Easy Grammar Ultimate Series–180 Daily Teaching Lessons Grade 8

Easy Grammar Ultimate Series: 180 Daily Teaching Lessons – Grade 8
By Easy Grammar Systems

About the curriculum

• 180 daily teaching lessons
• 10 minute lessons
• Concepts presented in an easy, step-by-step manner
• Building-block approach

Emphasis is placed on phrases (gerund, infinitive, participial, etc.) and concepts at Grade 8 level

The Easy Grammar Ultimate Series texts are similar to both Easy Grammar andDaily GRAMS. The texts are like Easy Grammar in that they are teaching texts. Concepts relating to phrases, clauses, compound-complex sentences, and other higher-level concepts (as well as basics) are presented in a 180 daily lesson format found in Daily GRAMS texts. Concepts are introduced, reintroduced, applied, expanded, etc. throughout each text. See the "Scope and Sequence" for each EGUS level: Grade 8, Grade 9, Grade 10, Grade 11, and Grade 12.

My Thoughts

We have been using Easy Grammar since Alexandre started grade 3.   After seeing the result is has made on him in learning English grammar, we decided to purchase the grade 2 book in order to prepare his siblings to the method of Easy Grammar. 

This year after 5 years of using the methodology of Easy Grammar, Alexandre embarked on a new journey with  the 180 Daily Teaching Lessons from Easy Grammar for upper grades.     The 180 Daily Teaching Lessons consists of the Teacher book, the student workbook and the test booklet.  The presentation is very different to what Easy Grammar was but the concept is still the same.  

Essentially, each day the student will go through exercises that will reinforce his/her knowledge of grammar.  The exercises consist of applying rules for capitalization, punctuation, parts of speech as well as sentence combining.    Each “lesson” will take approximately 10 minutes per day.  Every ten lessons, you can assign a test to your student in order to see if your student has mastered the material covered.   

For the past few weeks, Alexandre has been using the 180 Daily Teaching Lessons from Easy Grammar.   It is very different for him compared to the previous years where he had to learn the rules of grammar.  This time around, he has to complete some exercises while allows him to recall what he has learned in the past.    However, even though he has a strong understand of the grammar rules in English, I find this series will allow him to retain and put in practice all the things he has learned during his elementary years in primary homeschool.    As this point in time, the only issue I can see he has would be in the sentence combining exercises.   Sometimes he forget a part of a sentence while other times his sentence is too long.  However, when the test comes around, he has understood his errors during the exercises and apply it properly.  

To be honest, I almost wish that I would have had these books when I learned English grammar during my primary and high school years.   Being Francophone, I think my English would have greatly flourished if I had used these in the past.  Mind you, I am learning alongside my own kids because I am teaching them using the techniques presented in the Easy Grammar books.   And I have seen the difference it made for a child who learn easily as well as for a child who is learning differently and who takes longer to understand the rule.    All my kids are thriving using Easy Grammar.   I highly recommend it for anyone considering a curriculum to teach English Grammar.  

If you student has not learned the various rules of grammar during his elementary homeschool days, I strongly suggest that you use the Easy Grammar Plus curriculum which will provide the lessons needed in order to understand English Grammar.  Then the transition to the 180 Daily Teaching Lessons can be done easily with more practice throughout the high school years.

Note that the student workbook does not contain the answer key and is to be used in conjunction with the teacher’s guide.  Though technically, since the teacher’s guide allows you to reproduce the pages of the exercises, you might only need the teacher’s book for your own use.  The test booklet will give the parent a way to assess their child’s mastery of the concepts.  The test is reproducible for student use.

The teacher edition of this curriculum is available to purchase in paper or pdf format for the price of 26.95$.  The student workbook is available for purchase in paper format for the price of 13.95$.  The test booklet is available for purchase in paper or pdf format for the price of 5.95$.  (all in US dollar)

These resources are also available as a kit on amazon.com.

