Memoria Press - Eighth Grade Literature Guide Set {TOS REVIEW}

We have been very fortunate to review the 8th Grade Literature Guide Set from Memoria Press. Boo loves to read and we looked at the 7th Grade Literature Guide Set the 8th Grade Literature Guide Set and the 9th Grade Literature Guide Set they all looked excellent. Boo had already read all of the seventh grade choices and although she could have handled the 9th grade choices we decided that she would enjoy the 8th grade choices and we have not been disappointed.


To facilitate this review we received the consumable student guide and the corresponding teacher guide for; The Wind in the Willows Treasure Island  The Adventures of Tom Sawyer As You Like It The four books can be used in any order as they are studied as individual units one per quarter of a school year. Boo decided she wanted to work on The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, As You Like It, Treasure Island, and then finally The Wind in the Willows. The study guides do not come with the literature book but they are easily purchased, in fact we already owned three of them.  Boo loves to read, which is one of the reasons we had to move on to the grade 8 literature course. She has liked to read for as long as I can remember. We have also used a few other courses from Memoria Press and so we were very excited to get started. When you open the student workbook for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer the first thing you see is the table of contents. 
How to Use This Study Guide  - is the first part of the introduction.  A. Read How to Mark A Book - This is included in the student workbook. Boo found it extremely helpful. It gives useful tips. If you don't like marking books then it's something you will have to get over if you use this program. It encourages you to underline important passages. Then add a vertical line in the margin of the really important passages that you may have already underlined. Then add an asterisk next to key phrases if you have already underlined and added a vertical line. Plus it is recommended to add notes in the margin too. It seems complicated but really helped Boo focus on what she felt was important. Plus it includes an example showing just what to do. Next Boo completed the preface questions. At first she wasn't very enthusiastic about reading the 'preface' of the book. However after reading it and completing the preface student questions she was hooked. She loved the extra information that she gets from reading and working through each section.  Lessons - There are 36 lessons in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer student guide, one for each chapter. There is a process to each lesson. 1. Read the 'Reading Notes' this is something Boo and I could do together. Or she would come to me with any questions or if she needed anything clarifying. 2. Work through the vocabulary section using a dictionary. This is crucial and something that I tell my language students all the time. Go through unusual vocabulary first - HUGE way to increase understanding of a section. 3. Read and mark the chapter using the methods we discussed above. Boo really found this helpful as it made it possible for her to remember and find easily the section she wants to discuss with myself or her dad etc... 4. After reading and underlining the text Boo then returned to the student manual to answer the chapters comprehension questions. She sometimes discussed these with me and sometimes just worked through them on her own. 5. Then Boo worked through the discussion questions and we discussed them together. 6. The last step for each lesson is the 'focus passage section'. This section is where Boo was able to focus on one particular passage chosen by 'Memoria Press'.  Boo really likes this program. She loves to read but it helps her to focus on the text and think about what the author intended. It's great when my book loving daughter finds something that helps her enjoy books more! When looking at the complete course I can see how well rounded it is. There is a wide variety of comprehension questions and vocabulary. Each book covered is so different in content I can see why Memoria press made the selections in did for this 8th grade course. Tom Sawyer is an American classic, and of course no literature could feel complete without a little Shakespeare. Boo is even excited to read Treasure Island soon, which is a book she has always shunned as a 'boy book' before but with the help and insight of these guides she knows it will be an interesting and educational read! Some of the guides seem longer than another, for example after looking through the 8th Grade Literature Guides I noted that the Shakespeare guide is a little shorter than some of the others, so it's easy to look ahead and plan your schedule so as not to overload your child.
Check out all the other grades and subjects that the crew reviewed by clicking the box below!  




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