I was looking for a grammar curriculum and decided to adopt 'First Language Lessons for the well trained mind, Level 1' by Jessie Wise. Here are my thoughts.
I would recommend it..NOT.
I was quite shocked by how slow the lesson plans are. Imagine it takes 41, a whopping FORTY-ONE (almost half the book), lessons just to teach about common & proper nouns. I was yawning my way through while reading the lesson plans. I took just 10 minutes to teach sonshine both concepts.
I picked up a locally written grammar book
In this book, it took about a 2-3 pages to explain the same things. This is right up my alley. I don't know. It could be the Singaporean in me that makes me want things to be quick, fast and good! Oh and cheap too! This local book was like $20 cheaper then Jessie Wise's book!
That said, there are some thing i like about the book:
1) I like it's usage of famous paintings for the narration exercises. Take a painting and ask the child questions relating to the picture. It helps in their oral skills and at the same time exposes the child to well-known art works.
2) Although i don't exactly follow the lessons but it did gives me alot of ideas on how i can conduct my lessons.
3) I like the idea of introducing poems to the child but i am undecided about the memorising bit.
Overall, i don't think it is worth to purchase this book. It is way too slow even for the average learner. Although, it is great that each lessons are very short (less than 10 minutes) and it's lessons are very clear & easy for a pre-schooler/kindergartener to understand.
Every language has its own importance. As Dutch language is the finest language spoken over the work. Learning dutch language is not much difficult . So to learn language lessons this we should have a great passion as well as good teacher who can teach us dutch language.
ReplyDeleteSorry! Abit don't understand the end part. So u don't recommend the FIrst Language Lesson for the well trained mind but u will recommend the local book : basic English grammar?
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