Disclaimer: Thanks to Easy Grammar Systems for sending me the above mentioned product for review purposes. I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way. All opinions expressed here are only my own.

Easy Writing

Easy Writing
By Wanda C. Phillips
Published at Easy Grammar Systems

This year, we will also incorporate more writing exercises in our homeschool.    Not only have I found a marvelous composition curriculum but I also have discovered a great product to improve the sentence structures.  The composition curriculum is a different curriculum which I won’t present here.  But Easy Writing will guide your child to write at a higher level while writing sentences.   This book do not teach paragraph composition which is why I wanted to have another curriculum to strengthen this facet of writing for my kids.  Instead, it presents a step-by-step method on how to write:

• Sentences containing verbals
• Sentences using present and past participles
• Appositive construction
• Sentences using semicolons for more intricate formats
• Sentences containing relative clauses
• Sentences using subordinate clauses

This book contains numerous exercises that will help your child to write better sentences in their own composition.   In all, two levels are included in this book – level one which is primarily for elementary students and level two which is geared toward junior high, high school and/or adult students.  There is always room for improvement I find when it comes to writing and this book will guide you and/or your student to improve your sentences in order to make them more alive and interesting to the reader.

In the pages of level one, the student will discover how to present items in a series, how to construct a sentence using semicolon, how to use appositives, how to use the present participle, the past participle, as well as using having in some situations.  It also covers the subordinate clauses as well as the relative clauses.  When the student arrives in the second level in the book, he/she will deepen the understanding of all these rules in the English grammar with more exercises.   Practice makes perfect apparently and this book contains numerous exercises to practice until the lesson is understood. 

Even though my kids have done similar exercises in the Easy Grammar curriculum we have, I think that the Easy Writing is wonderful because it allows them to review some notions from previous books as well as discover a new way to strengthen their sentences when they are writing.  In the end, going through this book will allow them to build stronger sentences in their compositions.  It will reflect in other subjects we are covering whether you think of history, geography, science, literature and so on.

If your child is struggling writing sentences that are strong and that make sense, I strongly recommend the Easy Writing book.  It will help him/her tremendously in building higher level sentences and prepare them in better writing when they are in college or university.

The Easy Writing book is available for the price of 28.95$ in the regular format or the eBook format.   Both can be purchase through the Easy Grammar website.

Disclaimer: Thanks to Easy Grammar Systems for sending me the above mentioned product for review purposes. I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way. All opinions expressed here are only my own.

Easy Grammar Plus

Easy Grammar: Plus
By Wanda C. Phillips
Published at Easy Grammar Systems

My oldest son has been working on his English grammar in our homeschool since he was in grade 3.   Back then we had selected Easy Grammar 3 because of the way it was presented and how it brought confidence in me when I was checking it out.    We have not stopped using their products even adding the grade 2 book when our second son started that level.   So far, I have three kids using Easy Grammar and I  even learn a few tips and tricks while teaching them the lessons in the books.   My youngest, who is five and starting grade 1, wants to do her own Easy Grammar but she is a bit young still to understand what needs to be done and such. 

But earlier this year, it dawned on me that I needed to figure out what Alex, my oldest who was to enter grade 7, would be doing for his English grammar.   So I emailed back and forth in order to understand better the higher levels of Easy Grammar.  I knew there was a Plus book but for which grade was it?    Turns out that Easy Grammar Plus is considered a non-grade level.   It could be used for seventh grade (which is ideal by the way)  but can also be used for other middle levels, high school levels and even college levels.   I have been told that if Alex had done the grade 3 to 6 books, then chances are he could probably skip Plus and jump immediately at a grade 8 or 9 level.   Really?  I even got a small test for him to do to determine which level he could do.

Nevertheless, I wanted to check it out.  So I requested the possibility of reviewing it.    Turns out that after going through the table of content, I have decided that Alex will go through this book after all because we discovered some of the lessons inside the book he had never seen before.   Actually, he has decided himself that he wanted to do it.   On his own will…   That tells a lot of him.   He has done the pre assessment test and got almost 88% – before starting the lessons!

