We use Rod and Staff English 4th grade orally, it usually takes around 10 minutes. I never let them do any exercises that require pen and paper. If we can't do it orally, we skip that part of the lesson. We also do Fix it Grammar; I absolutely love the review, it consist of only one sentence per day and copy work. We also do the Sonlight Language Arts Level D worksheets. Some days if we are running behind, we may skip Rod and Staff but we always try to include it. My 2 kids do it together and keep score lol. They treat it like Jeopardy, we even have buzzers. We also do IEW Structure and Style A Year 1
I asked a seasoned homeschooler her thoughts on teaching writing and this is what she told me. I think it’s brilliant. Dropping this here word for word as my mother in law texted it to me. “Each child will be different as to what they are interested in accomplishing with writing and the only mistake is making them feel like writing is an assignment to plod thru rather than a fun way to get their ideas, interests amd information across. It is much easier for everyone to let them enjoy the process rather than push them thru. Sean was a visual learner so it worked best to start him that way, even something as simple as a 3 part 'storyboard' showing the beginning, body, and end of a story (simple, obviously...even a favorite joke) keeping it fun is the key, and continue adding things as their desire and skills progress... the actual Grammer and repetitive draft rewrites being the last things, like polishing.... or sanding.... gotta build structure first. Just brainstorming topics, then freewriting a few sentences to start, on a daily basis is good. No corrections. Just getting in the habit... they will show interest (hopefully) in wanting their writing to grow at their own timing, and you build from there... again, the parts, one by one... sentence structure, simple punctuation, paragraphs, dialog, hook statements, et al... If you feel like they are falling behind, you can add the next step, but if you push too hard, they will end up hating writing and it will be an uphill 'battle' for many years.”
This video was wonderful! Thanks for sharing all of your research. It was very helpful. We love Brave Writer around here! And like you I felt like the grammar would just take a long time to get through it all. So we added Fix It! Grammar from IEW and it is wonderful! My daughter loves it so much. And now I think we have the perfect pair for both inspiring the excitement to get their ideas on paper as well as teaching grammar. It's the right puzzle pieces for our homeschool.
I loved when you said, “I love her stuff… I don’t have the right personality…”. Years ago I wanted desperately to send my son to a specific Waldorf school so when we started homeschooling we used a Waldorf curriculum. It was a nice, gentle entrance into homeschooling and I am grateful in many ways that we used it, but I quickly realized that I don’t have the right personality to teach in that style! So often I hear people talk about what programs do or don’t fit their children’s learning styles, but programs also have to work for our teaching styles. In my case I can use something that doesn’t fit my style, but I won’t do it justice. My child was not getting the beauty of a Waldorf education from me, he was getting a watered down version which would have left him really wanting had we used it longer. Thank you for clarifying this in my mind. We are a couple of months into third grade and my approach thus far is to teach grammar explicitly, read tons of high-quality literature and non-fiction, do some copywork (though not much, maybe once a week) add in more writing to other work (such as writing answers in full sentences) and beginning to work on more creative writing assignments with gentle discussion of flow and writing for both interest and clarity. For my son my gut tells me to just let him write without too many rules (aside from correcting grammar and spelling) so that he doesn’t feel like writing has to be rigid or formulaic. To me it feels similar to how many things kids learn first through play (think playing catch or batting a ball in the back yard) and then later you teach them how to put all their skills together in a formal game). This is too long a comment for RUclips, so I’ll stop, ha!
What exactly does “copy work” look like for younger children? Is it those workbooks that have the little sentences that your child traces, then writes below, “The turtle has a shell”? Or is it taking short passages from the literature they are reading and set-up our own “copy work”, like two sentences from Farmer Boy that you’re reading? Poems?
@@katiejon17 , it varies from family to family. For us we primarily used short verses, such as nursery rhymes and little poems, when my son was young and now we use poems, quotes and favorite passages from our literature readings. I want copywork to feel like something my son might use in real life. I have a commonplace book where I copy poems, quotes and passages I want to remember, so him doing the same doesn’t feel like busy work as learning to do what Mom does.
If you're looking for something that uses narration, copywork, and so on, but is more organized and structured, you might want to check out Writing & Rhetoric by Classical Academic Press.
I once heard someone say that Shurley English in the early years to learn basic writing structure. Then IEW for the middle grades and then back to Sonlight.
