Working on Grammar with Easy Grammar Systems {A Homeschool Review Crew Review}

Grammar. The subject I would prefer to avoid. The subject my daughter doesn't see the use of. And the problem is, mom doesn't know how to explain the necessity either, seeing as I get along just fine without understanding all the ins and outs of grammar. However, now that I am the teacher and not just the mom, I need to be able to teach grammar to my children. So, when we are offered the chance to review a grammar curriculum, I jump at the opportunity. I figure we can learn together. Even though Tabitha was less than thrilled with me, I welcomed the opportunity to review Easy Grammar Plus from Easy Grammar Systems. 

We received an email with the link to the Easy Grammar Plus eBook PDF. It was quite simple to click on the link and download the file to my computer. And from there, we were ready to go.

This 720-page  book is actually the Teacher Edition, which includes teaching instructions, reviews and tests (both unit and cumulative), plus answer keys. As we had the downloadable files, I was able to easily print out the exercise pages and give them to the children to work on, without having to worry that they would have access to the answers. I say "worry," because the answer pages are on the left side and the exercises are on the facing page in the physical book. If we had received the book, which I had originally thought I wanted, I would have had to use  photocopied the pages for multiple reasons. One, I ended up using the book with both Tabitha and Amelia. Two, I probably would have photocopied them anyway so I could use it in future years with the younger children. And three, I would have wanted to make sure the children didn't see the answers. So, even though it wasn't my original choice, I have to say I am glad we received the book as a downloadable eBook. 

I will add, if you don't want to photocopy or print, and also don't want your child to write in the teacher edition, there is a physical Easy Grammar Plus Student Workbook available. There is also an Easy Grammar Plus Student Test Booklet, seeing as tests are not included in the Student Workbook.

Let's look at what is contained in Easy Grammar Plus: 

The book begins with the Table of Contents. There is then an eight-page pre/post assessment test and an introduction before getting into the lesson pages. The book concludes with the answers to the pre/post assessment test. 

Here is a list of the topics covered in Easy Grammar Plus:

• Prepositions
• Verbs
• Nouns
• Interjections
• Conjunctions 
• Adjectives
• Types of Sentences
• Sentences, Fragments, and Run-ons
• Phrases and Clauses
• Adverbs
• Pronouns 
• Punctuation
• Capitalization
• Letters

The Introduction explains the purpose of Easy Grammar Plus, which is to provide grammar TOOLS to the student. The author also explains the two most important guidelines for using the book. The parent/teacher is to insist on MASTERY learning (making sure the student fully understands the concept) and ensure that the student first memorizes and learns the list of fifty prepositions.

Unfortunately, this first directive completely turned Tabitha off of this book. In the past she had been told that it wasn't important to memorize lists such as this. Additionally, she is not good at memorizing lists. When it comes to passages, such as Bible verses for church or Bible Quizzing, she can memorize with no problem. Of course, because of the overwhelming amount of memorizing she is currently doing because of Quizzing, she didn't want to have to memorize more. So, yes, she balked. She said she couldn't do it. Amelia, who I wasn't originally going to include in this review because she is in sixth grade, actually tried harder than Tabitha did. I honestly didn't like that this had become such a point of contention in our day. I mean, as I mentioned above, Tabitha already complained that she didn't see the need of learning grammar. I even tried telling her, just read through the list a few times a day, don't worry about sitting down and memorizing it, just familiarize yourself with the prepositions. 

I finally decided we couldn't spend so much time focusing on the memorization of a list of words, so we moved forward in the book. I figured they could have the list of prepositions in front of them while working, if needed. My sneaky desire was that they would still learn them as they used the list, viewing it several times a week. 

I think the girls did have fun playing the Bingo game that was designed to help them familiarize themselves with the prepositions.

Though they weren't as fond of having to unscramble them.

Now, let me just say, I do understand the idea behind memorizing the prepositions. However, I believe children can learn them, get them in their heads, by diving right into the lessons and having the list in front of them to reference. I understand that this book uses a "prepositional approach," where the student works in a sequential manner, starting with the basics of the sentence, identifying the subject and verb by crossing out the prepositional phrase, and then working on more challenging topics. I understand this. I just question the need to memorize the list and make it a mandatory first task.

I like how the girls began by looking at simpler sentences, just needing to identify the subject and the verb, but then the sentences became more complex as they were to also identify such things as compound subjects, helping verbs, and infinitives. Of course, then they were taught that a word listed as a preposition wasn't always used as a preposition. It might be used as say, an adverb. Which got an "I told you so" from Tabitha, because that was one of her arguments when she fought memorizing the list. I did explain that that doesn't negate the fact that the words are still used as prepositions.

