The Good and the Beautiful Language Arts Levels 6 and 7

The curriculum systematically builds domain knowledge across geography, art history, and literature. Students study specific regions of the world each year while engaging with high-quality artwork and classic literature.

Level 6 covers Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, Thailand, UK, and New England geography. Level 7 covers Russia, UK, Pennsylvania, and US regions. High-resolution artwork images are included with directed questions about each piece.

The curriculum is described as challenging and uses appropriately complex texts for the grade levels. Students engage with classic literature and substantive reading materials.

The courses are described as 'challenging, so you might use a level that is below a child's grade level.' Students read works like Little Lord Fauntleroy and stories by Leo Tolstoy, indicating grade-appropriate complexity.

The curriculum provides explicit instruction through course books with clear instructional information, visual aids, and structured lessons. Some teaching videos supplement the written instruction.

Course books have 'instructional information and student activities' with 'charts, visual aids, reading material, full-color artwork.' Level 7 includes 'four teaching videos presented by Phillips' for specific skills like note-taking and sentence diagramming.

Vocabulary instruction is included and becomes increasingly challenging at these levels. The curriculum incorporates vocabulary development through literature study and composition work.

The review mentions that 'vocabulary becomes increasingly challenging' at Level 7, and vocabulary is listed as one of the core components covered throughout the curriculum.

The curriculum provides structured composition instruction with varied writing assignments and systematic skill development. Students progress from basic assignments to research papers with scaffolded support.

Level 6 includes 'book reviews, summaries, literature response papers, magazine travel articles, poems, autobiographical sketches, and various types of essays.' Level 7 'helps students learn how to write research papers' with supplied research materials.

The curriculum emphasizes whole books, requiring students to read complete works like Little Lord Fauntleroy and full-length biographies. While some excerpts are included, the focus is clearly on sustained reading of complete texts.

Level 6 requires reading the complete book Little Lord Fauntleroy for about a month, and the Level Six Reader includes 'two complete books.' Level 7's reader contains 'four lengthy stories, a play, and several short stories.'

The curriculum includes answer keys and some instructional guidance, but comprehensive teacher training materials are not evident. The program is designed to be largely independent for students.

An 'answer key' is provided and there are 'occasional instructions telling students to read aloud to parents.' The curriculum is described as 'open-and-go' with students expected to 'complete most of their work independently.'

The curriculum includes memory work and regular review through dictation, memorization of poems and geography facts, but specific retrieval practice strategies are not clearly detailed.

Students have 'memory work that varies from course to course,' including 'poems and ladders (lists of states and capitals) to be memorized' and regular dictation activities. Level 7 reviews 'states and capitals that were learned in Level 5.'

The curriculum reviews phonics but concentrates more on literature and reading skills at these upper elementary levels. Phonics instruction appears to be completed in earlier levels.

The review states that 'after Level 3, reading instruction reviews phonics, but it concentrates more on literature and reading skills,' indicating phonics is not a primary focus at Levels 6-7.