Essentials EEL Student Notebook
Essentials is the bridge program where students began to become more independent in their studies. Before you have a party hear me out! You have to set them up properly to do this. They need to have access to all of the tasks you want them to accomplish. You are not in the clear yet. Essentials takes management, close follow up and lots of conversations. Here is one way you can set your student up for Community Days and work at home.
In the video, I reference the Classical Conversations subscription program called CC Connected. Out of respect for Classical Conversations Copyright, I can not post links to the referenced pages or resources taken from CC Connected. I will do my best to compile a list of usernames and filenames I have downloaded and references.
The Essentials of the English Language (EEL) Guide
Its big, it comes shrink wrapped and 3 hole punched. You have to purchase it from Classical Conversations. You must be enrolled in a community to purchase it. It is required resources.
Once you get this beast of a guide you need to put it into a binder and put some tabs on it. First a few notes about putting it into a binder. My first year I put every single page into a slipcover. The next year I took all the slipcovers off. My husband just shook his head and said, "I am not even going to ask." It all depends on how you like to use your "teacher guides." Do you like to write in them or on them? Some people like to put 6 weeks at a time into smaller binders so it is more manageable. I have seen some guides spiral bound! After 5 years I have no slipcovers and everything in one binder. Keeping it simple.
Before you tab your guide and start marking it all up let me give you an overview of what is in your guide.
(Actually, pick one color tab and place it on the top of each of these pages. Write the bolded word on the tab.)
Page 9 Part 1 - The Expedition
You need to read this. It will communicate the heart and vision behind the Essentials program.
Page 19 Part II - The Itinerary
This is the nuts and bolts of the program. It's in here that you get what to do each week, Scope and Sequences etc. No need to read this straight through. Take a look and familiarize yourself with the format. I will share more about this section later.
Page 395 Part III - The Gear
I do recommend putting these pages in slipcovers as you will be using them quite frequently. Believe it or not you and your student will know and understand all of these charts by the end of the year.
Page 443 Part IV - The Excursions
This section contains advanced charts and a spelling program option. If you have a spelling program you use feel free to continue with it. If you do not you may utilize this one.
Now that you have put tabs on the major sections of the Guide lets add some more.
Select another color tab. You will be writing on them Wk 1, Wk 2, Wk 3, Wk 4 and so forth to week 24. Week 1's lesson starts on page 27. Put the Wk 1 tab on the top right corner. Week 2 begins on page 35, place its tab on the top right corner slightly lower. Keep working through all 24 weeks.
Finally, select a different color and tab the following pages that are important to note or good gems to know about.
- Page 20 Offers 0ne page at a glance of the Scope and Sequence.
- Page 51 - In week 3 there are several pages devoted to explaining the process of the Analytical Task Sheet
- Page 396 - A Glossary of Abbreviations for Diagraming
- Page 397 - Snapshot what charts to study and on what days.
- Page 435 - Snapshot of the weekly sentences
- Page 437 - A blank Copy of the Analytical Task Sheet
- Page 439 & 441 - Quid et Quo Worksheet
- Page 445 - 8 Parts of Speech Definitions
- Page 457 - Section on Punctuation & Capitalization Rules
- Page 461 - Spelling Rules and Lists
That's your guide set up and ready for you the teacher to use. Each week before class take a few moments to read the lessons. Make notes about what you don't understand. It is highly likely your tutor will answer your questions in class. If they don't ask! Every tutor wants parents to go home feeling equipped to help their student. Note: Your tutor does not have anything you do not have.
Now let's move on to getting your student set up with a student binder.
Essentials - Watch this First!
This video will encourage you on your Essentials journey. Whether you are just getting started and trying to figure it all out or if you are entering your 8th year. Take a moment in the midst of your planning and remember the why behind the what.
“God Wastes Nothing”
Why is Essentials Such a Beast?!
There is no one way to "set up and do" Essentials correctly. This video will encourage you to find your flow. Know your personal work style and how your student learns best.
Challenge - A, Daily/Weekly Planner
Everyone has to organize their child's work in one way or another. There are some amazing planners and strategies out there. If you know of something great please feel free to share with us in the comments.