Easy Grammar Plus has been written to give students a solid understanding of grammar.   Though written at a fourth-grade level, the book will allow the student to focus on concepts and mastering them as he advance in the book.   The book uses the same prepositional approach presented in previous titles and the student continues to strip the sentence to the basics in order to identify the subject and verb. 

Here’s the table of contents for you to examine:

• Prepositions: game, prepositional phrases, compound subject, helping verbs, infinitives, subject of imperative sentences, prepositions vs. adverbs, review, test, direct objects, compound direct objects.
• Verbs: Action or linking, contractions, auxiliary (helping) verb, verb phrases, regular verbs, irregular verbs, direct objects, sit/set, lie/lay, rise/raise, to be, linking verbs, predicate nominatives, predicate adjectives, action or linking verbs, subject/verb agreement, verb tenses (present, pas, future, perfect, progressive), transitive and intransitive verbs, indirect objects, review, test, cumulative review, cumulative test.
• Nouns: concrete and abstract, defined, noun determiners, common and proper nouns, singular and plural nouns, possessive nouns, predicate nominatives, appositives, gerunds, review, test, cumulative review, cumulative test.
• Interjections
• Conjunctions
• Adjectives: limiting adjectives, function, descriptive adjectives, proper adjectives, degrees of adjectives, review, test, cumulative review, cumulative test.
• Types of sentences
• Sentences, fragments, and run-ons
• Phrases and clauses
• Adverbs: defined, adverbs that tell how, good or well, adverbs that tell where, adverbs that tell when, adverbs that tell to what extent, adverb or preposition, degrees of adverbs, double negatives, review, test, cumulative review, cumulative test
• Pronouns: personal pronouns (nominative, objective and possessive cases), antecedents, reflexive pronouns, demonstrative pronouns, interrogative pronouns, indefinite pronouns, review, test, cumulative review, cumulative test.
• Punctuation: periods, apostrophe, comma, semicolon and colon, question mark, exclamation point, hyphen, underlining, quotations marks, test.
• Capitalization: First words, titles, outlines, direct quotations, titles, organizations, business names, government bodies, departments, institutions, geographic locations, historical items, days, months, holidays, special days, proper adjectives, titles, brand names, religions, languages, races, ethnic groups, regions, structures, names, initials, political parties, hyphenated words, greeting and closing of a letter, presidents, well-known areas, events, when not to capitalize, test.
• Letters: Friendly letter, business letter, envelope.
• Pre/Post Assessment Test and Answers included in the book.

Alexandre is having some facilities in his English grammar this year because he had a strong based with four years of working with the Easy Grammar books.   But I also know that he will learn new things in this book that will make the upper levels easier in the end.    As I said, he chose himself to go through this particular book this year.  I think it was a wise decision and it will bring him more confidence when dealing with English grammar.    As I correct his exercises pages, I am seriously pondering the fact that I, myself, should go through this specific book in order to better comprehend the English grammar.  You see, English is not my mother tongue – I was born and raised as a French Canadian and even though I had English classes in high school (and did Kindergarten in English), I still struggle with the grammar when I write.  

If your child has never done concrete English grammar during the primary years and you want him/her to expand on this particular level, the Easy Grammar Plus is definitively the book to go through.     I know that these books works because I have three kids doing them now.   It’s a thorough curriculum that is easy to deal with and to learn.  It will also give your child more confidence because of the ways it deals with the sentences.    In the end, your child will remember the rules and apply them in other places.

The book Easy Grammar Plus Teacher Edition is available for purchase at Easy Grammar Systems for the price of 32.95$ US.   An e-book edition is also available for the same price.   You can also purchase the Student workbook for the price of 13.95$ and the Student test booklet for the price of 4.95$.   However, be aware that if you purchase the Teacher Edition, you will have the student exercises and tests included in it as well and have the authorization to reproduce within your own family.  

