Placement Test for First Language Lessons

[LeslieF]

We are pulling our 9yo with ADHD from public school (4th grade currently) and starting homeschooling in Fall. District says he is below grade standard but i dont know how below. Should I start from book 1 and work up to book 4 to cover unknown knowledge gaps? I don't want to waste time but I want to make sure he has the requisite knowledge base before entering "middle school" age. Is there a placement test?

[Miss Tick]

Welcome! I haven't used FLL in many years, but I'm pretty sure there is no placement test and each year is standalone. The material introduced in previous books is summarized in the back (capitalization rules, verb chant, prepositions, etc) The program is super scripted, but you are welcome to modify it as you like. I would sometimes skip pieces they remembered from previous lessons. It was pretty easy going, and my high schoolers still remember some of the poetry and use the memorization chants (quietly in their heads! 😃)

Without knowing more about your ds or yourself, I would say that if it sounds like what you want you could probably start in level 3, although it would be nice to hear from someone who has used it more recently than I have.

Edited April 14, 2023 by Miss Tick
homeschool jargon

[Kiara.I]

Level 3 would be fine. The definitions get memorized in levels 1 and 2, so when they get presented in level 3 you'll need to take a bit of extra time and review to memorize them.

[EKS]

Just a warning that SWB's bottom up, study-the-trees-first-and-for-a-very-long-time approach may drive a kid with ADHD crazy.

[LeslieF]

3 minutes ago, EKS said:

Just a warning that SWB's bottom up, study-the-trees-first-and-for-a-very-long-time approach may drive a kid with ADHD crazy.

Hmm. What do you mean by "bottom up"? Also, are there other grammar curricula that may be more suited for 9 - 10yo ADHD (combined) kids? 

[EKS]

53 minutes ago, LeslieF said:

Hmm. What do you mean by "bottom up"? Also, are there other grammar curricula that may be more suited for 9 - 10yo ADHD (combined) kids? 

By bottom up, I mean parts to whole.  So you teach the pieces first.  ADHDers many times prefer whole to parts.

I'd use Michael Clay Thompson's grammar books.  They're engaging and take 5-10 minutes a day.  Do it with him as a conversation--you write.  

Once you've learned more about how he learns best, you can add other things.  

[Nm.]

My 2 children with adhd (both boys) do much better with parts to whole- rod&staff / math mammoth.  

Edited April 15, 2023 by Lovinglife123

[Porridge]

My ADHD child did fine with FLL. Years 1 and 2 have a lot of repetition, so you could probably start in year 3 and do year 4 next year. He won’t be “behind.” The lessons are short and sweet. The repetition really worked - my child can rattle off the pronouns, helping verbs, prepositions, parts of speech, etc., and that is a huge help benefit for him in his writing. Any diagramming exercises you could do on a white board with your child, to help break up the seat work.

The books after FLL (Grammar for the Well Trained Mind) are much more complex and I wouldn’t personally use them with my ADHD child. In middle school, we dabbled with Growing with Grammar (NOT good, IMHO) and landed on Analytical Grammar, which has worked well for us.  FLL gave my child a solid background to go into Analytical Grammar painlessly. We adapted the AG lessons for shorter attention spans - Instead of doing “seasons” as AG suggests, where you do grammar for only part of the year, we did grammar all year, but only half a lesson. In this way, the lessons were still short and sweet, and the repetition throughout the year helped solidify concepts.

[Helpdesk]

WTM Press doesn't have a placement test for FLL, but this article from our FAQs might be of interest.  And I agree that Level 3 is probably a good place to start.  Remember that the point is mastery, not completion-of-book, so take the time that your student needs to master the material.  

[SilverMoon]

I wouldn't do the first two levels with a kid that age. They'd feel babyish. Start at 3 or 4. 

[PeterPan]

Sometimes if you google some terms like "grade 3 grammar pdf" or whatever grade, you'll turn up things. 

https://daythemthcsblog.files.wordpress.com/2017/12/success_with_grammar_grade_3.pdf

This is from a series I used with my ds and liked. You might not find FLL a good fit, given the things you've described in your other posts. There are lots of materials out there and you might be able to find something that scratches his itch, is brief, and is very explicit. 

During covid lots and lots of stuff was out there. McGraw Hill put out a whole series of their grammar curriculum. You never know what you'll find with googling. 

Here's another http://albany.k12.or.us/media/2016/04/grammarpracticebookgrade3.pdf

He doesn't necessarily need to *write* all that. You can do it orally, use markers, scribe, whatever you want.

Edited April 19, 2023 by PeterPan

[PeterPan]

One of the things I'll do with my ds when I find materials like that is to collate it across topics. With that super bright IQ, he needs to start low but work up. So instead of getting lost in "now we're going to complete a 1st grade grammar" instead I work across levels for a topic. So we might work on pronouns or adverbs or whatever and we're going to start at the lowest level and work UP through gr 6. 

This might make you feel better. 🙂 He's probably not weak across every area and it will help you address your panic that you're doing things in too low a way while also providing repetition. 

You don't have to, but it's something to think about. There are articles on Hoagies Gifted I think about telescoping and compacting, etc. These are educational strategies you use with gifted kids when trying to decide how to approach materials. It's why things don't have to be "hard" right off the bat, because sometimes we're doing a simple thing in a sophisticated way.

I also liked the Success with Writing series with my ds and used it that way, across levels. It will let you do say 3 grade levels of the curriculum in a year without any stress.

Edited April 19, 2023 by PeterPan