Week 6: Life hit; my blog entry is late.

Class Overview

This week we tackled a new structure and sentence pattern; we learned compound sentences and subject/verb transitive/direct object (S-Vt-DO).

S-Vt-DO
We talked about the fact that a transitive verb transfers action to an object.  We started with a subject/verb, then added an object.  For example,

Matthew threw...
and I would ask the question (verb, who or what?).  They would respond,
threw who or what?  threw ball.

So, we bantered back and forth, always asking the question, "Verb, who or what?"  The answer, of course, is...the object that receives the action, the direct object.

When I asked everyone to make up their own S-Vt-DO sentence it was a bit more challenging.  Many stumbled over the prepositional phrase ending instead of a noun acting as a direct object.  For example,

Mary swam in the lake.
If we are trying to find a direct object, the question that we ask is swam, who or what?.  In the lake answers the question where? and is adverbial. So, to make a direct object, we have to answer the right question, who or what?.  A possible answer would be,
Mary swam a mile.
swam, who or what? swam mile.  Mile is a noun, acting as a direct object.

Please remember to ask the question, verb, who or what? when finding the DO.  If it doesn't answer that question, it isn't a direct object.

Compound Sentences
First, I covered the definition of a compound sentence and reviewed the list of coordinating conjunctions.  I made it clear that a compound sentence has to have two independent clauses (sentences) joined by a coordinating conjunction, both elements or it isn't compound.

First, we made compound sentences by adding a coordinating conjunction to join some independent clauses.  I gave them many examples,

I take good care of my cat.     He loves me.
The British attacked.     Washington defended.
Carl became an intern.     He makes great coffee.
I spent all my money.     I am broke.

Next, we moved on to differentiating between coordinating conjunctions that are joining words only and those that are joining independent clauses.  For example,

Bob and Carl ate donuts and talked.  
(first and joins Bob, Carl = words (compound subject); second and joins donuts, talked=words (compound verb)) 

Claire sneezed, and milk came out her nose.
(and joins Claire sneezed, milk came out her nose=independent clauses)

Please note that a compound sentence requires a comma before the coordinating conjunction.  A compound subject or compound verb does not require a comma.  In fact, adding a comma is probably the biggest comma misuse out there.

Here is where it gets tricky.

Thomas hiked the mountain and reached the summit.  

No comma necessary because and is joining an independent clause with the phrase reached the summit.  This is a compound verb, not a compound sentence.  The temptation is to add that comma, but it doesn't belong.

When diagramming a compound sentence, use a dotted line with a "chair" between verbs.

Grammar Rule

Rule 2a: Semicolons (pp. 60)

Use a semicolon between related independent clauses not joined by a coordinating conjunction.

In other words, if you have a compound sentence, you can substitute a semicolon for the coordinating conjunction.  So,

Claire sneezed, and milk came out her nose.
Claire sneezed; milk came out her nose.

The semicolon goes on the "chair" when you diagram.

Grammar (Drill)

Memory work through week six and review charts A-F, and take a look at chart H (conjunctions) to see that there are many types of conjunctions.  Just memorize the grey area at the top (definition) and the coordinating conjunctions (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so); forget the rest for right now.

Dialectic (Understanding)

Work through many compound sentences.  Create them, and "task" them on the task sheets.  Challenge yourself with S/Vt/DO compound sentences if you want.

Don't ignore the back of the task sheet.  On task 5, one exercise makes you write a sentence by structure.  Have fun making a simple sentence compound, or making a compound, simple.

English grammar is a puzzle! Have fun taking it apart and putting it back together and seeing the wonderful picture of language that God created so that we could relate to one another!

Personal Note

Moms, grace to you as school marches on in spite of life happening.  In order to keep it real and provide a bit of group therapy, I'll let you know that I have five, 5, V, that's FIVE! whopping loads of laundered, but not folded clothes in piles around my living room.  If you come over, please perch atop one of them, grab a cup of hot tea (or Starbucks), and chat with me awhile, or is it a while?  And when we chat, we'll ignore the fact that math and spelling isn't getting done right now, and we'll definitely not see that my children are running around barefoot in 55 degree weather.  Your friendship blesses me.  Please come to Mom's Night Out next Thursday.  I want to know you more.

Week 5, Did we introduce interrogative sentences?

Class Overview

In class we introduced the interrogative sentence.  Our crime scene, chalked out and roped off, on the sanctuary floor, drew lots of questions as students went by on the way to science and lunch.  I heard, "Who did this?" and "Did someone really die in here?" and "What's going on?"  And you found out the answers when you came to class.  Mrs. Varnell did this.  No, no one died here.  Mrs. Varnell was just trying to illustrate that when there is a crime scene, police ask questions and interrogate suspects to find answers.  Interrogate reminds us of interrogative, which is the name of the type of sentence whose purpose is to ask questions.

