Planning Easy Grammar

How to Plan Easy Grammar

Easy Grammar is straightforward. The student would simply do the next lesson each day, 5 days a week. Planning problems crop up when grammar is not done daily and the books for older students have many more lessons than school days. It is at that point where you must think about how you will divide out the lessons during the school year.

This is how I planned Easy Grammar

Planning Style

I planned based on series planning, in other words, I added no dates or days on the planner, just one lesson after another in the planner. Lesson Series for an entire book is briefly explained here: Using the Quarter Planner There will be an example on this page.

Planner Type:

Quarter planners and semester planners would both work. You can find those types of planners here: Term & Subject Homeschool Planners

Making Decisions:

Look through the student worksheets and determine how many worksheets there are and then decide:

1. How many days a week you will have grammar.
2. How long you will use the book. (one year or two years)
3. If you will assign more than one sheet a day. (not recommending this)
4. If using for two years: Will you use the worksheets in order or every other worksheet reserving similar lessons for next year?

Make the Lesson Plan Series:

In each cell of the planner, write the page number(s). If the lesson is associated with a new concept that you will teach, highlight the cell with a highlighter.

Example

(please note: I do not have a current book, this example is based on the old purple book starting somewhere in the middle.) The page numbers are based on the reproducible worksheets that are in the teacher's book. (I have an economical copy machine.)

Class Schedule

Name: Jane Austen Class: Grammar (4X a week)

Key	A	B	C	D	E
1	T:343 Adverbs WS: 345 100%	WS: 347 100%	WS: 349 100%	WS: 351 100%	WS: 353
2	T:354-355 Adverbs -Good or Well? WS: 357	WS: 359	WS: 361	T:363 Adverbs- Where? WS: 365	WS: 367
3	WS: 369	T:371 Adverbs- When? WS: 373	WS: 375	WS: 377	T:379 Adverbs- To What Extent? WS: 381

And etcetera
Add to the bottom of your planner this information:

Key:
T = Teacher Page (This is a day to teach the lesson, I recommend highlighting them.)
WS = worksheet page
Materials: Easy Grammar Plus (list the books used)

Tips

Take note of how many times a week this class will be done.
Highlight all teaching days. Highlighting the teaching days is for your benefit. At a glance, you can see which days that you should be prepared to teach the lesson.
After making your plan, print or copy at least one additional copy of the plan.
With the additional copy, teach your child to check his schedule and to mark off lessons completed.
Check the work as soon as possible. It is best to check work immediately after child finishes worksheet. Give feedback and note grade on planner.

Note: If you must make a weekly plan of all subjects for records, use your subject planners each week to fill in the up-coming week in a weekly planner. [See Example of this: Transfer Plans from Subject Form to Weekly Form] You could also fill in a weekly plan daily or after the week is over. Just like it is with all school planning, do what best suits you and gets the job done.

Donna Young
July 28, 2007

Workbook Algorithm

The workbook is a good deal and will save you time. I recommend getting the workbook over copying pages from the teacher's book. Below are some points to consider.

Depending on which workbook that you need, each page costs only a few cents. When considering if you should get the workbook versus using a copy machine, use this formula to arrive at the cost per page.

Workbook Price divided by number of pages = cost per page

This only helps if you have a good idea of how much it costs you to make copies of pages with your copy machine. Be certain to include the cost of paper in your estimate. Additionally, consider your time.

If you own a copy machine that is cheap to operate, get the teacher's book and each day, copy your child's lesson. If you do not own a copy machine or if your copy machine is expensive or awkward to operate, buy the student books.

Note:I'm not familiar with the test booklet because they did not exist when we used Easy Grammar.

Workbook versus Copying, What I did

I have a copy machine and two children. They were 3 grades apart, so each one used different grade levels of Easy Grammar, but eventually, my younger child used my older child's books. I copied the reproducible teacher's book worksheets for each of my children. Although I recommend getting workbooks, I can't say for certain that using my copier was any trouble, every day I was always so enthusiastic about being able to homeschool my children, that I barely noticed such things. Thinking back though, this would be my list of pros and cons of making use of the reproducible sheets and my copier.

Pros

It seemed to save money, but I am not sure if it really did or not.
I could assign the worksheets in any order that suited my plans.
Holding a workbook open can be a distraction.

Cons

Cutting the teacher's book binding off and having to 3-hole punch it and place it into a 3-ring binder.
Having to make a copies (This is debatable as a con, copiers vary in ease of use and cost of operation.)

Donna Young
January 13, 2008