Disclaimer: Thanks to Easy Grammar Systems for sending me the above mentioned product for review purposes. I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way. All opinions expressed here are only my own.

Easy Grammar Grade 6

Easy Grammar Grade 6 Teacher Edition

About the Product

Students are asked to delete prepositional phrases in order to help understand other concepts. In addition to grammar concepts, capitalization, punctuation, sentence types, phrases/clauses and friendly/business letters are included. Ample practice worksheets are offered for each skill.

• 53 prepositions introduced.
• Materials presented and reviewed throughout .
• Contains unit reviews, unit tests, cumulative reviews, and cumulative tests .
• Writing section "teaches" how to write appostives, semicoln, construction, compound sentences, subordinate clauses, and participal phrases .
• Includes pre/post assessments .
• See "Scope and Sequence" for content.
• Reproducible worksheets (answer key on left side and reproducible page on right) .
• Tests are also in the teacher edition.
• This student test booklet saves you from having to make copies of the tests.

My Thoughts

I got introduced to the Easy Grammar Systems a few years ago when a friend of mine showed it to me.    I was debating how to teach English grammar to my kids because English is not my first language – you see I am French Canadian and though I am fluent in English, I do make errors when I write or speak (trust me I do have stories about this…).    So when Alexandre went into Grade 3, I purchased the teacher’s edition as I knew I could reproduce the pages for my kids.   

Honestly, I almost wish I would take the time to go through these books myself.   I have seen how Alexandre has progressed through the Grades 3 to 5 so far and how Dominic has became more self-confident with the Grade 2 book.

As like the previous books, the Easy Grammar Grade 6 starts with a pre-test to evaluate what the student remembers and know about English Grammar.   This test doesn’t count but will give you a better idea of where the student need to spend more time to assimilate the grammar rules.  At the end of the book, the student will do the same test as his final comprehension test (which will count for his grade).

Through this workbook, the student will learn more about prepositions, verbs, interjections, conjunctions, nouns, adjectives, adverbs, sentence types, friendly letter, sentences/fragments/run-ons, pronouns, capitalization, punctuation, important words, writing sentences as well as get sample lessons of the Daily Grams.

The technique of learning the English Grammar with Easy Grammar is easy to learn and will help build confidence in your child.    In the end, there will be no more stress in identifying the parts or in writing a paper for schoolwork.  To be honest, I think this techniques should be taught everywhere to help student to get a better understanding of the rules of the English grammar.   As you progress in the book, you will regularly revise the lessons via reviews as well as tests for each chapter and cumulatively.

Here are some examples.

In the Teacher’s Edition, you will also have all the answers of all the exercises as well as the tests. This is very helpful for anyone. I have learned quite a bit while going through the books with my oldest and I suspect that I will continue to learn with my three other kids as they follow in learning the English Grammar.

If you are debating on which Grammar books to get for your kids this year, I would strongly suggest that you try out the Easy Grammar Systems books.   I think it helped us a lot to go through English grammar without the tears and having to push to get it done.   The boys enjoy it and I have a child who is looking forward to start the grade 2 next year.    It means a lot to me that the kids enjoy what they are doing and learn at the same time.  

Easy Grammar Grade 6 Teacher Edition is available directly from the website for the price of 32.95$.  

Also available: Easy Grammar Grade 6 Student Workbook @ 13.95$ and the Easy Grammar Grade 6 Student Test Booklet for 4.95$.

Disclaimer: Thanks to Easy Grammar Systems for sending me the above mentioned product for review purposes. I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way. All opinions expressed here are only my own.

Easy Grammar Daily Guided Teaching and Review for Grade 2

Easy Grammar Daily Guided Teaching and Review for Grade 2
Published at Easy Grammar Systems

About the book

This book is a teaching text with the Daily Grams format.  It contains an introduction to the understanding of  language usage and skills,  180 short and enjoyable lessons--one per school day, concepts introduced and reviewed throughout, capitalization taught or reviewed every day,  and punctuation taught or reviewed daily.  It also includes usage, dictionary skills, sentence combining, etc.  The book has reproducible pages within the text  and the answers are in the back.