I have found the biggest challenge in Challenge A is communicating schedules and helping my child manage their workload. The Guide dictates the weekly work. Yes, I as the teacher can scale* as needed. In order to be prepared in class, my student still has to get at least a portion of the work done.
In previous homeschooling years I was the master of our schedule but now I must blend with the Ch A schedule.
I might know that we need to get a bulk of our work done on Tuesday because we have guitar lessons, a doctors appointment and grandparents coming into town. However, my Ch A student, who is learning to take ownership of his work, may not know all these things. They think they can focus on just Research and Reasoning and the next day get caught up on their LTW paper. The results between parent and child is frustration. We have to communicate schedules and expectations.
Here is what I highly recommend. No matter how tired you are after a Community Day sit down with your student and plan out the week. If you wait till the next day, your student will forget important instructions given in class and it will cut into your productivity. Have your student bring out their planner, we use the attached sheet, discuss your week. As the parent, let them know of family commitments, late nights, or interruptions in a day. Together fill in their planner and strategize how they are going to get their work done that week. If you have other kids or commitments it's ok to tell your child when you will and will not be available to review work and answer questions.
It is best to establish a routine for what days and what order your child will do work on. Let them have a say in this. However, it is important to provide boundaries. Such as, your student wants to start with Research. You make it clear that that is acceptable but Logic and Latin must be done before lunch. Also, establish if you are unavailable to help them or check work between 11- 12 because you are working with another child.
Attached is the planner I will be using with my son. I type it up as we go through the Guide and discuss his tutor's instructions on Mondays after community. We print it out and put it on a clipboard for him each week. If this is not your thing you can do something as simple as writing it out on notebook paper. Do not make this harder than need be. Keep it simple and help your student take ownership by effectively planning. Welcome to the teenage years of your child having a life apart from you and learning to blend the two!
I am providing this in an editable form so you can customize it and change it for your specifics. The sample content is for week 2 work of Ch - A. We have a Monday community day and my son will be out of town with his dad on Tuesday. Therefore I have cleared our schedule for him to work fervently for 3 days.
“Those who fail to plan, plan to fail. ”
* A note about Scaling: As your student's teacher, you can scale your child's work. I am not a Challenge A Director but can I encourage you to communicate with you Director when you scale. Email, call, text them and let them know. Directors want to hear it from you, not the student that their work was scaled.
Lost Tools of Writing - Forms
Lost Tool of Writing! I love it because it teaching our students how to write and how to think! Each week LTW builds a skill of thinking and writing in one area of the 5 Cannons of Rhetoric. In the Student Workbook, there is a form for the student to complete related to the skill at hand. It is intended to help the student in the thinking/writing process.
As the student progress from Essay 1 forward new techniques and skills are added. However, the previous week's technique forms are not given. This specifically holds true for the Cannons of Invention and Elocution. For the Cannon of Arrangement, the from changes Essay to Essay as elements are added. If you didn't understand any of that here is the bottom line. You have to make copies of the forms for each Essay.
What I have done is make digital copies of the forms. With each Essay, I have included previous Essays forms. I find it is easier to print pages as needed than make copies.
For a Challenge A student I do not recommend printing out all the forms and handing them to the student. It will be overwhelming. Essays take 3 weeks to write. 1 week on Invention, 1 week on Arrangement and 1 week on Elocution. Each week print the pages necessary for your student. In class students often write in their workbook while learning the new technique. This is great! It is nice to know you have a digital clean copy on file.
“Focus your instruction on the thinking that leads to good writing. ”
Finally, LTW is not about the worksheets it's about the thinking. We started using the forms in this complied format at about Essay 3. There were so many elements to remember to include. I found that printing the forms each week was helpful to keep us organized. My student did start to complain about doing so many worksheets. The purpose of the forms is to make sure they are practicing and incorporating previously learned elements. The goal is that they will internalize this thinking process and do it without the forms. Use the forms only as needed to organize and remind your student.
Do not leave IEW skills and techniques behind. Require your student to incorporate dress ups, decorations and sentence openers in their writing.
If you like checklists I have scanned in the LTW checklist from the back of the Student Workbook for your convenience.
