Language Arts
Wednesday, August 22, 2012 at 04:56PM Next up is Language Arts. This has notoriously been my weak area and the area of highest turn-over for us. See here, here, here and here for a summary of our journey thus far. Since we're now fully past the whole "learning to read" stuff (Asher and Micah each read more than 100 chapter books in the past year, so I think we're good, lol)...here's our plan:
We'll use Michael Clay Thompson's stuff for the basics. We used level 1 last year but only read through Grammar Island and Sentence Island together. I didn't do any follow through or put it into practice. I did, though, appreciate the program and see its potential. This year, I'll do Grammar Town and Paragraph Town and actually use the practice books and all. I'll also use Caesar's English I for vocabulary and Latin sorts of stuff. I want to really drill this stuff home and have high hopes. ;) (Yes, I'll work this with all three boys but will try to assign more or less work depending on the needs and age of each boy.)
Beyond that, I plan to incorporate aspects of the Brave Writer program for writing and reading. I'm thinking I'll assign a book to each boy each month. Using that, I'll work in discussions about main topics, character development, plot, setting, fact vs fiction, point of view, etc. I'll also work in the main tenets of the Brave Writer program (which, incidentally, mirror the basic premise of the Writing With Ease program that we've tried in the past but with much more flexibility in subject matter)...narration/summary, copy writing and dictation. I'm thinking book reports will be in order. :)
Given all that, I could REALLY use some help in brainstorming appropriate books to assign to boys. I like the list (and ideas) presented by Brave Writer's language arts program called The Arrow...but I know that not all of those books are going to work for us and would need three different books each month anyhow. Ideas? Pretty please? Honestly, I could use the most help for Noah...my 11 year old who much prefers non-fiction and technical writing to anything fiction. I have lots of ideas for the younger two, who are thrilled with adventures and stories and fun. Help?
Reader Comments (7)
John Steinbeck's The Red Pony is an excellent book with a great appreciation for the simply life of a boy.
Isaac's Storm is a great nonfiction book about a huge hurricane.
The Diary of Anne Frank
The Boys Book of Survival, a book about how to survive anything, from snake bites to quicksand!
Left for Dead: A Young Man's Search for Justice for the USS Indianapolis
George Washington, Spymaster: How the Americans Outspied the British and Won the Revolutionary War
Animal Farm
The Giver
Grapes of Wrath