We talked about the three ways to change a declarative sentence into an interrogative:

1) Inflection, "Robert talks." vs "Robert talks?"

2) Interrogative pronoun
(who, whom, whose, which, what--9th song on sidebar in Cycle 2) replaces the subject,
"Robert talks." vs "Who talks?"
 This form is labeled (SP) when we are labeling sentences in task #2 on the task sheet.

3) Helping verb introduces the sentence, "Robert talks." vs "Did Robert talk?"
The helping verb is labeled (Vh) when we are labeling sentences in task #2 on the task sheet.
We will memorize the list of helping verbs in Foundations this year, after we finish prepositions.

We spent time working through the task sheet with each of these forms and focused on diagramming the helping verb sentence, which students have to switch around in their heads to the declarative form in order to diagram.  For example, "Did Robert talk?" becomes "Robert Did talk." (Did capitalized to remain the first word of the sentence).  This is much easier to work with when diagramming.  Remember to put both the helper and main verb together to the right of the bisecting line.

Robert (line) Did talk

Grammar (Drill Section)

Review memory work through week 5, and charts (A-F)

Grammar Rule (Rule 5, page 69)
This week we talked about the difference between its and it's.  Remember that its is a possessive pronoun, it's is a contraction.  Easy way to check--ask yourself, "Can I replace the two words it and is in the sentence?"  If you can, it's a contraction.  If you can't, it's not.

"It's not its problem," is the same as, "It is not its problem."

Dialectic (Understanding Section)

Work with your student to make up interrogative sentences using all three forms: inflection, interrogative pronoun, and introductory helping verb.  Then "task" a few sentences as far as your student can go.  Remember, new students, if you make it through task 2, you've accomplished big things.  If you can go all the way to task 4, you've arrived.

Moms, please remember that quantity is not king.  Quality is the focus of EEL.  We take one sentence and tell everything there is to know about that sentence before setting it aside.  We don't just identify all the nouns in 20 sentences, we go much deeper because we identify nouns in every sentence throughout the entire year.  There is a cumulative effect.

Special Note for those using the checklists
You will see the Quid et Quo introduced this week in Thursday's lesson.  This tool is a separate page from the task sheet, but is task six.  There is a basic and advanced form.  If you would like to do this, please have at it, but don't worry about it if you have never used this tool before.  Remember that the checklists were written with year two and three students in mind.  If you have no idea what the Quid et Quo is, just skip that part.  Year two students, it's time to try this.  Year three students, advanced form as far as you can.

One other thing about checklists.  This week and last you may have noticed that it just says "forum sentences" and then gives the numbers you are to cover.  All this means is that your student should parse these sentences with you.  This is meant to be an oral drill instead of the formality of the task sheet.  This is task sheet without it in front of you--very dialectic.  Just look at the sentence and tell everything you can about it:  part of speech, gender, number, person, tense, talk about what kind of verb it is, what kind of noun, what purpose, structure...  Talk about the sentences and identify.  This is like a mini Quid et Quo.

If you can not be there, Mom, have your child label the sentence with parts of speech/usage.

Week 4 (You) Begin task sheets.

Announcements
If you have not yet paid for checklist copies, please bring $6 with you next week.  Thanks!

Class Overview

We introduced the imperative sentence with the understood you.  We practiced changing declarative sentences into imperative sentences.  For instance, Miss Zielny speaks, becomes, Speak.  The colossal toddler stomped on an unsuspecting ant, became, Stomp! or rather Don't Stomp if you prefer.

From the imperative sentence, we moved on to interjections.  We talked about how the interjection is not really part of the grammar of a sentence, except to add emotion.  I explained that if we use an exclamation point after an interjection, it demands more emotion than a plain comma after an interjection.

Finally, we launched into the task sheet.  You will be using this tool throughout the rest of the year.  Either make copies and have your student "task" sentences in pencil and then move on to another sentence with another task sheet, or slip the task sheet into a page protector and use dry erase or vis-a-vis.

Assignments

Grammar (Drill Section)
Review memory work through week 4 and charts A-F.

Dialectic (Understanding Section)
Practice changing some declarative sentences into imperative.
Add an interjections to the beginning of a sentence.

Task Sheets
First year students: try tasks 1-2, then 3-4 if you and your student are comfortable.  Remember that writing a dictated sentence is a huge skill to undertake.  Then checking spelling and the elements of a sentence can be exhausting.  If 1-2 overwhelms, know that you are still in a good place.  Be willing to gauge where your child is and work with him at that level.  There will be much more time to move deeper in this curriculum.  (No crying in Essentials).

Second and third year students: Take on the task sheet!  If you have never done task 5, try it.  Dust out the cobweb build-up from summer and rewrite those sentences according to purpose, structure, and with modifiers.  Third year kids, even tackle the active and passive voice element.

