Grammar By Diagram - Second Edition Workbook: Understanding English Grammar Through Traditional Sentence Diagraming

In the spring of 2007, I found myself standing in front of a class of very bright high school honors students who were asking me to teach them grammar: "Teach us grammar!" they begged. "No one has ever taught us grammar!" It has now been exactly five years since that strange request, and that is why I want to leave this comment today, that, and the pile of papers to grade that I am trying my very best to ignore. I had never received such a strange request, and frankly, I was somewhat embarrassed by it, even perplexed, for I had never really been formally and systematically taught grammar. I did not know how to do it. All I could do was turn to some lame, hit-and-miss worksheets. How should I teach them to dig into language, to grasp its complexity? I did not know where to begin. I knew much about "the writing process" from Donald Murray and how to help students with their language within the context of their writing, as Constance Weaver had taught me, but I did not know where to begin with a formal, systematic instruction in grammar. In my heart and in spite of what I had been taught in my progressive Education classes, I knew that this ironic circumstance was the equivalent of a high school chemistry teacher being asked to teach about molecules and not having the ability to do so. It was not a proud moment for me. Years earlier I had graduated with honors from a state university here in Michigan, where I had earned a degree in English and a Michigan teaching certificate. But let me tell you a dirty little secret: In spite of our certifications and diplomas, most American English teachers today do not know grammar because, even if they had wanted to teach us, our teachers did not know grammar. I was the product - we were products - of an educational system with deep holes and flaws which had been around since misguided hippy-dippy English professors had brushed aside the first Liberal Art in favor of progressive fads and specious nonsense. During this rather awkward time of trying to teach my docile and long-suffering honors students, I stumbled upon two texts that eventually changed my teaching career: The War Against Grammar by David Mulroy, which explained to me why I did not know grammar, and Cindy Vitto's two fine books, Grammar by Diagram (Second Edition) and Grammar by Diagram: Workbook. Over the course of the next few years, I taught myself grammar - daily - with Cindy's amazingly clear and succinct books, and now, alas, have a silly family, nerds all, which loves to determine which of Dr. Vitto's ten sentence patterns comes in the sentences contained in our Chinese fortune cookies. At least from my experience, I would say that Gertrude Stein was right; diagramming is great fun, so much so, that I eventually recommended Grammar by Diagram to my buddy Dan, a professor at Hillsdale College who teaches classes on grammar. Dan now uses Dr. Vitto's texts in his classes, and there is usually a waiting list to get into those classes. Now I almost always seek to understand and articulate the structure of the sentences that I read, using diagraming as a tool. I do it automatically. Diagramming reveals to me my ignorance; it makes what I do not know explicit. It points me to the sentences that I do not fully comprehend, the syntactic puzzles that I need to solve, and now I am driven to grasp and understand them all, so I can use language to discuss language with my students. These books have helped this one-time embarrassed and perplexed high school English teacher to learn grammar, and for that, I owe Cindy Vitto my deepest gratitude. Back in 2007, I bought at least a half dozen books from Amazon as I tried to teach myself grammar, and there was not one single book that has come close to hers in quality. They are succinct, clear, and always helpful. That is why I am taking this break, when I should be grading the piles of papers that are now screaming at me from across the room: I want to pass on my deepest and sincere gratitude to Cindy for her fine books. And no, I will not pour over this comment, looking for ironic grammatical problems or even spelling errors. I chiefly want to say thanks to her. Pax, Tim

People who love to diagram sentences will appreciate this. These people make up a very small segment of the population. I used the book in a college grammar class, but the students were lost mainly because they don’t know parts of speech. I should have started with the basics, but the book is solid.

I have read and used several books on diagramming. This book is the best I have seen so far. The grammar section at the beginning is thorough. The author even has a quick page on parsing. The text and layout make the book easy to read and use. Everything I have to say is positive. Diagramming with this book's help is an amazing method to see language as more than words thrown together. I also recommend Rex Barks for additional practice and another way to look at parts of speech. Everything a squirrel can do to a tree is a great way to remember prepositions. Sister Bernadette's Barking Dog makes a nice introduction to diagramming and discusses the history of diagramming, but doesn't really teach it.

I was aware of that before ordering, but If you skim through the reviews you would think that this book has it all. It does not. It's a companion for a textbook by the same name. I would not have ordered this if it weren't for the glowing reviews here. My mistake, but most of the reviews here are for the textbook and not this workbook--I don't want others thinking they are getting something they are not. I'm ordering the textbook now and will update this review soon. I need to thank reviewer Don V for the tip to search for 1551117789--that will bring up the textbook when searching Amazon. UPDATE--I've purchased the textbook and have had a chance to go through it, so I wanted to update my star rating for this. I like this supplement for the textbook; it provides some quality exercises to help further expand the concepts explained in the book. Just be sure you don't solely order this expecting it to be the complete textbook.

Great book in the spiral binder is perfect because I use it on a daily basis for my English course in college.

Good accompaniment to Vitto’s textbook. Exercises are very useful and all answers are in back of text.

The listing of this item changes to look like the actual textbook. this is not the textbook but a workbook based on the textbook. The textbook is the one with the flowers on it. don't get mixed up or it will cost you an extra 30 bucks, and no one wants that. Also if you are looking for this particular book, be warned that it's likely full already with other people's notes, even when I bought the new listing.

A most brilliant, accessible offerings of grammar's structure and reason>

This is a excellent book. I got two. There both good books and I like the ring binding on it.

The best book I have ever brought. Buyer will not be disappointed. It is best to buy both books, the workbook and study book. I thank you Cindy Vitto.