2008-09 Goals for Jessie: Language Arts

This will be my second year making academic goals for our homeschool. I've found that knowing what we are trying to accomplish with our school work helps in many ways. As far as curriculum goes, it helps me evaluate whether or not a certain curriculum will work for us, identify places where there is overlap (that can usually be eliminated unless we are using it as a means of reinforcement), and discover portions that may need to be modified slightly in order to make a curriculum meet our needs. During the year, our goals keep me focused on why we are doing what we are. This helps keep school from turning into an endless string of busywork and gives me a basis to evaluate how well our plans are working or where they may need to be altered. The one change that I've decided to make this year is to print out a hard copy of these goals to put in my teacher's notebook so that I will do a better job of remembering to check our progress more frequently during the year.

GOALS	RESOURCES/COMMENTS
GRAMMAR
1. Recite and understand the definitions of the 8 parts of speech.	Accomplish using R&S 4 exercises, Grammar work in CW Aesop, and memory work
2. Correctly Identify the part of speech of a given word in a list or sentence.	Create appropriate grammar work in CW Aesop. Use dictation exercises for additional practice as needed.
3. Given a sentence be able to correctly identify all the instances of a given part of speech.	Create appropriate grammar work in CW Aesop. Use dictation exercises for additional practice as needed.
4. Given a sentence be able to correctly label the part of speech of each word in the sentence.	Create appropriate grammar work in CW Aesop. Use dictation exercises for additional practice as needed.
5. Improve sentence diagramming skills.	Learn new skills using R&S 4. Reinforce those skills with additional practice through CW or dictation.
6. Improve punctuation skills.	Learn new skills using R&S 4. Reinforce through dictation and CW draft editing.
SPELLING
1. Continue to improve spelling skills and vocabulary.	To be practiced using SWO F and G, dictation, and CW.
2. Continue to improve editing skills.	To be practiced using SWO F and G, dictation, and CW.
WRITING/PENMANSHIP
1. Transition from handwriting paper to regular lined paper for writing.	Dictation
2. Improve legibility, speed, and length of handwriting.	Dictation
3. Improve narration ability by decreasing the use of passive voice, increasing variety in sentence structure, and increasing use of more descriptive vocabulary	CW Aesop
READING
1. Increase variety of books read beyond fiction.	Assigned weekly history biographies and science books.
2. Increase attention to details and content.	Assigned literature readings to be discussed with Mom.
3. Improve reading comprehension beyond basic plot and fact information.	Reading Detective Literature narration, discussion, and some book reports.