Almost Finished with Foundation Skills

We are officially at the end of building my five foundation skills areas, and it's amazing to see how many students are now confident, and capable. I was slightly disappointed to have to prompt a few times when someone said direct object instead of predicate noun after a linking verb, but I usually only had to point it out once to the class. I also had to prompt a time or two in regard to verb phrases, especially if they were interrupted, or at the beginning of a question. And, I had to remind once to make sure each sentence was in natural word order. Even so, realistically, I should expect to have to prompt a little, especially if it's been awhile since we've touched on something, and I can't expect perfection. I just hope for continued growth and competence, and that students will continue to apply what they've learned.

We're about to start nouns. Some of what we learn will be more along the lines of knowledge for knowledge's sake (concrete and abstract, for example), and others are a little more of a challenge every year, such as possessives vs. plurals, and reminding students that proper nouns consisting of more than word are always treated as a single unit. I just keep reinforcing, and progress continues.

In reading, I came up with what I hope will be a very interesting and fun lesson to teach circular plot construction. As always, when trying something new, I may have to make adjustments as we go, or simply modify the entire plan. But, I am hopeful and optimistic. I ran it by a couple of respected colleagues, and they thought it was a pretty good idea. I'll let you know now it goes.

GW