Sixth grade English takes students beyond the basic nouns, verbs and adjectives that they studied in earlier grades and begins introducing more advanced parts of speech and punctuation rules. Whereas students in earlier grades focus on the basics of the English language, sixth graders begin studying the exceptions to the basic rules. Students may need to adjust their study habits to keep up with all of the new grammar rules.

Review Grammatical Rules
Before you can master the grammar rules you are learning in class, you must know them and understand why they exist. Sixth grade grammar lessons tend to focus on sentence construction and parts of speech, as well as punctuation rules. Consult your textbook for definitions of the parts of speech, such as pronouns, adverbs and articles and the functions each serves in a sentence. Read up on the proper places to put commas, apostrophes and quotations marks. Write down several examples of every rule over and over until the rule starts to stick in your memory. Another way to memorize grammar rules is to prepare flash cards. Write a part of speech or punctuation rule on one side of a card and its definition and/or an example on the back. For instance, you may write "article" on the front of a card and "a part of speech that takes the place of a noun or noun phrase. Examples: a, the, she, he, it" on the back.

Practice Correcting Grammatically Incorrect Material
Ask your teacher if she can type up some paragraphs with grammatical errors for you. Take a pen and mark where you notice any errors along with what you would have to do to make the sentence grammatically correct. A sample sentence may read, "When I saw Kevin at the park, they was riding his bike." This sentence would be corrected as "When I saw Kevin at the park, he was riding his bike." The ability to recognize others' grammatical mistakes is a good indicator that you are on the way to strengthening your own grammar skills. Make sure to have your teacher check your work when you are done and discuss any errors you missed or incorrectly fixed.

Practice Labeling Sentences
Sixth grade grammar tests often require students to label the parts of speech that the class is currently learning in sentences. Begin identifying the parts of speech in sentences everywhere you see them. Say you saw the sentence "Mary bought a necklace for her brother, but he didn't like it," in a book. Make a mental note in your head that "Mary" is a proper noun and the sentence's subject, "bought" is the verb, "necklace" is the direct object and a noun, "brother" is the indirect object and a noun, "but" is a conjunction and "he" is a pronoun describing "brother."

Take Lots of Practice Tests
Engaging in practice exercises will prepare you for the graded exercises on tests. The Purdue University Online Writing Lab (OWL) and the Guide to Grammar and Writing are online resources that offer practice quizzes on virtually every grammar rule imaginable. Visit either site and search for the particular grammatical concept that will be featured on your upcoming test. Check your textbook for sample tests as well, as many academic textbooks offer practice exercises at the end of every chapter.