Luv'N Lambert Life

A blog about living with Epilepsy, IBHS, Homeschooling and so much more

grammar

IEW: Fix It! Grammar {Crew Review}

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For this review, we were given a copy of the Institute for Excellence in Writing’s Fix It! Grammar.  We were allowed to choose which book we reviewed and I chose the first in this series for my children: Fix It! Grammar: The Nose Tree.  We received both the Fix It! Grammar: The Nose Tree  Teacher’s manual and the Fix It! Grammar: The Nose Tree Student book for Book 1.  This is a 6 book series which sells online for $19 for the teacher’s manual and $15 for the student book.  This program series is for students in 3rd grade and up.
IEW’s Fix It! Grammar is one of the best programs I have used thus far.  The program is wonderfully thorough and so easy to use.  It was perfect for our homeschooling.
We have been looking for a great Grammar program to use for a while, especially for Emmalee.  She’s a very independent learner and doesn’t require or want a lot of instruction from the programs she uses.  So I had been searching for a program that would teach her exactly what she needs to know as quickly as she learns.  The program also needed to be somewhat adjustable and easy to pick up on because Emmalee wants to learn so quickly right now that instruction bores her and makes listening hard for her to do.  
With Fix It! Grammar: The Nose Tree, Book 1, I was able to give Emmalee a brief lesson on what she was learning and have her jump right into completing her lesson in the student workbook.  The Teacher’s manual covered everything I needed to teach Emmalee how to use Fix It! Grammar and what we were learning about in the section we were working on.  It also helped that Emma is a great student and she loves learning which made the program flow a lot easier for us.  I would not have had the same results with my son, who does not learn as easily as his sister but this program is still great for him as well.
Students do need a binder for his program which will need to be purchased before they get started.  Within the binder should be dividers organized as Fix Its, Grammar Glossary, Rewrite, and Vocabulary.  Students should start their week out by reading through the “Learn It” section, being sure to cut out the weekly grammar cards that are located at the back of the student book.  I laminated these to make it easier to use and keep up with them since they are to be used for the year and beyond of learning through Fix It! Grammar.  The first few times we did the lessons, I helped by modeling the lesson on the dry erase board to show Emma exactly what was expected of her while using the program.  As I already mentioned, it did not take her long to catch on.
Emma enjoyed fixing the passages she read through.  She also enjoyed the interesting reading that was provided through some of the passages she edited.  She also enjoyed the rewrites for each lesson.  It made for great copy writing practice to help build her handwriting skills as well.
This was such a great program for her to use and just what she was needing for the stage of learning she is now in.  I’ve watched Emma blossom in her learning while working through Fix It! Grammar: The Nose Book these past few weeks and I love seeing the love of learning on her face.  It’s the best feeling ever to have a product and know it’s working so well for your child’s learning skills.
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Junior Analytical Grammar {Crew Review}

