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Middle school literature


Wendi
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I'm wondering what everyone here has done for middle school literature, specifically 7th and 8th grades. I was considering using Lightning Literature next year, which looks great, but I wonder if we'll be overloaded. We'll also be doing IEW SWI, and reading literature to go along with our history/geography studies (Around the World in 180 Days). So if he's doing the IEW writing, and writing reports for geography, and reading books tied into our geography program, plus reading for fun, AND reading and writing for LL, will he be overwhelmed? Or is it important for a 7th grader to do that much reading and writing?

 

I'm feeling torn between:

 

a. do Lightning Literature

b. use 2-3 literature guides

c. use the reading we're doing for geography, and make up my own "lit guides" if necessary

 

I guess I need some feedback about how much reading and writing a 7th grader should be doing.

 

Thanks!

 

Wendi

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I had the exact same question last year. We are using LL7 this year along with History Odyssey and its corresponding literature and a writing program. I would have liked to just discuss the historical literature that was already scheduled, but I was not confident in my ability. LL7 has worked nicely. The variety of literature covered has been very enriching. There is plenty of time built in to LL7 for reading. The additional writing in LL7 (we don't do all of it) has provided good additional exercise to our writing program. Overall, I have been very please with the introduction to literature and plan to continue with LL8 next year.

 

If you do a search on Lightning Literature, specifically with Lori D.'s name you'll find a lot of information, not only on LL, but lots of other helpful information as well. Here are a few:

Thread 1

Thread 2

Thread 3

 

HTH!

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Well, I'm planning 7th grade based on our success with 6th grade. I compared the recommended reading from WTM with the Middle Ages reading suggestions for Omnibus II from Veritas Press and saw that there was a lot of overlap. So we used Omnibus. DS would read the introduction to the book, then do the selected readings, discussing them with me. Often we used the discussion questions but sometimes I would just wing it. We didn't do the writing assignments since we are working through the progymn with CW. But we did most of both the Primary and Secondary readings each semester. Sometimes when WTM recommended a particular edition we went with that instead of the one recommended by Veritas for use with Omnibus. That sometimes upset the reading schedule and discussion questions, but we worked around it.

 

All in all I think it went really well. I'm hoping to use Omnibus III for 7th doing the same thing as last year since there's still quite a bit of overlap in the reading list. But we may need to do something else for 8th grade since there isn't as much from the modern period in Omnibus that is recommended in WTM and that I particularly want to tackle.

 

So, take that for what it's worth.

Blessings!

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Thanks for the links! Somehow I didn't find those when I searched. It sounds like the reading load will not be too bad for LL, and if we want to focus more on a writing assignment, we can set aside IEW for that week. I definitely think my ds will benefit from LL.

 

Wendi

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