William C. Michael

What are your thoughts about the following quote from the Roman philosopher Cicero?

When taking standardized tests, one areas many students struggle with is Language Mechanics. Language mechanics refers to the use of capitalization and punctuation in writing. In the Academy’s Elementary Grammar course, these topics are treated at the end of the textbook, so parents may wish to introduce these lessons to students earlier to prepare for testing. To help with this, I have collected all of the content into a single PDF document that can be printed and studied before taking the Language Mechanics portion of the California Achievement Test. -WCM

When CLAA students complete standardized testing, they immediately receive the following score reports, providing detailed information on their progress in core learning areas. I. Scoring Overview Students are provided with the following summary of their results. While “Grade Equivalent” and “Percentile Rank” may be high, the “Raw Score” shows where attention might be needed. As you can see below, Anna scored in the 99th percentile in “Language Mechanics” but had 13 questions wrong. This year, we will make sure she gives extra attention to Grammar studies. II. Premium Scoring Report In addition to the scoring overview above, students are provided … Continue

In modern homeschool circles, you may run into people throwing the fancy word “progymnasmata” around.  Modern publishers love things like this because they’re always looking for something novel to spin into new products.  We will find, for example, homeschool publishers introducing young children to the “progymnasmata” as some kind of “classical” writing exercises that are the magic remedy for modern writing problems. Total nonsense. The “progymnasmata” are nothing more than “practice exercises” for older students who have progressed through classical Grammar studies, into Reasoning and are getting ready for the study of the art of Rhetoric.  In Rhetoric, they will learn … Continue

“As a father hath compassion on his children, so hath the Lord compassion on them that fear him.” (Psalms 102:13) “For whom the Lord loveth, he chastiseth: and as a father in the son he pleaseth himself. (Proverbs 3:12) “For thou didst admonish and try them as a father: but the others, as a severe king, thou didst examine and condemn.” (Wisdom 11:11) “You are witnesses, and God also, how holily, and justly, and without blame, we have been to you that have believed: As you know in what manner, entreating and comforting you, (as a father doth his children).” … Continue