Remember that task #6 is the Quid et Quo tool.

Suggested sentences are in the checklists as well as in the back of the mom folder that we handed out at orientation.

Here are a few in increasing difficulty:
Mom laughed.
Time flew.
Hope soared.
Wow! You won.
Dance.
Ryan and Andrew aimed carefully at the target.
A colossal toddler stomped an an unsuspecting ant.
Oh my goodness! Because the baby didn't know better, she sharply yanked my hair and spit up on my silk shirt.

Wow! If you task the last sentence, please bring it in for me to see!

Week 3: Nouns and Avoiding Repetition

Announcements:
Next week during the first hour of Foundations, Tina and I will be available in the sanctuary for Q and A about Essentials.  If you are overwhelmed or confused, or just need a bit of clarification, please come.  For those who cannot be there due to tutoring, please talk with us and we will gladly set up another time to meet.

Class Focus:
Overview of nouns and pronouns (charts E, F)
Explanation of two of the sentence purposes, declarative and exclamatory
Introduction of Grammar Rule #12a,b (pronoun rules)
     These are from the gray sheets at the back of the student binder that are not page protected.

Memory Work (Grammar)
Remember that this is the foundation of Essentials.  Do this if you do nothing else.  This is where first year students live, before diving any deeper into understanding.

1) Review: Charts A, and C, (Sentence Classification, Verbs) or alternate between charts and weekly memory work (flashcards).

2) Introduce and drill charts E and F ( Nouns, Pronouns).

Remember only to go as deep as your child is ready.

Young, first year students don't have to go further than chart A and the main definitions at the top of charts C, E, and F.  Anything more is gravy.

Second and third year students should be filling in much more of each chart, at lease major divisions and subdivisions, if not details.  Review those pronoun songs (on blog sidebar, http://essentialsofgreensboro.blogspot.com) to practice the types of pronouns: Nominative, objective, possessive, reflexive, relative, demonstrative, interrogative, and indefinite.


Understanding (Dialectic)

1) Usage
In class, we discussed that nouns and pronouns perform different roles, or have usage, in a sentence.  The role that the students need to comprehend during these first weeks is the "subject" role.  The student should be able to identify a noun or pronoun used as a subject.  They should also be able to identify other nouns or pronouns in a sentence, though not necessarily the function of that noun or pronoun.  For example,

It remains her pride and joy.

I expect students to know that both "It" and "her" are pronouns and that "It" is used as the subject of the sentence.  I do not expect the students to know that "her" is used as a possessive pronoun adjective, describing a predicate nominative phrase (unless they are second or third year students, in which case, they need to dust off the cobwebs that crowded in there during the summer and dive right in).

2) Type
Noun types are fun.  Banter about the difference between proper and common, concrete and abstract.  Come up with examples of collective and compound nouns.

Trick for remembering difference between concrete and abstract.

When you go to the art museum, you can touch the concrete floor, but you can't touch the abstract art.

Pronoun types aren't nearly as fun.  They fall into the memory work category.  They eventually need to be drilled, but you don't have to worry about this yet.

3) Number
We touched on the difference between singular and plural.  Talk about this concept and ask your student to identify whether a word in a sentence is singular or plural.

4) Gender
They came up with male and female in class, but neuter was a foreign concept to some.  You can point to objects in a room and explain that the paper, the window and the bookshelf are neuter.  Good vocabulary word to introduce!

5) Case (Moms, unless your child is a third year student, this is only for you to understand.)
In the second class, I completely forgot what case was.  In an effort to demonstrate that your tutor is learning right along with you, I'll give a synopsis of my findings (pp. 46-47 in EEL guide).

There is debate among grammarians concerning the English language truly having noun cases.  The notion of a case of noun is derived from Latin, where nouns change their form (or endings) to reflect the role (e.g., family) that noun is playing in a sentence.  In the English language, our nouns do not change endings, or form, to reflect their role in a sentence.  Rather, a particular noun's role is determined more by word order, according to where the word is located in a sentence.

So, in English, case refers to a noun's place in a sentence, or it's job, as demonstrated by the form it takes.

Nominative or subjective case includes pronouns used as the subject.
I, you, he, she, it, we, you, they  can all be used as subjects.  Me or him could not be subjects.  They belong to the

Objective case (used as direct objects, indirect objects, objects of the preposition, or object complement nouns).

Possessive case refers to pronouns used as possessive noun adjectives

Other usages are appositive and nouns of direct address.

Have fun talking about all these subjects this week.  Next week we introduce the task sheet!  Fun!

Checklists, Instructions and Encouragement

I wanted to spell out the instructions I gave you for the checklists that most of you picked up on Tuesday.

