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My oldest son is in sixth grade. We have taught him from a more than one vocabulary curriculum over the years. However, now that his reading is getting more complex- for fun, he is reading from the Lord of Rings Trilogy right now- I decided that it was a great idea to change his vocabulary curriculum again. This time, I went with Educators Publishing Service (EPS) Vocabulary From Classical Roots, by Norma Fifer and Nancy Flowers
Features:
This book features root words from Greek and Latin languages. My son learned word families so that he could figure out the meanings of many words derived from one Greek or Latin word. For example, in one lesson, he is given "Fero, Ferre, Tuli, Latum," which mean to bring, to bear, to carry. A list of words that are familiar to him is provided in a box. There is a list of challenge words in another box. His vocabulary words that went with the roots in the example: defer, dilatory, elation, and infer. Each is defined, part of speech provided, and used in a sentence. If there is more than one meaning, there will be more than one example sentence.
Lessons:
There are five parts to each lesson, so it should be completed over five separate days. In the first lesson, it provides the fifteen vocabulary words and corresponding word families. Then, the student identifies synonyms and antonyms found in multiple choice questions. Another exercise has students identify which, out of two, sentences the word in bold is used correctly. The last exercise for lesson one is fill in the blank using vocabulary words in their proper form (present, past, etc). Then, there is a test. The test has multiple choice questions and "choose the best analogy" questions.
Lessons two through sixteen have similar activities. If you want to have the vocabulary lessons span the length of the school year, you could choose to assign three one week and two the next. On the days that they do not work in their vocabulary book, they could do composition lessons where they incorporate a given number of vocabulary words from the lesson they are working on. I prefer that my kids do five lessons a week. Once the lessons are completed, I have them work on composition daily and refer back to their lessons to include vocabulary words. Either method should increase their long term memory of the words they learned from vocabulary.
Recommend?
Yes, I do recommend these books. My son also gives a thumbs up for this vocabulary series. I have chosen to order the next level for my son while he is in seventh grade. I plan to order them for my other children once they reach sixth grade as well. My kids use Wordly Wise 3000 in second and third grade. In forth and fifth grade, Vocabulary Workshop.
Thanks for the compliments and taking the time to comment.
LOL I need to take these lessons. Really though you are doing your son a great service by teaching him in this manner
Thanks for the comment and the compliments. I really think it's working because he seems to understand more words in the harder books he chooses to read for fun. Those books wouldn't be much fun to read if he didn't understand them. I benefit from these lessons, too. There is quite a bit I don't know, but learn through teaching my kids. They keep me sharp.
You are helping your children immensely by providing these lessons for them. They will thank you for helping them learning vocabulary like this.
Thank you for the comment and compliments. I hope they will eventually appreciate all the work I give them. I still remember some of my vocabulary lessons from seventh grade. My teacher always had pictures on the walls that went with the words. For the words ostentatious, the picture had a guy who was wall papering his house with money! LOL
Wow I'm impressed at what your kids are doing. Can we expect articles from them soon? I wonder how many parents, and I know a few, whom have never given the languages a second thought, concentrating rather on the mathematical side. I think what you are doing is commendable, I was atrocious in languages at school, but good with the sciences, this never seemed to both too many people, written off as a maths boffin. When I went on to tertiary education I actually suffered because of this. Well done, you obviously know what you are talking about, do I need lessons? I think so!
Thank you for your comment and the compliments. To answer your question: My 6th grader, a boy, is an avid talker. He is starting to turn that into writing and has some excellent ideas. Still, he is best in math and science. I agree with you about our country pushing the math and sciences more than other subjects. Anything to do with language studies and skills seem to be frowned upon, looked down on.
sounds like you have a brilliant child there a special child, is it not unusual for them to be good at both?
Maybe I should put it another way, he prefers the science and math subjects. I do think of him as a well rounded person, academically speaking. He also is good at playing the trumpet. You're right, kids can be talented in many areas.
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