My Thoughts

I have a struggling learner who is very intelligent.    We suspect that my son might have the same learning disability than my husband.    He will be in grade two next year.   This year, I am going through some basic grammar lessons with him by reading to him in another curriculum.   But I also know that I want him to go through the same curriculum than his brother so I was curious to look into the Daily Guided Teaching and Review for Grade 2.    I was pleased to have a positive answer to my request to review it.

I didn’t know what to expect.   My oldest son has started using the Easy Grammar when he was in grade 3 and he is learning well with them.    I knew that if there would be too much work in the pages, there were some chances that Dominic would be discouraged and give up.    So when I received my copy to review, I was pleasantly surprised at the pages.    See the example below which was taken from their website.

Every pages in this book contains about four  to five exercises that the child will have to do.   With Alexandre I can do more than one page per day.   It will be a different story with Dominic, I know it.   And having one page per day of school will permit me to pace ourselves in his learning and discover a better schedule for him.     But I am encouraged to see how well the pages are designed.   Bright and lots of spaces in them will allow him to not see a huge mountain in front of him when we will do his grammar.   In each pages, there is a small lesson which I will do with him and explain it more if it is needed. 

The Daily Guided Teaching and Review for Grade 2 covers the following concepts:

CAPITALIZATION: abbreviation, business, closing of a letter, club/organization/team, day of the week, events, geographic places, greeting of a friendly letter, holiday/special day, language, month, names of people, outline, poetry, pronoun, proper adjectives, quotation, school/college, sentence, street/lane/avenue, structures, title of books and other works, title with a name and what not to capitalize.

PUNCTUATION: apostrophe, colon, comma, exclamation point, hyphen, period, question mark, quotation marks, underlining, where not to place a comma or a period.

GRAMMAR AND OTHER CONCEPTS: adjectives, adverbs, compound words, conjunctions, dictionary skills, difficult words, friendly letters, interjections, nouns, prefixes/roots/suffixes, prepositions, pronouns, rhyming words, sentence combining, sentence types, subject/verb agreement, subject identification, verb identification, synonyms/antonyms/homonyms, verbs and more.

I am estimating that it would take us maybe 15 minutes to go through one page.    Just enough to start building his knowledge on grammar and be more prepare when grade 3 arrives.    I want to give all the tools for him to succeed and discover that he can do it.   Having the Daily Guided Teaching and Review for Grade 2 will be such a tool.    I know that going through this book will give him confidence to move on when he arrives in grade 3.    And without him realizing it, he will start with basic information on grammar and do more complicated things by the end of the year.   I am more confident in starting the 2nd grade with him knowing that I have a book that will guide us through the discovery of grammar.

Easy Grammar: Daily Guided Teaching and Review for Grade 2 Teacher Edition is available directly from the website for the price of 24.95.   A student workbook is also available for 12.95$.   

Disclaimer: Thanks to Easy Grammar Systems for sending me the above mentioned product for review purposes. I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way. All opinions expressed here are only my own.

Easy Grammar Systems

Easy Grammar Systems

Easy to Teach...
Easy to Learn...
Easy to Remember!
Easy Grammar texts use the prepositional approach combined with effective strategies. This helps students to understand grammar, a tool for speaking and writing properly.

About the Easy Grammar Grade 5 Teacher Edition

In this specific book, students are asked to delete prepositional phrases in order to help understand other concepts.  In addition to grammar concepts, capitalization, punctuation, sentence types, phrases/clauses and friendly/business letters are included.  Ample practice worksheets are offered for each skill.

53 prepositions introduced
materials presented and reviewed throughout
contains unit reviews, unit tests, cumulative reviews, and cumulative tests
includes pre/post assessments
reproducible worksheets (answer key on left side
and reproducible page on right)
writing section "teaches" how to write appositives, semicolon construction, and compound sentences
See "Scope and Sequence" for content.
Tests are also in the teacher edition.
This student test booklet saves you from having to make copies of the tests.