There were 4 piles of paper
1. Checklists: consist of the main bulk of the copies (largest pile of papers)--These are the student pages.
2. Essentials Editing Exercises: These are numbered 1-12 and are two sided.  Please collate these work pages with the student checklist.  Each page (numbered by appropriate week) needs to be placed at the back of each week's first lesson (Wednesday).
3. Answer Keys: this packet contains all the Our Mother Tongue lesson answers as well as the forum sentences, parsed and diagrammed. This packet is intended for teacher use.
4. Synopsis Pages: this packet starts with the Forum Sentence synopsis, and also includes capitalization and punctuation rules overview, spelling rules overview, and all the optional vocabulary quizzes that go along with IEW vocabulary.

If you are overwhelmed by this resource and it doesn't contribute to peace of mind, please set it aside for a while and try it later, after further understanding makes it comfortable or when you get your sea legs with Essentials.

If you're overwhelmed, please revert to memory work only.  Remember that the first couple of weeks are heavy for memory work, but pretty soon it will settle down to a reasonable pace. Also, understand that the memory work needs to be introduced right away, but that mastery will take some time. Be patient with yourself.  If you feel tempted to cry, please breathe and scale back.  Feel free to email me or call if you need a lifeline or need to understand how to scale back.  Three quarters of the battle with Essentials is understanding how to approach it.

Have a blessed week everyone!

Week 2: Vivacious Verbs

This week we did a big overview of Verbs.  There is no crying in Essentials, but I know that the overview weeks right at the beginning can overwhelm.  Please hang in there.  We will be slowing down and taking individual bites of the proverbial elephant very soon.  Also, I want to remind you that there is a lot of memory work at the beginning  (first two-three weeks) and then it levels off to a sustainable pace.

Assignments this week:

Memory Work (Grammar)

On the checklists, this is the “Drill” part.

First year students: Practice chart A again and work on the definition of a verb (gray bar at top of chart C or in memory work).  Cover week two memory work.  Kids, use those flashcards!

Second year students: Practice chart A (Sentence Classifications) on a blank sheet of paper.  Practice copying chart C (Verbs) using the blank chart C.  Fill in as much as you can.  Make sure you know the verb types, attributes, and tense (made of a combination of time and form).

Third year students: Practice writing out charts A and C on a blank sheet of paper.

Understanding (Dialectic)

For those of you using the checklists, this is the “Do” section.

I covered compound subjects and compound verbs in class.  Please go over some examples of these at home.

Also, I introduced intransitive and transitive verbs.  Feel free to review this, but we will revisit this in a few weeks, so don’t feel that you have to get this yet.  I just wanted to put this on your radar.

For first year students using the checklists, please disregard the Task Sheet check box.  Just take the designated sentences and dictate and check for spelling, punctuation, and the five elements that make up a sentence (from chart A).

Second and third year students, dust off those Task Sheets and get to it.  The checklists start Quid et Quo on week 5!

Week 1: Students start!

Students start!

Simple
Exclamatory
S/Vi
And an alliteration

Announcements this week:

1. Checklists: This week's checklists will come to you in electronic form because I failed to get the copies made (store was closed on Saturday of Labor Day weekend).  If you are a second or third year Essentials student, go ahead and use the emailed checklist. If you are a first year Essentials student, please put the checklist on the shelf for the first couple of weeks and just work on the memory work. If you haven't already paid me, please bring $6 next week for your checklist workbook.

2. Blog: Please subscribe to this blog and Mrs. Gaines' blog.  That way, each post will be delivered to your inbox once per day.  Because Feedburner delivers only once per day, there may be delay.  If I have posted, it will be immediately available on the blog, but might not be delivered to your email yet.  If you are anxiously awaiting my next entry because you love this blog so much, you can always go directly to the blog.  : )  Another advantage to going directly to the blog is that there are helpful links and grammar songs in the sidebar.

Assignments this week:

Memory Work (Grammar)
First Year Students: copy chart A, looking back and forth between the master and blank, and then take out a blank sheet of paper and see how much you can remember. To mix it up, use the memory work flashcards to drill--only study week 1.  Work on writing out chart A every day this week.

Veteran Students: get to the place where you can take out a blank sheet of paper and write out the Sentence Classification Chart (Chart A) with ease.  You already know this information: now master it.

Understanding (Dialectic)
1. Subjects/verbs 
Moms, make sure your child has an understanding of subjects and verbs and has the ability to identify them in a simple sentence.  You can cover compound subjects and implied subjects (those imperative sentences have implied "you" as their subject every time) if you want to.  I will hit these next week.

Also, you can refer to chart B (112 Model Sentences-Simple) for examples of how the simple sentence  can be configured to make all 7 sentence patterns.

2. Checklist (veteran students only)
Follow the checklist for a thorough review of week one.  This will lead you through a "drill" portion and a "do" portion.  The "do" portion is the dialectic part.