Don't forget to assess your student work and provide them with feedback. In the Teacher Edition of the LTW book on pages 275- 286 they give an insightful way to assess your students work. I HIGHLY recommend you read and digest this approach. I created a template (Surprise Surprise!) using this approach.
Ch - A Henle Latin Exercises
As your student embarks on their Challenge A journey there is so much to learn. One area that can be intimidating is Latin. In this post I am not going to take on the questions of Why Study Latin? I simply want to offer you a tool to help. Your student will be learning a new language, making flash cards, learning new vocabulary, and grammar rules. It is a rewarding process but The Struggle Is REAL!
There are a couple of ways to approach the assigned Exercises from Henle 1.
1. The Latin A Workspace is what is recommended by CC for your student do to their Latin exercises in. It serves as a nice template guide to keep the students organized.
2. Handwritten Exercises on notebook paper. It is the true stick in the sand method. It allows for plenty of room to work out translations. If you chose this option I highly recommend a spiral bound notebook. My first year we used this plain paper option and I found Latin exercised everywhere!
3. The third option is a pre-printed workbook with the Exercises in it. The reason I like this format is that it cuts down on handwriting. The kid's hands will be falling off the first few weeks of class. It also helps students with dyslexia and/or dysgraphia. I know some directors do NOT prefer a workbook style. The goal of a Challenge A student is taking ownership of their educations. Pre-printed forms are sometimes seen as detracting from that goal. Learning to look up and copy exercises is a valuable skill.
You decide what is best for your child and your goals.
A Note about the sources used to compile this document. I used several PDF's that contained the Henle l content. I cut and pasted it together into one document so that the Exercises line up with those assigned in the Challenge A Guide as of 2018.
Student Binder - Part 2, Pages from the Guide
Once you receive your Challenge A Guide there are a few pages to be copied and put into a Student Binder.
See the video below for the pages I recommend.
I have also included a PDF document with the pages listed
Enjoy!
Getting to Know Your Ch - A Guide
In this video I will briefly go through the different parts of the Challenge A Guide. Make sure you take the time to read your Guide and utilize all it has to offer.
Research Strand of Challenge A and IEW
Don't leave your hard work in IEW behind! Bring it with you into the Research Strand of Challenge A.
Every week students will get the opportunity to do Research on a topic of their choice. A general science topic will be assigned, such as Amphibians or Invertebrates. The student will narrow down the topic into a more specific category i.e amphibians to an even more specific category like frogs. Andrew Puduew says, "Hands off content. Hands-on structure and style." For those who used sources texts for most of their IEW careers choosing your topic and sources will be new. Students love the freedom of picking their specific topics. They dig for interesting, obscure and shocking facts to write about.
In the midst of their newfound freedom sometimes students want to ignore all they have learned on how to write a research paper. Every week is basically an IEW Unit 6 paper. The goal after 3 years of IEW is that student would have internalized how to do a Unit 6 paper but alas they still forget. Frequently my student would enthusiastically work on their research paper only to have me, the teacher, have to come back and do quality control. To help students remember how to write a Unit 6 paper and encourage them to use the skills they developed in IEW I create the attached template.
Let me walk you through the process.
1. Each week there will be an assigned Topic, such as Amphibians.
2. Your student with chose a subcategory like frogs. Make sure you discuss with your director how they have the kids go about this.
3. Next, your student will come home and need to find at least two sources* for writing a 1-3 paragraph paper. The length of the paper is determined by the tutor and teacher.
4. Students will then do a Key Word Outline (KWO) for each source.
5. They will pick 1-3 subtopics, depending on how many paragraphs they are writing. For example, frog eggs, frog habits, poisonous frogs. Finding these subtopics is a skill used in our Faces of History papers and Unit 7. (Do you remember "Cotton Balls" from your IEW DVD viewing!)
6. They will fuse their KWO and write a paragraph for each topic.
I found the skills that need reminding and practicing are:
- Clear topic sentences
- Completing a paragraph with a clincher
- Adding dress ups, decorations, and sentence openers in a natural way. ( I don't require an exact number but encourage the continued practice of these elements.)
