Grammar through character, since 2010.
Grammaropolis is where grammar lives. The parts of speech are real characters with real personalities, starring in books, songs, videos, and interactive experiences. Hailed by the press as a Schoolhouse Rock for the 21st century, the work is character-first by design and pedagogically rigorous by construction.
Letter from the Mayor.
I taught 7th Grade Writing for six years at Pinewood School in Los Altos Hills, California. Many of the students had come from Pinewood's Lower and Middle Campuses, where there was an incredible effort to teach grammar, but about half the students came from schools with very little grammar background. This presented a challenge. How to teach grammar to a class where half the students could diagram noun clauses in their sleep while the other half had trouble with adjectives and adverbs?
My most successful assignment was when I had the students pair up and write a children's book from the perspective of a single part of speech. Using personification, strong characterization, and a clear storyline, the main requirement was that the story effectively convey the purpose of the chosen part of speech.
I'd already taught my students that an adverb modifies a verb, adjective, or other adverb, but this assignment forced the students to think about the parts of speech in ways they could relate to. An adverb as a definition was abstract, but an adverb as the protagonist of a story suddenly became bossy, became personified, became memorable. The students weren't thinking about parts of speech anymore; they were thinking about characters.
At the end of the assignment, the students illustrated the books, bound them, and read them to the younger grades. They were so excited to share their stories that they actually seemed to forget that it had been a grammar assignment all along.
As a fiction writer I have always believed in the power of story, but even I was surprised by how successful the lesson had been. Although students learn in many different ways, most of my grammar workbooks focused on the same approach: memorizing the dictionary definitions of the parts of speech. I became convinced that there had to be another way to do this.
I'm hoping that Grammaropolis is that other way. I hope it helps kids connect with the parts of speech on a human level. I hope they'll be so entertained that they'll forget they were supposed to hate grammar.
Best Wishes,
Coert Voorhees
The Mayor of Grammaropolis
Written 2010 for the original Grammaropolis launch. Still load-bearing fifteen years later.
From a classroom assignment to a catalog.
That children's-book assignment became the canonical Grammaropolis storybook line (eight picture books), the YouTube animated music videos (10M+ views), the subscription app, the workbooks at books.grammaropolis.com, the standards alignment tool at standards.grammaropolis.com, and the next-generation AI experiences at play.grammaropolis.com. The original insight is still doing all the work: characters ARE grammar, not metaphors for it. Nelson's bureaucratic personality IS what nouns do. Jake's compulsion to describe IS adjective-noun modification.
The cast.
Twenty-six fully realized characters live in Grammaropolis. Nine parts of speech (Nelson, Vinny, Lucy, Jake, Benny, Roger, Connie, Li'l Pete, Izzy). Twelve punctuation marks (the Grammaropolis Punctuation Department). The Mayor. Doctor Noize. Gabby Verbose. Plus supporting cast like Slang, who shows up uninvited, and the Mayor's nemesis at every turn.
Each character has a fully specified voice with signature phrases, teaching domains, and relationships to every other character. The site's copy comes out of those character voices, not out of a generic marketing voice.
Six kinds of people show up here.
Kids who would love learning about grammar if only it weren't so boring. Adventures, music videos, the cycle test, the storybooks. Built for ages 6 to 12.
Parents who want to help with homework but could use a refresher themselves. Fair warning: adults get just as into this as kids do. Start with play.grammaropolis.com.
Homeschool families looking for a complete parts-of-speech curriculum. The workbook line at books.grammaropolis.com aligns to four state and national frameworks. Twenty-one titles and growing.
Teachers tackling varied learning styles in one room. The Standards Hall at standards.grammaropolis.com maps every Grammaropolis title to the exact CCSS, TEKS, NYNGLS, or FL B.E.S.T. standard it covers.
ESL and multilingual learners of any age. The characters carry the grammar in a way that survives translation: a character with personality is easier to remember than a definition in a second language.
The fun-loving grammar geek in all of us. The cast is the cast. You don't need a reason.
Where this is going.
This site, grammaropolis.com, is the IP front door. The catalog lives at books.grammaropolis.com. The standards alignment tool lives at standards.grammaropolis.com. The Writer's Workshop and Adventures live at play.grammaropolis.com. Each does the job it's best at. The main site holds the IP itself: the cast, the world, the curriculum map, and the free-tier hooks that lead into all three.
Built in Houston.
Grammaropolis is independent. The catalog is published from a small studio in Houston, Texas. Coert is the founder, the author of record, the Mayor's voice actor, and the person you will reach if you email the company. The character art was originally produced by Powerhouse Animation. The editorial relationship is with Christopher Knight.
If you want to reach out: coert@grammaropolis.com.