Here's a look at how the lesson is laid out. First there is a short instructional page with examples:

Then comes the answer page: 

And finally, the actual exercise page where the child is to follow the instructions on what to cross out and single or double underline:

So, you can see where having the prepositions memorized would help with this curriculum. In order to quickly identify the prepositional phrases, a student is going to have to know their prepositions. Of course, I assume you can see, as I did, how a child can still work through the exercises by having the list in front of them. So yes, our little modification for this book. As I looked ahead in the book, I did notice that prepositions don't always come into play in the exercises for the other topics. However, there are times when students are still asked to work through the sentences as they are taught in this first section, before working on such things as labeling types of verbs or adverbs.

How did we use this book?

After our time of trying to memorize the prepositions and playing the Bingo game, the girls have been working their way through the book at the rate of a few lessons a week. I will read the short lesson information, and then I have them give me the answers orally to the examples. Then I hand them their page and have them work through the exercises. This takes them, at most, 15 minutes a day.

The Preposition section concludes with a review and test. The Verbs, Nouns, Adjectives, Adverbs, and Pronouns sections also end the same way. The Punctuation and Capitalization sections go straight into a test. And when a child finishes the entire book, they are supposed to retake the assessment test to see how they have improved. 

All in all, I think Easy Grammar Plus from Easy Grammar Systems is a great grammar curriculum that helps a child really look at a sentence and understand the different parts. 

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Improving Our Knowledge of Grammar with GrammarPlanet {A TOS Review}

I have a confession to make. First of all, I'm sure you will have noticed if you have been reading my blog for any length of time, that I love reading, and I love instilling a love of reading in my children. I also love to write. In fact, it has always been my dream to write a book one day. However, I have this tiny problem. Grammar and I are not friends. I am always struggling with the finer points of grammar, which also makes it hard to teach it to the children. So, when we were given the opportunity to review a new, online program called GrammarPlanet, I was thrilled! Not only were the older girls going to work on grammar, mommy was going to as well. 

Now, here's the thing, GrammarPlanet is actually a free website for learning grammar, punctuation, and usage. What we are getting to review is the paid version which does not include advertisements. I mean, who likes to deal with ads while they are doing schoolwork? That said, if you don't mind ads, you can head on over right now, and sign up for a free account. 

But first, wait!! Let me tell you a bit more about the program, so you can determine how fast you want to zing over there.

GrammarPlanet is a brand new site created by Erin Karl and Jerry Bailey. Erin Karl is the owner of Analytical Grammar, Inc., and Jerry Bailey is the president of Dynamic Literacy, LLC.. GrammarPlanet is actually based on Analytical Grammar, which started with Erin's mother, and is how Erin herself learned grammar. 

Currently GrammarPlanet has 13 Units for children to work through, with units being added weekly. Once the site is complete, there will be a total of 60. When we first started this review period, there were only 4 or 5 units, so in the past six weeks, around 8 units have been added.

Here is a screenshot that shows all of the topics that will be covered in the program:

The scary thing is, I am not even sure what all of those topics are. This is definitely a program that I need!

Now let's take a look at how the program works. 

As the parent/teacher, I have a teacher account where I added both girls, plus myself, as students. I had to make myself my own student account because the program can not be used from the teacher account. I can access these accounts through the dashboard:

From here I can check on our progress, even clicking through "Group Report" there in the upper right corner to get a printable copy. I can also click on each student's name to take a closer look at their/our progress.

While on this screen, I can access printable copies of each unit's report (bottom right corner). By clicking on the dark blue arrow on the left of the screen, I can see how each student (me in this case) answered each question, where they are making mistakes, plus see each unit's score.

Looking at Unit 4, here is one of my practice sentences that had all the words marked properly.

And here is one where I got one wrong.

Sometimes a student may label a word that wasn't supposed to be labeled during the lesson. When that happens, the program marks it red and tells you it should have been "unused." Even though it is red, these mistakes don't appear to be counted against the student. For example:

If you can see along the left sidebar, for this test sentence I had 7/9 correct, though clearly four are marked red. So, I deduced that ones that should have been "unused" don't count against the student.

Okay, so, now you have seen what I can see as a parent, how about we take a look at the student account, and how this program actually works. 

When I log into my student account I come to a very similar dashboard to the teacher account. There are a few differences that remind me that I am on my student account, as opposed to the teacher account. 