I had the same exact feelings as you 3 years ago! I had to pump the brakes from starting too much too soon with writing and I followed the wise advice of so many who know better than I in the HS community. After years of doing darts and copywork my child simply needed more by 5th grade. I thought she was ready for more. We had done TONS of narration. I had her orally narrate her audiobooks for me when she finished, I had her keep a reading journal grades 1-5 ( I wrote her early entries for her) and she loved telling stories. I decided after much research to introduce Evan moor 6 Trait writing workbooks for 5th grade. We actually did grade 4 in first semester and grade 5 in second. She flew through them and loved them! She thrives with structure and likes checking off her boxes. While I didn't want to outright crush her natural creativity I wanted to give her structure and was hopeful these workbooks would work. They did NOT disappoint! It was a great introduction to more formal writing and she looked forward to doing her pages .They have that workbook for younger levels but I do not think they are necessary. I say all this to share that we now are using Writing with Skill level 1 from the Well Trained Mind for 6th grade. She is CRUSHING it!!! We LOVE it! It was down to IEW vs MCT vs Writing with Skill. I'm sure any of these programs would be great. We may even try something new next year. My main takeaways are that when they are ready, they will soar. You don't need too much too soon and that narration is the root of all of these programs so if you can get that down, you can do anything! Have a great homeschool year!
My 7 year old excels in reading and math, but hates to write! I find it very awkward to expect her to write original compositions because the lack of spelling knowledge at this age. She doesn't want to guess at the spelling ( which I'm glad because I think that just develops poor spelling skills) so she basically has done no original written composition yet. Which sorta worries me, but this is the approach that Charlotte Mason teaches so that makes me feel better! The other day when she needed to personally respond to a question about a chapter in a book she read, I just guided her thoughts towards a complete sentence, wrote it down and she copied it onto her page. I think that's the approach I'm going to take. At least until she knows how to spell a lot more words. We will see how it goes!
I think you are on the right track. I found myself finally back to Sonlight all along with IEW being the spine and utilizing some other more direct grammar tools. I was where you were about 10 years ago. I now use a blend of Shurley English/Hake grammar /Fix-It /Killgallon Sentence Composing and Sonlight LA sheets. Those are the tools we use and basically have a writing/grammar meeting before we have our structured IEW at home video course that we follow. I intuitively know now I'd it is too much or not. I had finally realized that what I needed and wanted for the kids I have and me as their mom didn't exist. So I had to brush up on my skills as I could, begin teaching the children in front of me, and knowing where I wanted to take them in an area that has been a weakness of mine. We have finally found our sweet spot.
We have started Michael Clay Thompson’s curriculum (MCT) this year and it has been a game changer. The first level is the Island and it teaches the compete foundation of grammar. It’s all written through stories and is incredibly engaging and thought provoking! The second level is the Town and it focuses on sentences and review of grammar. The next level is the Voyage and it focuses on paragraphs and then continues. The vocabulary is heavily focused on Greek and Latin roots. It’s absolutely incredible! Definitely worth checking out. It is to be implemented when the child has already learned to read and is ready to read to learn.
We used MCT and writhing and rhetoric book 1 fables. This combination worked great. MTC covered grammar, vocabulary, and structure. Writing and rhetoric was really fun writing. It’s very gentle and the classical approach, and it’s so fun. It also has a lot of fables which are a requirement in public school. My kids loved the fables so much I added Evan Moore fables which had extra stores, games, and activities.
P.S. I love that you added that you are cautious trusting just one curriculum to get you (and your children) where you want to go and so you are instead doing your own research. I love this!! I am a researcher as well and I also have a third grade boy who is really entering the world of the written word in a new way and I take that responsibility very seriously, so I appreciate this conversation and you sharing your process and the resources you are using.
Rooted In Language used sell their early literacy under Brave Writer - their Pinwheels program is a very thorough and seamless reading/handwriting/phonetics/grammar/spelling for beginners and even struggling beginners! Highly recommend.
I'm super excited to watch this video. I lean Charlotte Mason and want to wait to introduce it much. I love the idea of developing their "voice" before pushing mechanics.
This is the one area we still haven't quite figured out. I have a 4th, 6th, and 1st grader. We tried Writeshop Jr last year, it was too many parts and too time consuming for us. Then we went to Essentials in Writing. The first half is grammar and since we didn't start until later in the year we didn't get to the writing part. I ordered EIW again and then my boys told me they really didn't like it. 😑 So we tried something very different. I got Writing with Skill for my 6th grader and Writing With Ease Level 3 for my 4th grader. My 6th grader worked mostly independent with his. My 4th grader was with me. I was loving both! I really like how they work. But after a few weeks my 6th grader begged to go back to EIW. He couldn't really give me a straight reason why he didn't like Writing with Skill. So that is where we're at. I don't know if EIW will continue to work. I've thought about switching back and forth between the grammar and writing portion too. Because I don't love that he spends half the year not really working on writing. I'm also using Writing with Ease with my 1st grader. I love it for him too. My 6th grader is also using The Creative Writer from The Well Trained Mind. He does it about once a week. He is very creative with his stories so I wanted to encourage that too. So far that's going well. Oh! My 4th grader also tried out Writing Rhetoric. I also really liked that one and it's very similar to Writing with Ease with narration and dictation. He said he much preferred Writing with Ease though. It kind of kills me that we've jumped around so much in this area but I'm hoping what we're doing now will be what works so we don't have to change any more! Not sure if that was helpful at all but I've been thinking about this topic for a long time. 😄
I completely relate to your feelings. My oldest is 3rd grade and I've started to become a little anxious about writing instruction. Grammar isn't a struggle but writing seems to really be difficult for my oldest. I'm going to look into the resources you've mentioned. Thanks for this! PS - I also relate to your feelings about Sally Clarkson. Everyone I know loves her stuff but I too just often feel left thinking, "this just isn't me." Glad to know I'm not alone!
