal grammar studies, except for some targeted test prep immediately before the test.

You lay the foundation by having the student develop solid language mechanics in the elementary and middle grades by correcting their speech, their writing, and by having them read a lot of well written, grammatically and semantically correct material. That is the best preparation. This means the student will automatically cringe when she encounters subject-verb  or tense disagreements etc. It then just needs some test prep to become familiar with the types of questions that are asked, and the format.

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3 hours ago, JoJosMom said:

Edit: If I recall correctly, OP, your son is younger. We did Analytical Grammar in 7th grade, and that was the end of grammar instruction for us. I highly recommend it.

Not so young. This is shaping up to be our 9th grade. I need to start thinking about tests a little more.

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9 hours ago, JoJosMom said:

 

Once again, I'm on Team RootAnn. Personally, I'd do a practice section or two to determine what, if anything, is an issue. Then I'd either do targeted practice on problem areas, or assign 15-30 minutes per week on Khan Academy for general test prep.

 

Edit: If I recall correctly, OP, your son is younger. We did Analytical Grammar in 7th grade, and that was the end of grammar instruction for us. I highly recommend it.

I would also highly recommend Analytical Grammar. It was the only grammar program we ever used and my son aced the verbal section of the SAT. And when he was in college, he thanked me many times for making him do the program, even though he disliked it very much. He now reads grammar books for fun.

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We tried Editor in Chief, and it wasn’t a good fit here. 

For SAT grammar, my son used Erika Meltzer’s prep book.  His score on the SAT grammar section was excellent, and he needed that score to make up for a relatively low score on the reading section that he was unable to improve no matter how much he tried.  

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Another vote for Analytical Grammar. We use it after FLL from 6th-8th grade, and then grammar instruction ends. It's a 3-year program, but really only 1-semester a year - so 2 of the 'seasons' could be doubled up for a single year of grammar instruction. Our first is gearing up for his first SAT in Dec, but the practice tests so far show he's solid in grammar. ? 

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