- Making sure bibliography information is collected and noted properly.
Most students want to work as independently as possible so the template I created is designed to help guide and remind them. Ideally, they will internalize the process and only need a sheet a paper. I recommend using the template for the first 4-6. Then move your student to a piece of paper as they prove they can follow the process.
One final note about sources. Talk to your director about acceptable sources. Most directors want at least one book as a source and will allow one online source. There are 2 life skills your student can learn while doing the work for this strand.
1. How to use a library and good old fashion books. Take a trip to the library and teach them how to look information up and chose a good source. If you have a good collection of resources at home make them pull the books off the shelf and read.
2. Online researching - this is a huge life skill and something we need to teach our kids. Before classes start, sit down with your student, and bookmark some credible sites. Help them to understand what makes the site credible for the research they are doing. Just Googling a topic is not research.
In the comments post links to any good sites you know for the Research Stand of Ch A. Let's share our wealth of knowledge!
Challenge A - Student Binder
In my opinion getting your student set up for Challenge A is much easier that Foundations or Essentials. There is a set booklist, curriculum and your daily coursework is lined up for you in the Guide. The most challenging thing is figuring out how to organize your student so they can be successful and take owner ship of their work. This video shows one way to set up a student binder. Enjoy!
IEW - History Based Writing Vocabulary
If you are diving into the world of IEW using the History Based Writing supplement make sure you get all you can out of the program. Aside from great source texts and helpful checklists dont miss the Vocabulary. Andrew Pudewea says, " You can't get something out of the brain that hasn't been put in there first. In this vlog I'll show how to the study and use the vocabulary during your writing times.
Art and Humor in Challenge A
In the Reasoning strand, there are catechism questions your student will memorize. The catechism questions are facts and snippets derived from It Couldn't Just Happen. These pegs of information are deemed worthy of memorizing. You need to learn and review these catechism questions just like you would Foundations memory work in a question and answer format. Regular review of these questions is needed through the entire year.
The most popular way to do this is by creating flashcards for the catechism questions. We felt that the flashcards were cumbersome and didn't allow for much creativity. Many Challenge A students are already making a myriad of flashcards for Latin and we needed to find something different. One great tool to be aware of is Quizlet. Quizlet is a flashcard App and you can get anything and everything on it. However, after using it for a few weeks, we realize that electronic flashcards did not help with long-term retention. Our solution was to get creative and have fun with our catechisms.
Each week The Challenge A Guide will assign you three to five catechism questions. They are all listed on pages 160 and 164 of the guide. We made a notebook page for each catechism question. I am not joking when I say we started simple; a piece of paper and some crayons. As we had more fun with it our art skills and storyboards became more elaborate. Here are some examples:
Here is one of my favorites I created for my daughter.
Catechism Question number 3 is about the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which states things left to themselves will decay. As you can see, I used my awesome art skills to draw a little picture of what her room looks like clean and what it looks like a couple of days later.
She decided to get a little bit more silly on number 34 where the questions is a fact about termites. She did a cartoon about a termite having gas and disrupting the temperature of the termite mound. Everyone had a good laugh. She loved sharing her creations with her brothers and me.
“Humor can be one of our best survival tools - Allen Klein”
The second semester we brought in some technology and we used her iPad and Apple Pencil. She started creating her pages on an App called Notability. This option was fun because she was able to import photos and other images such as memes. For one question, she has a picture of Jesus riding a dinosaur. It makes zero sense to me but it makes sense to her.
Making sure you review your catechisms on a weekly basis. Reviewing previous weeks work is key to long-term retention. After the first semester, you will have a good amount of catechism questions. At this point, we started reviewing them by category, bible, theory, animals, miscellaneous. I
In conclusion, you want to do what works for your student. You want your student to discover what form of studying works best for them. If your kid is a visual learner then get them doing something visual. If you have a kinesthetic learner have them make up hand motions. If songs are your student's thing find songs. ( I have not found all of the catechism songs on CC Connected.) Take all your Foundation skills and apply them here and find a method that works well for your child. Help them discover what ways of studying make the most sense to them.
Challenge A is a lot of hard work but don’t forget to have fun!