• Complete, ready to use!
• Book included inside the course!
• Makes reading fun!
• Develops literacy, vocabulary!
• Introduces some history, geography!
• Develops critical thinking!

I taught a literature class in my homeschool co-op using two Steps Literature Guides, Sherlock Holmes stories and The Time Machine. The Literature Guides are very easy to use. The lesson structure made scheduling and assigning homework very simple. We used the lesson questions to stimulate class discussion and I was impressed with the contributions that the students made during class. I look forward to continuing to use Steps products!  L.F., Homeschool Teacher
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He was the first great American writer.  His works were read around the world, and he encouraged more young writers, destined to become great writers themselves, to pick up their pens than any other writer in America's history.  His own life was filled with adventures that are hard to believe!  Yet today, Washington Irving's fame rests almost entirely on his two well-known short stories;   The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, and Rip Van Winkle.

Here's a complete guide that will help your student, ages 9-adult, understand these stories and their author as few readers ever do.

The history of the period of time is explained, so that the student understands why Irving wrote the stories, and what he was trying to say to his readers about their time (and ours).  Irving's history is also explored, and the student relates what he's learned about Irving's life to the story, and how Irving's' own experience helped to create his masterpieces.  The history of the stories, their publishing successes, is considered.

Important tools of writing are explored and explained, such as the message of a piece (the idea the author wishes to communicate), plotting, characterization, conflict, language, irony, and the use of surrogate characters in the stories that represent the author and his views. The student then uses his knowledge of the tools of good story-telling to analyze and understand the story.

No additional materials are needed.  The entire text for both stories is contained in the course, broken into chapters.  You won’t need to go on a search.

Before reading each chapter, the student looks though the simple, single definition that applies, for every key or difficult word used in that chapter.  This will allow the student to understand what he reads the first time he reads it.  ( WARNING – This course does require some serious literacy.  The student's vocabulary is bound to grow, given the number of terms defined. ) Locations mentioned in each chapter are also listed before the reading starts, and they are located by the student on maps or globes.  In this way, the student will know where those places are in the world when encountering them in the story.

After each chapter, the student is provided numerous exercises which demand cognitive and critical thinking on the student's part.  The exercises help make the story more relevant to the student, and increase his understanding of the story and its unique values.

We even provide links to film and/or other presentations of the piece being studied!

This is a complete study guide, one that will bring this great work to life, and which should help interest the student in literature, and in the great works of the first American writer.