some hand holding needed...

[Melissa in Jordan]

While our more turn to a more traditional study of grammar has been very stimulating to me, I sometimes find myself missing the ease of our old Abeka workbooks. Sigh. Even dd, who is somewhat of a grammar "natural" commented that she missed the ease of opening up her grammar workbook and having everything layed out for her. I have to admit, I sometimes worry that I am leaving something important out.

I'm not ready to throw in the Harvey towel yet, however, as I am finding his theoretical/traditional approach resonates with me and I am excited to see so many connections to our writing,logic. and latin endeavors. I guess I just need a little encouragement to perservere from those who have walked through the Harvey tunnel a bit farther than I have and have seen more light at the end.

As a brief aside, dd and I are working through Robert Einarsson's "English Grammar Handouts." These have been very helpful--particularly the work on identifying clauses by means of eliminating all the participial, prepositional, and infinitive phrases. These has helped dd to do the condensation work in her narrative writing and write a precis with surprising ease. Highly recommended!

Back to Harvey and a couple of specific questions:

I began Harvey's Revised with 13yodd this fall (though left it for a time to work through R. Einarsson's book.), working through Part I, Orthography. While I am finding it somewhat interesting, I'm not really sure how to make this practical for dd and am inclined to move through it quickly. Before doing this I just wanted to make sure that I am not missing something foundational and important. I've been tempted to skip straight to Part II but haven't done that yet. Advice?

Secondly, I have a question from Harvey's Elementary Grammar regarding the difference between a present participle and a participial noun. Harvey says that a present participle can be used as a noun:

"I am fond of reading"

How is this different than a participial noun/gerund?

In this case are they the same?

Thanks for any insights you can send my way.

Challenged,
Melissa

[Lene in CO]

>>> Part I, Orthography. While I am finding it somewhat interesting, I'm not really sure how to make this practical for dd and am inclined to move through it quickly. Before doing this I just wanted to make sure that I am not missing something foundational and important. >>>
The orthography section is very short. To me, personally, it was very instructive because I have a child struggling with speech. The section helped me (and also the oldest child, with whom I studied this) to localize where in the mouth my youngest child has trouble forming sounds. Other than that, I find it instructive in terms of learning proper, detailed spelling rules, syllabication, and proper pronunciation. That being said, we didn't dwell long in that section, because my oldest child had no trouble with spelling, or syllabicaiton, nor with pronunciation.

>>>present participle can be used as a noun:

"I am fond of reading"

How is this different than a participial noun/gerund?

In this case are they the same?<<<<

Yes!! It is the same verbal expressed in three different terms which mean the same thing.

**Verbals** are words that seem to carry the idea of action or being but do not function as a true verb. There are three types of verbals: participles, infinitives, and gerunds.

A participle is a verb form acting as an adjective. "The dripping faucet annoyed her". A present participle (like dripping) describes a present condition; a past participle describes something that has happened: "The poorly constructed wall collapsed". -- SO to say that something is a parcipial noun is to say that a word which was derived from a verb to function as an adjective is now functioning in the sentence as a noun. (Chiefly because the word, gerund, has gone out of vogue).

Infinitive: the root of a verb plus the word to. "To be or not to be, that s the question."

A GERUND is a verb form, ending in -ing, which acts as a **noun**. "Climbing trees is what Tiggers do best".

So in the question you had above, to name something **a participial noun** is really to name a GERUND.

Lene
...who agrees, Harvey's is harder and more work than Abeka work sheets, but also more rewarding for the dedicated student.

[Melissa in Jordan]

Thanks Lene, your response was helpful. I do realized that Harvey's will take more work and is more difficult than our Abeka work sheets--that is exactly what scares me at times. Am I really competent to lead my children down the the classical grammar path? I am barely one step ahead at times! Thanks for your encouragement and help to continue, Lene.

Humbled by all the typos in my first post ,
Melissa