From this account I can only "Continue Progress," which is that green button under my name. Clicking the "Continue Progress" button will only allow you to work on the current unit. On the teacher account that green button says, "Reset Progress."  Now, the only way to redo a previous unit is to reset the progress to that unit, though a student can rewatch any of the previous videos. So, if I wanted a student to redo Unit 1, I would have to go in as the parent and reset that unit which would technically delete everything done in the other units. However, if it was just Unit 4 that needed redone, all I would have to do as the parent is reset it to Unit 4. 

I can also click the blue buttons on the right to go directly to the unit's instruction video and the printable notes, that are required to be printed out prior to watching the video.

The recommendation for this program is for a student to spend about 15 minutes during a session, and to work every other day so as to not become overwhelmed and make silly mistakes (which we were doing at the beginning as I missed this information somehow).

When you first begin the program as a student, you will see instructions on the screen.

These same steps are to be followed for every unit. We are to click on the orange button with the little book icon at the bottom left of the screen. This is one place where we can print out the notes that we use to follow along with the lesson. Then we watch the short video. Each video has been between 4 and 6 minutes long so far. After that we start working on parsing sentences.

The girls and I all use the same notes I print out, as we are not marking them up. We are just using them for reference, following along with Ms. Karl. 

The section we are supposed to be looking at also appears on the screen.

Every so often during the lesson there will be a short, one or two question, onscreen quiz to see if you are understanding the lesson.

After the video is finished. we click on "Start Practice" to start parsing sentences. Very specific instructions are given in how to do this after the second unit. We are to always start by labeling the nouns and proper nouns. Then we are to move on to the words that modify each noun, such as articles and adjectives. From there we are to label the pronouns, and so on. 

A sentence appears on the screen with each word in its own box. We click on the word we would like to label, and a box with the grammar labels we have learned so far appear on the screen.

In the above screenshot, I clicked on "legends" as it was the first noun I came to. I then had to click the "N" to label it.

This is how the sentence looks after I labeled "legends."

After I labeled all the words I thought needed to be labeled, I clicked "Submit" to find out if I was correct.

As you can see by the green highlighting, I got everything correct for this sentence. 

The number of practice sentences will vary depending upon how well the student does with each sentence. If you are making mistakes, the program will have you continue working on sentences. However, if you are doing well you will have a total of ten sentences, two in each of five tiers, or levels. Then you will move on to the test.

This test is taken exactly like the practice sentences with one difference. During the practice, as soon as you hit submit you will see your results. With the test, you will work through five sentences and will only see the results after you have completely all five. 

GrammarPlanet is designed for upper elementary students. I will definitely agree that younger children would struggle with this program. In fact, even my girls are struggling a bit and they are in 5th and 6th grade. I have noticed that some of the girls' problems come because they may be unfamiliar with the words in the sentence. As you can see from the screenshots, these are not simple "The small, gray cat walked across the road to catch a tiny mouse." type sentences. They are quite involved and have more advanced vocabulary and ideas. I also know they were struggling with different abstract nouns, not understanding why they were nouns.

GrammarPlanet requires mastery and students will got locked out if they get too many questions incorrect. If I, as the parent/teacher decide that they aren't comprehending what they have been taught, I am able to reset their progress (as I touched upon above). Thankfully, you do not need to reset to the very beginning. You can choose which unit to reset to. I admit, I had to unlock and reset myself once. 

I'll also admit, we were confused as to why Tabitha seemed to be getting locked out all the time, though Amelia was making mistakes and wasn't getting locked out. It was very frustrating for Tabitha. And then I realized there was an answer to this mystery, which is found in the FAQs section on the site. Tabitha was making errors with too many questions in what is called a "tier" or level, so she was locked out. Each level starts with two practice sentences, for a total of ten in the unit. However, because the program is "responsive," if a student misses one, they will be given an additional sentence in that level. If they miss another in that level, another one is added, and so on. If they miss too many in that level, that is when they are locked out.

We still are a bit frustrated that missing one word in the sentence is enough to consider the student as missing the question. Though I admit, when we started slowing down and not trying to fit too much work into a session, we started doing better. We were all making silly mistakes by not making sure we had everything marked before hitting submit. You know, that silly "a" or "the" that we neglected to mark as an article, or missing one of the adjectives modifying a noun.

I think we have finally gotten comfortable with the program and I have every intention of continuing with this site for the girls' grammar instruction. Oh, and mine as well. When the younger children are ready, I can add them as students as well.

I am loving that we are not only learning about grammar with this program, but while reading the sentences we are also getting lessons based on different stories and facts from around the world, some even being historical in nature. We've read about Ancient Egypt and pyramids, Galileo, the famous Baldwin Street in New Zealand, and the Inca Empire so far.

