Solid English Composition and grammar course

[Faithr]

Hi all,

 

I'm looking for a good, solid Eng. Comp and Grammar course for my (next year) 11th grader. He's already studied lots of literature and he's a pretty good writer but he's shakey on the technicalities of grammar and punctuation. He's never taken a high school level grammar and comp course and I think he needs one, especially as he prepares for the SAT.

 

Any suggestions?

 

Thanks!

[happykids]

You could have him go through all 9 units of TWSS and SWI-C and also their High School Essay intensive course. This teaches you how to write the SAT essay and college application esssays.

IEW also sells The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation. This will teach him plenty of grammar and is very helpful for the SAT.

IEW's theme based lessons are also a great way to practice all 9 units. If he is studying American History in 11th grade, he could go through the American History based writing lessons.

http://www.excellenceinwriting.com

 

~Sabrina in NY

[readwithem]

Two that I like -

 

Jensens Format Writing

R&S (rod and staff).

 

Neither is fancy but they're both very good, tight solid programs.

[chelsea in TN]

I 2nd Rod and Staff - The upper grades are communicating Effectively.

 

Rod and Staff is a VERY Solid grammar program.

[Faithr]

I think the Rod and Staff books look like the kind of thing I was thinking of. But I have two more questions:

 

1. Should he do the 9th grade or 10th grade texts? Does the 10th grade build on the 9th? I'd rather he do the 10th as I'd like him to really know this stuff thoroughly.

 

2. How much time each week would he need to schedule to get through the text? We are not the type to do every exercise, but do a lot of stuff together orally. But still, he'd need to do a fair amount of writing. So what's realistic, one hour, M - F?

 

Ladies, thank you so much for your suggestions. I never would have thought of Rod and Staff. The last time I used anything from them was the Pathway Readers! The IEW program has always intimidated me. It just looks so teacher intensive and time-consuming. I can never understand how it works from the website. And once we tried Jensen's Vocabulary and couldn't understand it one bit. We gave up after about 4 lessons. I think we're just not on the same wavelength.

 

Anyway, thanks a ton. I think R&S is the answer!

[vmsurbat]

Abeka has solid grammar/comp texts for the high school level. You could choose either the ninth or tenth grade book set.

 

R&S is also an excellent choice; we use it only at the elementary (K-7) level because after that, I prefer the workbook format of Abeka. It is visually appealing, provides solid instruction, includes plenty of exercises (choose just half!), and is a nice change of pace from R&S.

[readwithem]

I think the Rod and Staff books look like the kind of thing I was thinking of. But I have two more questions:

 

1. Should he do the 9th grade or 10th grade texts? Does the 10th grade build on the 9th? I'd rather he do the 10th as I'd like him to really know this stuff thoroughly.

 

2. How much time each week would he need to schedule to get through the text? We are not the type to do every exercise, but do a lot of stuff together orally. But still, he'd need to do a fair amount of writing. So what's realistic, one hour, M - F?

 

Ladies, thank you so much for your suggestions. I never would have thought of Rod and Staff. The last time I used anything from them was the Pathway Readers! The IEW program has always intimidated me. It just looks so teacher intensive and time-consuming. I can never understand how it works from the website. And once we tried Jensen's Vocabulary and couldn't understand it one bit. We gave up after about 4 lessons. I think we're just not on the same wavelength.

 

Anyway, thanks a ton. I think R&S is the answer!

 

The 9th and 10th books are designed to use interchangeably, they are divided by themes (I guess all of the grades are that way:) so you can pick and choose what you want to do. They don't necessarily build sequentially.

 

And we tend to do all of them orally as well, except for the writing exercises. Generally we do it weekly (sometimes less frequently:rolleyes: and she reads several chapters at a time, then we do alternate exercises every day. It's not time consuming at all, in fact that may be to our detriment because it tends to fall through the cracks :)

[StaceyinLA]

They certainly do build on one another up until the 8th grade text.

 

I don't know what grade your child is in, but those 9th/10th grade texts have some stuff in them that I have never heard of! I think you can do R&S texts up to the 8th grade book and have covered grammar most people never will. I'd use the 7th/8th grade texts with high schoolers and leave it at that. It is that solid of a program.

 

I just used the 4th and 5th grade books with my son (youngest of my 4 - now using Analytical grammar in 7th grade), and he can do more grammar than my high school junior, and he diagrams like a fiend.

 

You really need to look at the texts before you choose a level.

[readwithem]

I didn't mean you could jump around in earlier years, just that they are all divided by themes.

[Faithr]

I looked through the table of contents for Grade 10 and the only thing thing that looked unfamiliar to me were 'substantatives.' Not sure what they are! But everything else looked familiar. It is kind of quaint that they teach about card catalogs! I've done a fair amount of diagramming with the kids, though my 15 yo is the weakest in the family at it. But I think if I'm teaching him one on one, he'll be more likely to get it. I'd teach it to the whole family at one time and he just didn't engage the way my 12 yo did, for example.

 

I have some grammar reference books and there's a TM and I'll be doing this one on one with him, so I'm thinking we could do this. Maybe I'm overly confident!