In Grade 8 students do a fast-paced review of grammar concepts learned in previous years. Topics reviewed include the eight parts of speech, adjectival and adverbial prepositional phrases, principal clauses, adjectival and adverbial subordinate clauses, and diagramming. Noun clauses are introduced this year. 

Composition for Young Catholics is the second semester component of the English course. Students focus on expository writing using examples, details, and reasons to support ideas. In the final quarter, students go through the steps of writing a practice research report, which include taking notes, constructing a bibliography, and citing sources. These skills will be especially valuable in the high school years.

Students improve comprehension and literary analysis skills using Reading 8 for Young Catholics: Comprehension as they continue to identify characters, plot, theme, and other elements that they will later encounter in high school literature courses. In Reading 8 for Young Catholics: Thinking Skills, students apply these skills both to classic short stories and selections from the life of St. Joan of Arc. Each quarterly book report requires a thesis statement that is supported in the five-paragraph analysis. Students will find this classic five-paragraph format useful for years to come. 

Students learn to spell by completing 36 lessons with exercises on the makeup and definition of the words, and then read the words in sentences and paragraphs. Stories focus on the lives of the saints and other religious stories. In Spelling 8 for Young Catholics, students cover such concepts as words derived from Latin, Greek and French, clusters and diagraphs, negative prefixes, suffixes, and scientific and mathematic terms.

In Vocabulary 8 for Young Catholics students learn the meaning and correct usage of new words and often learns new meanings for familiar words. Use of a dictionary, plus exercises and a crossword puzzle contribute to the learning experience and leave your Eighth grade student ready for High School.