The Rick Riordan grammar series

What, you haven't heard about that one?

Actually, we "officially" use First Language Lessons for grammar, and like it well enough, although I agree with some of my homeschooling friends that it can be rather...um...boring at times. Let's face it - that's just the truth. And that being the case, I never make my kids repeat the definition of a noun with me three times...and three times again...and yes, three times again...in one lesson. But since I own the books for levels 1-4 and am far too cheap to invest in an entire new grammar curriculum for those of my kids who are still working their way through those levels, this is what we're doing, love it or not.

However, as I might have mentioned once or twice before, I tend to take what we've got and work through it the way that suits us best. I also encourage new homeschoolers to use this approach, because I really think it's not about finding the perfect curriculum, which, by the way, doesn't exist; rather, you should let your curriculum serve you. With this in mind, I can follow the general track of First Language Lessons, but adjust how I use it based on each child's learning style. Aimee is a by-the-book sort of person, so she went through the workbooks as directed. Drew, however, who last year started level 3, which includes a workbook, practically experiences some kind of strange spasms when I open the book to a page of something like diagramming. Since starting up our school year a few weeks ago and having this happen more than once, I realized that this was going to be a no-go, at least at this point in the year, while we are trying to rein everyone's attention back in toward academic pursuits (and for Drew, this means that trying to hold his focus for longer than ten seconds is something like trying to herd cats in one direction).

Enter The Throne of Fire, Rick Riordan's new book in the Kane Chronicles. Fyi, this series, and this latest book in particular, contains a bit more magic (spells, etc, not "magic" as in general wonderment!) than I would ordinarily like in books for the kids. But they had already devoured it a few times over before I got to it, so it seemed a little late to say we were probably not going to explore this particular corner of Rick Riordan's universe. So we had a brief discussion on magic and what the Bible has to say about it in real life, and how we could just appreciate the fiction without emulating any of the practices. And then - moving on - I began finding fun sentences in the book which Drew could use to find various parts of speech and then even to diagram. Honestly, which sentence do you think a nine year-old boy with attention issues (which is rather redundant, I suppose) would like to explore:

"Helpful John stirs hot soup,"

OR

"The magic flame tickled my fingers."

Yes, exactly. So there you have it - it's how grammar gets down around here. We've covered adjectives, adverbs, direct objects, and the diagramming of the same using Rick Riordan's scintillating fiction. And for that matter, we've used the same for cursive practice, dictation, copywork, and as many other forms of language arts as I can squeeze out of a book both older kids enjoyed. So for the time being, the grammar workbook will be lonely, empty, and used only as a guideline for which parts of speech to review next. I don't think Jessie Wise would mind, but if she did, well, who cares - in the nicest way possible. Homeschooling, after all, is not about being enslaved to the curriculum - it's about letting your kids be free to learn!