My Thoughts

I will be honest, when my son Alexandre approached grade 3 I knew that I had to introduce English grammar in his homeschool.  You see English is not my mother tongue – French is.   A friend of ours had mentioned to me that she was using Easy Grammar.   After checking it out, we decided that we will give it a try and when the homeschool conference came we purchased the grade 3 level for him.    And I must say that I was pleasantly surprised during that year.   I loved the way it is organized and how it makes grammar so easy to learn.

This coming September, we will enter the grade 5 world and more grammar notions will be introduced.   The first step the child goes through with these books is to memorize the prepositions.   My son, Alexandre, has an incredible memory but even he forgets some of the prepositions listed.   Once the prepositions are learned, it becomes easy for the child to identify the prepositional phrases and remove it from the sentences if needed.     The book always start with a pre-test which helps to identify the notions that has slipped the mind of the child during the summer time.    That same test can be used at the end of the year to get the final result of the child for the grade he/she was in.   I am surprised to see that the pre/post test seems to be shorter for the grade 5 book than the previous books.   That will make my son happy I guess!

The book is divided in sections: Prepositions, Verbs, Nouns, Adjectives, Adverbs, Pronouns, Sentences types, Friendly Letter, Interjections, Conjunctions, Sentences & Fragments, Capitalization, Punctuation, and Writing Sentences.   Depending of the section, you will get more sub-divisions.  For example, while looking at the Adjectives section, I can see that it will cover descriptive adjectives, limiting adjectives, proper adjectives, predicate adjectives, and degrees of adjectives. Just by looking at the table of content, I can see that we will learn quite a bit in the grade 5 year (both my son and I actually!)   Each section has a review and a test for the section as well as a cumulative review and test.   Consequently, as the student goes through the book, he/she will review all the sections that was covered so far. 

I particularly like the fact that this system teaches the student to look at the sentence as a whole, identify any prepositional phrases and remove it before identifying the verb, subject and/or direct object.  It makes the learning of the English grammar more interesting and practical at the same time.    Even me as a mom I am learning quite a bit.   I wish I had had this system of learning when I learned English – it would have made my life easier and I wouldn’t make as many errors while talking. 

The Teacher Edition includes the grammar rules to explain to the child, the exercises as well as the answers for each of the exercises.    Everything under one book.   It makes teaching so much easier I find.   

I usually gives one or two pages to do per day – sometimes more.   It depends on how the week is going and what is happening in our lives.   But generally speaking, so far we start in September and we are able to complete the level in May or early June.   The Grade 5 level contains definitively more grammar lessons than the previous ones we have done.  I am quite satisfied with how the English grammar is presented and how the lessons are easily assimilated by my oldest son.   Next year, I will also have a grade 2 child and I am debating about purchasing the Grade 2 level for him.   I find the learning for this 2nd son is different than my first born.   So at this moment I am investigating to determine if this would be a good fit for him or not.  No matter what I decide for the 2011-2012 school year for my 2nd grader, he will embark the journey to Easy Grammar eventually.   I’ve seen the results in my oldest son using this method and I know that it will work perfectly for the other kids.   

If you are considering getting some books to teach English grammar to your kids, I would suggest that you take the time to check out Easy Grammar.   From their website, you can easily check out some example of the pages of the books you are interested in.   To identify the scope and sequence of your  own child, go to  http://www.easygrammar.com/scope.html.

The Easy Grammar Grade 5 Teacher’s Edition is available for 32.95$ US.  Also available are the Easy Grammar Grade 5 Student Workbook  for 13.95$ US and the Easy Grammar Student Test Booklet for 4.95$US.   They are available directly from the website or you could see their list of stores who carry their products at http://www.easygrammar.com/store.html.

Disclaimer: Thanks to Easy Grammar Systems for sending me the above mentioned product for review purposes. I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way.  All opinions expressed here are only my own.