Language Arts I

In the days of knights and castles, minstrels wandered Europe and told tales of great heroes, of knights who showed the virtues of courage and bravery and selflessness, of King Arthur and Charlemagne. Over the course of the two semesters we’ll read tales from Iceland and England, France and Germany that bring the eleventh century to life. Students will learn the art of writing through a series of staged assignments based on these tales of valor. As they develop their writing skills, students practice the art of English grammar by studying the Parts of Speech and the Sentence, using many examples from the books we read together.

This course serves as a gentle introduction to the arts of reading, writing, and grammar for elementary school students.

In addition to written work and grammar exercises, a short exam each semester assesses a student’s progress. Dependent upon the needs and homeschooling style of each family, Language Arts 1 can be taken as a graded or not-graded class. With either option the teacher provides corrections and comments on both grammar and writing assignments.

The first hour of class is devoted to instruction in grammar with particular attention to parts of speech. Nouns, adjectives, adverbs, verbs, conjunctions, prepositions, pronouns and antecedents, reflexive and emphatic pronouns – these are all explained with a wide variety of examples and exercises.

The second hour involves the literature-based discussion mentioned above and sequential writing assignments designed to build each student’s ability to formulate and express his or her ideas in writing. Students participate actively in both segments by reading aloud, answering questions in real time, posing their own questions, performing exercises, and engaging in literary discussions.

Although it is recommended to take both parts together, some sections allow students to only enroll in the grammar portion or literature and writing portion of the class.

There are three sections available for this course. Each teacher has a slightly different emphasis in the grammar, writing, and literature discussion portions of the class. Scroll through the sections below to read more about each teacher's emphasis.