Prior to using GrammarPlanet, I had never heard of "parsing" sentences. So far, I have found it a very helpful way to see how each word is used in the sentence, really helping to understand each part of speech. Once we get to Unit 6 we will also be learning to diagram sentences.

So, are you ready to head on over and try out GrammarPlanet? Are you ready for your child (or yourself) to start learning all about grammar? I highly recommend this program, and hope you will find it beneficial in your homeschool as well. 

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Enjoying a Well-Rounded Homeschool Language Arts Program with Hake/Saxon Grammar and Writing 3 {A TOS Review}

Grammar never has been one of my strong suits. Of course, as a homeschool mom, it is my responsibility to teach my children grammar. So, I really appreciate when I find a product that can help me do just that. Thanks to the Homeschool Review Crew, I have been working with Hannah using the brand-new Hake/Saxon Grammar and Writing 3 from Hake Publishing. 

Prior to the release of their Grammar and Writing 3, they did have materials for older students, from 4th through 8th grade. I was thrilled that they were releasing books that I could use with Hannah, who just finished 2nd grade. Not only is grammar and writing included in this curriculum, but there is spelling, punctuation, and vocabulary development. These topics are taught with Hake/Saxon's approach of incremental development and continual review. All in all, this seemed to be a well-rounded language arts curriculum from a respected publishing company, and I was thrilled to have Hannah get started in it. 

We received the three-book set shown above. There is a Teacher Guide, Consumable Textbook, and Writing Workbook, each of which is a soft cover book. 

Teacher Guide

This 391-page book begins with an introductory section which includes a note "To the Teacher," the Teacher Schedule, plus a script for the Grammar Meetings. The next 111 pages are the scripts for the 111 lessons in the program. 

Each lesson is broken into several sections. The optional Speaking and Listening section, and the required Vocabulary, Lesson, and Review Set sections. Scripted lines that are to be read to the students are in bold font, and instructions for the teacher to follow are in italics. The sections that are in the boxes are also found at the top of the student's textbook, and they are to follow along. The lesson itself is written out in the student textbook, but not in the Teacher Guide. 

After the section with the lesson scripts you will find the Answer Key for both the Textbook and the Writing Workbook. Each lesson's answer key is displayed on a single page so it can be shown without revealing the answers to the upcoming lessons. The answers for the Writing Lessons however show 3-4 per page. The next section contains the answer keys for the tests. Tests are given after lesson 10, and then after every fifth lesson, for a total of 22 in all. Then there are answer keys for the "More Practice" pages. Not every lesson has a sheet for more practice. Out of the 111 lessons, only 28 provide an extra sheet for more practice. Also included in the "More Practice" section are three Tricky Teasers which help children practice with the different concepts they have learned thus far. These are stories with blanks for the children to fill in like a game, where they need to fill in certain parts of grammar, similar to books I used to use growing up, and which I have seen on the backs of cereal boxes and other places. 

The Teacher Guide concludes with the reproducible Masters, for the Tests and the More Practice, including the Tricky Teasers.

Consumable Textbook

This 488-page book begins with a Table of Contents, showing the student each lesson number, along with the topic for the lesson and the page where it can be found. There is then a one-page introduction for the student, after which the lessons begin. Each lesson is between three and five pages in length, and follows the same pattern. 

At the top of the page the student will find a box containing the Grammar Meeting question and Vocabulary. 

The questions give the children a chance to practice speaking in full sentences. As this curriculum is actually created with a classroom in mind, the question is usually asked to the entire group and then they take turns answering and listening to their fellow student's answers, after which they are to spend some time discussing other's answers. While we don't have a classroom, we do have a family with four children, so I have been asking this question to all the children.

I love that the vocabulary words are derived from either Latin or Greek roots. As you can see, the root is shown along with its meaning prior to sentences which explain the new words. After these sentences are read, the children are to come up with their own sentences. I occasionally include the other children in this exercise as well, especially if Hannah is having trouble coming up with a sentence.

Next we come to the actual lesson. We just read this straight from the book while snuggling on the couch.

As a part of the lesson there are a couple of examples to help demonstrate what is being taught. Directly under the example you will find the solution. I do try to hide the solution so Hannah can try to figure the examples out on her own.

Then we come to the actual practice section. Children may need direction here, especially making sure they understand what they are being asked to do for each problem. This section will include the concepts related to the lesson and ask the child to use their new vocabulary. 

The lesson concludes with a Review Set. I usually have Hannah complete this section independently to see if she is understanding the concepts she has been taught. 