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For this review, we were gifted a complete set of Analytical Grammar’s Junior Analytical Grammar set, which includes a teacher’s guide and student workbook.  This set retails for $39.95.  Additionally, we were also sent the Junior Analytical Grammar Companion DVD.    This is an additional purchase for $19.95.  Extra workbooks may also be purchased for $19.95 each.  This set is for students in grades 4-5.
Over the years of homeschooling, I have heard many great things about Analytical Grammar but I always avoided purchasing this curriculum because I wasn’t certain if it would live up to it’s huge reputation in the homeschooling community or if it would even be a good fit for us.  We are pretty laid back when it comes to homeschooling and I admit that I often look for the easy way to educate in order to keep school fun and to avoid battles that using heavily structured programs have caused in our home in the past.  I didn’t want to spend money on something that we most likely would never use in our school days.
When I saw Analytical Grammar come up on the Vendor List this year, I knew I wanted to give it a shot.  For one, I couldn’t say no to trying this program if I review it and two, I felt it time for a more structured program for us in homeschooling, especially for Emmalee who I used this program with during the review period.  I knew it was past time to cover these lessons with her and this was the perfect way to make that happen.
When Junior Analytical Grammar arrived, I immediately thought “this is just another workbook but I’ll give it a shot”.  The books have bright orange paper covers and spiral bindings.  They aren’t very thick books but they a jam-packed with lessons to complete.  Junior Analytical Grammar wastes no time getting right to work with the program.
Additionally, there was a sheet in the package and a booklet included which explained a bit more about Analytical Grammar – who Robin and Erin are and how they came to create this amazing company, as well as more detail on the programs available through Analytical Grammar.  I was excited to find that as middle school specialists these ladies had created an easy to use curriculum to help students really learn Grammar.  Growing up, my career goal was to be a middle school English teacher until I decided I wanted to be a Homeschool Mom instead.  The fact that Robin created this program especially for use with middle school students because she believes these years are educationally valuable really spoke volumes to me.  Her logic was the same as mine in reason to work with this particular grade level, educationally.
Another thing that really hit home with me about this program was the encouragement to delay Formal Grammar education until the 4th or 5th grade.  There are very few programs that support and are effective in promoting delayed academics in any manner.   We do practice delayed academics in our homeschool and prefer to allow our students to thoroughly study a concept before thrusting the next concept upon them.
It is suggested that Junior Analytical Grammar be completed as a prerequisite course to Analytical Grammar in preparation for the course in the 6th to 8th grade.  This allows students to really know their grammar basics before moving forward in the Analytical Grammar program.  It also allows their young minds to master these basics before moving forward.
Junior Analytical Grammar is an 11 week program that covers all the parts of speech, parts of a sentence, classic sentence diagramming and the five sentence patterns.  It introduces grammar, punctuation, capitalization and usage to students who are new to these concepts and helps prepare them at a slower pace than the original Analytical Grammar.  These concepts are also covered in Analytical Grammar’s first ten units, however the exercises in Junior Analytical Grammar are shorter and written at a lower reading level than the original program.
Since English is my absolute favorite subject, it was very easy for me to read through this program and put it to work for my family.  I did allow my 11 year old daughter, Emmalee to work through the program and she was able to do so on her own.  She would watch the video and then complete the exercises as explained in the DVD lessons without much input from me.  She would then complete the worksheets as directed by the lesson she was working through.
I also used this time to review these concepts with my son and my younger daughter, discussing what each part of speech is and how it works.  Together we diagrammed sentences using the dry-erase board and also using the examples from the book itself.  It was very easy to make work for all the kids together and also very easily completed alone by Emmalee.  This was a bonus for us as a family, since Emmalee wishes to do more independent study away from her siblings while I still prefer teaching them together as a unit.  Please not these workbooks cannot be copied in any manner so if using this program with more than one student, you will need to purchase extra workbooks or work through the program orally using paper or a dry-erase board to work through the examples.
The DVD was easy to use as well.  Emmalee just popped it into the DVD player and listened to the short lessons provided.  The DVD is a bonus to the curriculum and not necessary to use the program but it is nice to have.  Since it’s instructional, it prevents the “teacher” from having to put a huge amount of time into instructing the program and allows more independence.  This gives Mom more time to prep for the next course or to work one on one with another student or even just have a little me time.  The teacher will still need to check the students work once the worksheets have been completed.
In the teacher’s book there is an example plan for how to use Junior Analytical Grammar suggesting a 5 day a week programming.  This didn’t work for us and really wasn’t needed either.  I allowed Emmalee to work at her own pace, as she pleased and as we normally do for independent schoolwork.  She chose to watch the video and complete several of her worksheets on the same day for most lessons.  Sometimes she would chose to go ahead and test and sometimes she would feel she needed more review and would ask for that.  I allowed her to do what she thought best and discussed with her what I thought best when I felt she needed more time with a concept.  This worked well for us.
I must say that I am extremely impressed with Junior Analytical Grammar.  It is easy to use and Emmalee really loves it.  This program will be one that we continue to use in our homeschooling and I regret not having added it into our lessons sooner.

