Grandma,
I know that it sounded like writing sentences was never important to me, but I am referring to the mundane times when a short answer is more than sufficient. I guarantee that correct grammar and being able to communicate in complete sentences are both more than trivial things to me. In fact, I have been told that correct grammar is referred to as "my name's English" because I do have such high expectations.
There are simply times, though, that sentences are not important to know if the child has a concept. G/T kids, especially, see through that sentence requirement as a time filler when it is used in that way. Essays and composition are totally different stories.
One example of the times that I would seldom require the students to write sentences is in English practice with certain skills. The book will generally tell the student to copy the sentence and then "underline the nouns." I find that I really get better results with focus if I simply have the kids write the nouns from those sentences.
