Daily GRAMS (Guided Review Aiding Mastery Skills)
This is one of those simple ideas that I love as a review in our weekly schedule. We thoroughly covered grammar, capitalization, punctuation, and sentence writing in our grammar and logic stage years (grades 4-8). As high school students, they no longer needed a full-blown language arts program, but I also didn’t want to get rusty with our grammar terms and other skills.
I introduced Daily GRAMS as a quick and easy way to review and refresh our memories. Each Daily GRAM takes about 10-15 minutes to complete and my boys were able to fit them in as they had time in their morning.
These exercises are not meant to be lessons but rather to review their language mechanics skills. Each GRAM is one page in the workbook and the student can write directly on the page. Categories include capitalization, punctuation, parts of speech, sentence combining, outline formats, and parts of a friendly letter. I liked using Daily GRAMS as a way to spot check any trouble areas my sons might have and then to review briefly as they came up.
All the answers are in the back of the workbook and with 180 GRAMS in this book, we stretched the book out over two years since we didn’t complete a GRAM a day. CLICK HERE to pop over to Easy Grammar Systems and view sample pages for the Junior/Senior High Level. You can also find samples for other levels there as well. We did not use Daily GRAMS for any other level so you will need to view the sample and make up your mind whether it fits your language arts needs.
Written by Barb-Harmony Art mom.Ā She also blogs at http://harmonyartmom.blogspot.com and her business is found at http://www.harmonyfinearts.com. I would love for you to join us for the Outdoor Hour Challenges: http://handbookofnaturestudy.blogspot.com.
Barb McCoy- Harmony Art Mom writes about homeschooling their teens on her blog Harmony Art Mom. and taking family outdoor adventures on her other blog, Handbook of Nature Study. She is the author and host for the Outdoor Hour Challenge and a series of ebooks helping families get started with simple nature study. Barb also founded Harmony Fine Arts which helps homeschoolers with their art and music appreciation.
I completely agree with you that these books are an excellent review of grammar for keeping their skills up. No need for hours of grammar in highschool, just enough to not get rusty. I actually took your advice on this a while back, and have been so thankful. Great review, Barb.
How do Daily Grams and Easy Grammer go together? Do you pick one or the other, or do they go together? Thanks for the review!
Easy Grammar teaches grammar and Daily GRAMS are meant as a review. The Easy Grammar lessons are topical and the Daily GRAMS are a mix of skills.
We used Easy Grammar Plus with one child and it worked well for teaching grammar. I would not have used both at the same time.
Hope that helps.
Barb
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I remember daily grams from HS 6th grade! I simultaneously hated and loved them. Can’t wait to use them for my own kids. Thanks for the review!
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I am definitely keeping this on my list of things to look at in the future.
Thanks.
Here is my question regarding DG’s: My children are growing up in an environment where proper grammar comes quite naturally because nearly everyone they are in contact with speaks and writes quite well. While teaching basic grammar, I sometimes find it difficult having to go through with a thick teaching curriculum when using DG’s seems to do the trick for now. I don’t want to hinder my kids, but I also don’t like to bog them down with unnecessary “stuff” either. Could you recommend a teaching (as opposed to just the DG type of “review”) curriculum that would be good for 4-5th grade and up that could be used in moderation? Grammar was so boring for me in school and I remember disliking it terribly, in spite of enjoying writing, reading and literature deeply! I don’t want to do that to my kids. š
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Have you looked at the other Grammar products? (You can use the link in the post above and then just click over to their other products.) We used Easy Grammar Plus and it was not overwhelming so I would imagine that their other levels are just as easy to pick up and put down as you wanted to.
I used *Daily Grams for 2/3rd grade* (the pink book) for two of my children and found them a low stress way to introduce formal grammar. Later I used *Easy Grammar Plus* . The most helpful thing about this series is that they teach prepositions first and eliminating those from a sentence simplifies it tremendously. Another title in this series which I found especially helpful for my weak writer was *Easy Writing*.
Now I’m on my last child…..the one I wish I had done more grammar with (something like Rod and Staff maybe ). Since we’re doing 8/9 th grade I bought *Easy Grammar Ultimate* for 9th grade. This series is “180 Daily Teaching Lessons” and I find it to be just right for our needs. This *Ultimate* series includes “instruction” in just the right doses my student needs for many grammar concepts. The amount of practice is just enough for each day — not overwhelming, but thorough. I find it reviews the basics and takes them to a higher level, as appropriate for high school. My feeling is that you would need to use *Daily Grams* AND *Easy Grammar Ultimate* at the same time.
Let me correct what I just said ____ I agree with Barbara, you WOULD NOT need to use Easy Grammer and Daily Grams together. Sorry I mistyped that and didn’t catch it in proof reading.
You might choose to use both products, but you wouldn’t need to every year. Daily Grams is designed for review. It can go with any other grammar curriculum as well as Easy Grammar.
My kids LOVE Easy Grammar/Daily Grams! The prepositional approach makes it so much easier to identify the other parts of speech. Even my one child who struggles with written language can spot infinitives, or words from the preposition list that are actually being used as adverbs–and he’s doing so with confidence and accuracy!