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Mobile Education Tools, Rainbow Sentences App {Crew Review}

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     Every year when our taxes come back, I look over what we need for school and try to invest it in things that would be useful for us educationally while we have the money to do so.  Last year was no different and I chose to invest in one of our favorite classroom products, our iPad.  This has been such a blessing for our homeschooling and has allowed us to be able to review great products like this one from Mobile Education Tools.

     Rainbow Sentences is an iPad app available on iTunes from Mobile Education Tools.  It’s designed to help students recognize grammatically correct sentences by using visual color coded cues.  The basic structures of Who, What, Where, and Why of sentences are color coded so that students can better understand how these combinations work together to create basic sentence structures.  With this app, students learn to recognize nouns, verbs and prepositions and have the opportunity to record their sentences in their own voice to improve their speech and other language skills.

     Rainbow Sentences features 168 unique images to create a sentence from, 6 levels of sentence complexity, and color coded words for added visual support.  Words are dragged to create correct sentence placement and are spoken for non-readers who may be using the app.  Students also have the option to record sentences in their own voices and to save and email recorded sentences.  Throughout the app, as lessons are completed, students earn puzzle pieces to encourage continued play and those puzzles come to life as they are completed, keeping the students interests active as they work through their lessons.

     Rainbow Sentences was a HIT in our house.  All three of my children loved using this one from ages 4-11.  I set the app up with their log-in and allowed them to play freely as long as they wanted.  Each of them found a different interest while using the app and all enjoyed completing the fun little puzzles as they worked through it.  This is definitely a product we will continue to use.

     Since this app is encouraged to be used with Special Needs children, it was perfect for us.  I will be able to continue using it with all three, and especially with my 4 year old who is in speech therapy once a week.  The ability for her to hear the words in the sentences and also record her own voice reading the sentences will be a great help for her auditory skills, as well as for her brother and sisters skills too.  This app has truly been a huge blessing in our family.

     Rainbow Sentences from Mobile Education Tools is available through iTunes on the iPad for $7.99.  It’s recommended for ages 3-10 as both an educational and special needs tool.  It is compatible with iPad’s system iOS 4.3 or later.  For more reviews of this product, please visit the Schoolhouse Review Crew blog!

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*Disclaimer – This app from Mobile Education Tools was provided free for me to review in exchange for my honest opinion in a blog post both by the company and the Schoolhouse Review Crew. 

Still Planning {Homeschooling}

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This is my sixth year homeschooling.  Somehow it feels like my first.  Each year is just as exciting as the first one.  Planning always brings it’s own challenges.  Then there is the changing of curriculum because what you used is no longer available or simply did not work for your child(ren). 

So this, my sixth year homeschooling is just as challenging for me as my first year was.  Actually, I think my first year may have been much easier! LOL

As I’ve mentioned before, this year I have decided to switch up curriculum and basically at the last minute.  We normally school year round in an unschooling manner, using bits and pieces of this and that for curriculum.  This year we will be switching to Tapestry of Grace for our core curriculum.  I am having to learn to plan around this study, add to it where needed and build upon what I already have.  Sounds simple, should be simple but somehow for me, it’s just not that simple.

Then to throw another loop in the rope, my usual Grammar curriculum, those wonderful FREE workbooks from Scott Foresman, are no longer available.  So now I must find something equally wonderful to use for our Grammar lessons.  I have several ideas in mind but haven’t quite nailed the right one.  After all, I just found out yesterday our original workbooks were no longer available.

So as you’ve probably guessed, I’m still planning out our school year, taking it one step at a time.  I’ve not had quite as much time as I’d like to do it because life has thrown various stops in my path but I’m getting there slowly but surely.  I’m hoping to be ready to start our school year on September 5 or there about.  Guess we will see what happens.