This section will have concepts from the current lesson as well as previous lessons. The numbers in parentheses under the question number indicate which lesson the concept was introduced in.

I really do appreciate that the Review Set allows the child to review previously learned topics. I have noticed there are definitely concepts Hannah is struggling with. Having the reproducible "More Practice" sheets has also been very helpful, though I do wish more lessons had them. I am curious how the authors decided which lessons would have and wouldn't have these extra practice sheets. 

As we've been working through the lessons, Hannah has been introduced to sentences, subjects and predicates, action verbs, different tenses of verbs such as present tense and past tense, nouns such as proper nouns and concrete, abstract, and collective nouns. We've also looked at words with short and long vowels. As we continue through the books she will learn other spelling rules along with many other grammar rules, and we will even get into diagramming sentences. 

The student's Consumable Textbook concludes with an index.

According to the Teacher Schedule, as I mentioned above, after lesson ten and then after every five lessons thereafter the child is to take a test. It is also at that time that they are scheduled to use the Writing Workbook.

Writing Workbook

This 92-page book contains 21 lessons. The student will focus on the sentence for four lessons, the paragraph for six lessons, and then will move on to different forms of writing, such as persuasive, expository, narrative, and descriptive. At the end of the book they will be asked to write a chapter summary. Not only do they work on writing, but they are required to evaluate their writing. They will be able to use concepts they have been working on in their textbook.

After lesson 10 there is a writing lesson on The Sentence, focusing on subjects and predicates.

How are we using Hake/Saxon Grammar and Writing 3?

Hannah has what we call "mommy time" two times during the week, so we used that time to work on grammar after she reads to me for a while. As it is recommended to use this program at least three times a week we also added time on Wednesday for sitting down to use the book. We didn't get as far into the book as I would have liked as I did have a sick little girl one week, plus last week was VBS/no-regular-school week. Additionally, we did end up needing to spend more time on review than I thought we were going to. So, some days, instead of doing a new lesson, I photocopied the "More Practice" sheet or went over the previous lesson. 

We would sit on the couch or loveseat and discuss the Grammar Meeting question, sometimes asking her siblings if they weren't in the middle of their school work. Then we would work on vocabulary.

Then I would read the lesson information to her, making sure she understood the concept being taught. Though, there were times I thought she understood, but then realized she wasn't quite "getting it" while she worked on the practice questions.

Then we went over the practice questions.

I then have her work on the Review Set as independently as possible. Sometimes she remains on the couch, other times she sits at the table. 

As you can see, she does still require some guidance with certain concepts:

I absolutely appreciate that there is review of past concepts in every lesson. Things that Hannah was struggling with toward the beginning of the review period are now better understood. At first I didn't understand the approach that this curriculum takes. This approach is actually the same approach that was developed for the Saxon Math program by John Saxon. After using Hake/Saxon Grammar and Writing for the past six weeks, and glancing through the books to see what is coming in the future, I can definitely see the benefits of this approach which is explained on Hake Publishing's website on the page titled Grammar and Writing Pedagogy. 

I really love how the topics are spaced over time and there is continual review. Hannah has also mentioned how she likes the way she gets to review every day. She is really enjoying getting to learn grammar concepts she didn't know before. Though I think she is a bit frustrated, as am I, that the lines given at times are not quite long enough for her to write in. 

I admit, Hannah does struggle with her handwriting and it is a bit sloppy . I actually am not sure what a 3rd grader's handwriting should look like. However, I did notice that some of the spaces would just barely fit their typed words, such as "multiplication" in the picture below. And young children are not going to print as small as typed words. Honestly, if this didn't state it was a consumable textbook, I probably would have been having Hannah write her answers in a notebook. In fact, I am debating having her doing any writing in a notebook from now on, as we do love the program and don't want to let such a small issue interfere with her enjoyment of the work.

All in all Hake/Saxon Grammar and Writing 3 is a wonderful language arts program. I am amazed at what Hannah has begun to remember, and I am pleased that she is actually enjoying her lessons. For me as the parent, the lesson is easy to teach as it is laid out nicely. It is nice knowing that each lesson is going to follow the same format. All I have to do is read the lesson information, which actually helps me re-learn concepts as well. With only 10 to 15 Review Set questions so far, in addition to the practice that we work on together, the lesson is short enough to keep her attention and not bore her. I did notice that there will be more questions per lesson as we get further into the book. We'll have to see how she deals with this when we get to these lessons, perhaps I will allow her to spread the lessons out a bit more, or we will do grammar every day of the week. Either way, we will continue with this program, as I feel it is very well thought out and, as I thought when I first looked at it, quite well-rounded. 

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