Feedback appreciated for 8th grade plans

[hpymomof3]

I am trying to plan next year for my dd who will be in 8th grade. She will be going to a private school for freshman year so I'm trying to prepare her as well as possible. I would appreciate any feedback.

My goal is to concentrate mostly on areas where I feel that she has weaknesses and also on areas that I feel she will need for high school. I also noticed that when my oldest daughter took the Plan test that they only had english, reading, math and science on it so those are the areas that I think would be most important to concentrate on to be sure that she is on level.

She will be doing Lial's Algebra and I'm thinking about possibly having her do a few of the Singapore math books to prepare her for geometry. My oldest dd recalls that many of the things that she learned in Singapore math she is using now in geometry.

I'm undecided about science. She will be taking biology as a freshman so I'm not sure what path I want to take for that. This year she has been doing Prentice Hall science explorer but we haven't done many labs. I really dislike labs and dd really likes to read about all different science topics so it has really been more of an interest led study.

She really needs to work on her writing skills so I want to focus on that. She has been using Jump In this year with ok results but I am looking for other suggestions.

She is ok in grammar and spelling but I'm wondering if we need to continue with an actual spelling curriculum. She isn't the best natural speller and will probably need to use spell check her whole life but any papers she will be doing will be typed. If we dropped these two subjects it will give her more time to focus on other areas.

I will do a government/constituation unit with her and finish our American History studies (post civil war) but I don't think we will focus on this area. She will be doing world history freshman year and American History sophomore year again anyway.

She is using Rosetta Stone Spanish but has difficulty with the lessons where she actually has to type words or phrases. We will probably continue Rosetta Stone for the vocabulary but I am looking for something that I can supplement to help with the grammar. I have no experience with Spanish so it would have to be something that she could do independently.

We will probably continue with Lightning Literature and also some kind of vocabulary book since she isn't especially strong in these areas.

Have I missed anything important and does the rest look ok?

[Karin]

My eighth grader is using Jensen's Format Writing. To quote another poster, it's dry as dust! But, what I like about it is that it breaks the process of sentence flow, paragraphs, 5 paragraph essays and other non-fiction writing formats down into easy to grasp chunks. The boring samples make the steps very easy to see. If, on the other hand, she has those down and you're looking to have her move into fabulous writing, it's not the book for you.

As for spelling, I have one who will probably need to check her spelling all her life, (my gr. 5 dd), but I still work on it due to homophones as well as typos that can be real words--writing checked only with spell check can be rife with errors (okay, I'm a bit of a spelling pedant:), even though I make typos all the time). However, I think you are wise to spend more of your focus on what she needs to help her next year. If her grammar is good, you may wish to work just on her most troublesome spelling words/patterns a few minutes a day.

I can't help you with the Spanish, as dd has been doing RS German as well as a slow cruise through Latin. We have Jensen's Vocabulary on the back burner, but more as a review and a check course.

When I was a child (violins now playing;)) we didn't do tons of labs before high school. I did zero dissections in high school (my lab partners did them as I was too squeamish) and I still managed to do well with dissections in university when I was less squeamish. I'd focus more on scientific thinking, logic tools needed, etc., besides the basic knowledge.

[Faithr]

Hi,

I've gotten 2 so far through 8th grade and I'm working on my own plans for my 8th grader to be next year. We have done very well with Saxon Algebra I which includes some geometry, but it sounds like you've settled on a combo of Lial's and Singapore.

I have kids who really struggle with spelling. The best thing I ever did for them was to take them through Phonics Pathways. I did this with my oldest two when they were in 7th and 8th grade. I taught them one on one and in my little lessons I'd go over the spelling pattern or rule, then dictate them the words, then sentences from the text. Every two weeks or so I'd go back and make up a review test. I found the text really easy to use. I skipped the really simple stuff in the beginning and started where I thought my kids began to struggle with spelling. Really focusing on teaching spelling to them helped a lot and they gained lots of confidence.

As for grammar and writing, I am using Classical Writing for the Older Beginner right now with my 12 yo ds and I really like it. It is extremely thorough, we do about half of it orally, but even so we are learning a lot! For me it was a very hard program to understand so if you go with it, you might want to spend the summer figuring it out! Your daughter will learn grammar, composition, and vocabulary very, very thoroughly.

A really fun vocabulary program that I have used lightly but with great success is English from the Roots Up. I just post a root on my fridge once a week and review over breakfast. I make a kind of game out of it. My oldest dd who now attends the local community college said that learning those roots from EFRU helped her immensely in so many ways. So that's kind of a fun way to get vocab in.

The other thing I worry about for my kids is if they can take notes or hand write fast enough to take notes. This is a problem with us because my kids would rather type and I've let them. But once my oldest two starting taking outside classes they realized what a diadvantage this was so if you are preparing your daughter for school, I'd say work on penmanship just to be able to write faster! I even had my kids watch Teach. Co. dvds and then practice taking notes during the lectures.

I personally think that 8th grade is that year that you can be interest driven for science. If she's solid in math, she should do okay in high school science.

Can she just take Beginning Spanish as a Freshman? Does she need to study it now? I'd work on English roots and grammar which will give her a good basis for understanding Spanish next year, but personally I don't think I'd focus on that for 8th grade.

So in other words I'd work on the basics of math, grammar, spelling, handwriting, vocabulary and unschool the other stuff through good read alouds, movies, dvd lectures, fieldtrips or whatever. If she is solid in the basics the other stuff will come much easier, but if she's shakey it will be that much harder for her.

[Karin]

Hi,
I have kids who really struggle with spelling. The best thing I ever did for them was to take them through Phonics Pathways. I did this with my oldest two when they were in 7th and 8th grade. I taught them one on one and in my little lessons I'd go over the spelling pattern or rule, then dictate them the words, then sentences from the text. Every two weeks or so I'd go back and make up a review test. I found the text really easy to use. I skipped the really simple stuff in the beginning and started where I thought my kids began to struggle with spelling. Really focusing on teaching spelling to them helped a lot and they gained lots of confidence.


What a great idea! I've been using this to teach ds to read and was going to give it away (rather too dog eared to sell), but now I'll hang onto it for when my gr.5 dd is in gr.7/8.