July 20, 2006 - How Will You Teach Writing This Year?

Well…that was until I discovered Andrew Pudewa’s Institute for Excellence in Writing (IEW).  IEW had a flagship product, Teaching Writing:  Structure and Style, that intrigued me.  He did not spend a lot of time brainstorming ideas for students to write.  Instead he spent the bulk of his curriculum on “how to write”.  This was a new concept to me because the biggest problem my students had, like all other students, was what to write about.  Andrew’s approach to writing solved this problem by telling the students what to write about.  His program spends more time teaching “structures” or outlines for a variety of writings.  Depending on the type of writing and your purpose for writing, you will use different outlines to organize your thoughts. 

In addition to teaching structures, Teaching Writing also shows students how to improve their “style”.  Thus, the name of the program is Teaching Writing: Structure and Style.  Students learn a variety of ways to vary their writing style.  Mr. Pudewa shows students how to dress up their sentences with strong verbs and quality adjectives.  Other dress ups include adverbs and clauses.  After mastering the dress ups, students learn how to open their sentences in a variety of methods. 

Let me share a simple activity you can use with your own children this week (or the first week of school).  If your older children struggle with writing, this is a great place to start.  Just choose a story they would enjoy.

DAY 1 

   In order to help your children with “what” to write, you should xerox a simple, 1-page story, perhaps Aesop’s Fables.  Read the story with your child.  After reading the story, write an outline/structure so you can do a key word outline with your child.  The structure should look something like this.

I.

   1.

   2.

   3.

   4.

If you are an outline perfectionist, you might have a heart attack since there are no letters on my outline.  The only person that will have a hard time with no letters is YOU.  Children have no problem using an outline that has just numbers.  In fact, they will find it easier to work with.  There should a number for each sentence in the story.

Re-read the first sentence and have your child offer 3 key words from that sentence that will help him remember what is written.  Underline or circle those words as he tells them to you.  Once he has chosen three words, write them in order on I.  Then, move to the second sentence and underline three key words for that sentence.  Write them on 1.  Continue until you have three words for each sentence.  You may have less than three words, but not more.  This forces your child to learn how to make a decision.  Besides, he does not need to remember EVERY detail in each sentence.

After you have your outline completed, put away the original source.  Have your child use the outline and tell back to you the paragraph.  Children have a much easier time telling verbally what they read than writing it down.  You just finished half of the writing lesson.

Older Students:  Be sure to have them re-tell the paragraph to you.  This will help his thought pattern as he writes tomorrow.

DAY 2

   Pull out the outline along with a blank sheet of paper. If your child needs to refresh himself on the content, have him retell the paragraph.  Now, your child will write a sentence for each line of his outline.  The sentence does NOT need to be an exact replica of the original paragraph.  In fact, your child may improve on what was originally written.  When he finishes each line of the outline, he will have a completed paragraph.  If your child is young, you might let him tell you each sentence and you write it down for him.  At this point, you (mom) should edit the paragraph for spelling and punctuation.  Notice I did not say rewrite the sentences or add words.  Let this be your child’s writing, not yours.

Older Students:  If your child is older and can edit for spelling/punctuation, let him do this on Day 3.

DAY 3

   On the final day your child will copy his completed paragraph making any of your changes for spelling and punctuation.  Of course, there are places you will see that need improving, but you can teach that in a later lesson.  This is an activity to help your child see that he can write something on his own.  He doesn’t have to worry about “what” to write” any more because you will give him a source text from which to start. 

Older Students:  Edit for spelling/punctuation.  Re-copy in good handwriting.

Isn’t that easy???  And you thought writing was difficult to teach!

If you liked this simple activity and the layout with assignments for each day, you will want to look at the new Student Writing Intensive Workbooks.

What are Student Workshop Intensives?

   At the beginning of this article, I explained the Teaching Writing: Structure and Style program.  Not only does IEW have workshops to teach teachers, they also have workshops to teach students.  These are DVDs you can let your students watch and follow the assignments.  Each Student Writing Intensive (SWI) includes 4 days of student workshops on DVD and a basic writing notebook to organize the student’s writings and stylistic charts.

But now, there is MORE! 

   Homeschool moms were practically demanding the new lesson plans included in the consumable Student Writing Workbooks.  These workbooks expand the four days of Mr. Pudewa’s student workshop DVDs into 15 weeks of lesson plans and many, many extra writing assignments.  As a busy homeschool mom, you need a plan to use the best writing program on the market (IEW), so check out the Student Writing Workbooks HERE. 

These new Student Writing Workbooks will SAVE YOU TIME so you can teach and guide as your children need you!

I almost forgot…

…when you order IEW products from Curriculum Connection, you receive FREE shipping. 

If you have any questions, post them on the comment section.  Or, share your own writing source texts.  When you post a comment, you are entered into our contest to win a prize.

Blessings,

Kerry

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