Christmas Preposition Practice

One fun way to help solidify all those prepositions you are learning, is to have your students identify them – highlight them – in whatever they are reading. “‘Twas the Night before Christmas” is full of prepositional phrases.  I found 70 phrases!! So, for your convenience, there is a printable copy of the poem with

Essentials – Week 7

Teaching Adverbs, Noun of Direct Address, and Appositives One of my favorite ways to teach is to build a sentence. We began my class with a simple imperative sentence and then added the pieces we are practicing today. We started with “Sing a song,” which is a simple imperative sentence. I asked my class, “Who

Practice Combining Sentences

One skill that we learn in Essentials grammar program (of Classical Conversations) is to combine sentences using who-which clauses.   Technically speaking, these clauses are relative adjective clauses using the relative pronouns who or which.  But the IEW curriculum simply calls these “who-which” clauses, to make the idea approachable to students. So, how do we

Diagramming Complex Sentences

These are the sentences I used for my Essentials (grammar 4th-6th graders) class. These sentences are complex, imperative. Caroline, send Hadassah a text message about the assignment when you have finished it. Charlotte, bring your friend Hannah a pillow because she looks sleepy. Ben, send Kyle a postcard when you arrive. Make me an offer

Why Should I Learn Irregular Verbs? Tips on Cycle 3 English Grammar

Lists of principle parts of a verb seems boring and completely unnecessary.  What does this information mean?  How do we help our children connect with this material?   It helps to understand where we are going. In the Essentials Program, 4th-6th graders will learn these principle parts of the verbs, learning to conjugate verbs.  The