I have been getting anxious about writing since my daughter started reading more fluently, because I know it's the next step 😬. For second grade I decided to just keep focusing on reading and just dip our toes into grammar and writing through Evan Moor. When we get to third grade though, or even fourth, I know we will need more. I'm just all over the place as well on where to go.
Teaching writing is one of those things that few feel confident about. Confidence will come as you do it. Keep in mind that your little writers only need basics such as using a capital letter at the beginning of a sentence, having a subject and verb, and end punctuation. You can teach that! Later you can find a curriculum to teach difficult concepts such as punctuating dialogue. It's ok to tell your child that you will learn that part later. Too much too soon will frustrate your child anyway. I appreciate the discussion here about different teaching personalities and confidence in teaching writing. I struggle to find curricula that both me and my children are comfortable with. My children enjoy the ones where I am writing with them or writing the content, but I lean towards more structure. Their favorites were Writing Wizardry, a writer's craft curriculum, and Caught'ya Grammar where I wrote 100 daily sentences. It's challenging, but the more I am personally invested the better they do. Don't be afraid to look up answers together or leave some topics for later. Also, for older grades you can trade another Mom, use a writing class, or hire someone to check their compositions. You got this!
Angie, I agree with you that Brave Writer and Sonlight are very similar. They only differ in the source of the copywork; BW uses read Alouds and SL uses readers. I have a 14 year old that only did copywork, narration and dictation and now is able to write really well. I would have to say, in my experience, narration across the curriculum is everything. This narration, or oral composition is the precursor to written composition and the transition while it takes years, it works really well and it’s gentle. By the time the kids are in middle school they can write fluently about everything. But it takes time. As you ca see in Karen Glass’ book, the only thing needed is a form Al composition book in highschool to polish paragraphs, learn how to format outlines and add some variation to style. IEW is a good resource for that.
I am newer and only just starting getting into even thinking about writing with my oldest. Can you clarify what you mean by “narration” (versus earlier when you said “narration and dictation”)... or did you mean them interchangeable? Do you ask your child to narrate a story for you... and you write it down?
I also need someone to hold my hand and teach ME how to do it. English is not my first language and I need that. I tried brave writer with my second grader and I was so confused. I do love her idea but I wish she could provide more for the teacher.
I wish that I had never strayed from Sonlight. I also think just writing something a little each day, l Ike copywork is just fine until things are sorted. Just fun with writing and building stamina.
Yes thanks for starting this discussion- to me copy work does not help with original composition and creative writing - as Fred lybrand said - its better to write effectively than correct. So I started my 7 yo in writing sentences of his original thoughts … we’d go from there . An essay a day according to the Robinson curriculum
Also I have read similar books as you. I did have to throw away my Well Trained Mind Book eventually because of the pressure that I had with it. It made me want to strive in a direction that I could not maintain. I learned a ton and used their writing resources too. I also dove deep into Brave Writer too. I really enjoyed all of Ruth Beechick's books as well as Charlotte Mason.
Loved this! Its like you read my kind. I am trying to figure out how I want to teach this as well. You’d think that I would have more confidence because my degree was in English, but I have my doubts too! The only thing that I could tell is that for me and I think also for my daughter I want to be able to somehow show her that there are formulas without boring her/ limiting her with them. I think for me the formulas took away creativity and I wasn’t able to get it back with confidence until I was like in college. I am really interested in Dart right now and it looks like I might try that alongside a simple grammar workbook. I feel like we have enough to deal with with spelling and reading to not bring into much writing worries yet for my second grader. The Charlotte Mason approach and literature focus seems to be our calling for now. I feel like I learned a lot through reading more than even my teachers teaching me the grammar concepts so my hope is that the same will apply for my daughter. I plan on teaching it to her explicitly but not worrying about whether not she could define an adjective for example. Still not sure how I’m gonna do creative writing but I think I like the idea of doing it with them like in the Writer’s Jungle. for them not to get discouraged by a script or writing it perfectly but kind of putting their ideas on paper. I do like IEW a little in the organization aspect, so maybe in the future I’ll do a little bit of both that and Dart for example.
This is exactly what I’m thinking about currently for next year. I have a first grader but am trying to decide what direction to go for writing in 2nd grade and beyond. I love Ruth Beechik and Susan Wise Bauer’s philosophies. Did you use writing with ease? I am leaning towards that for second grade. Have you looked at Learning Language Arts Through Literature? It is inspired by Ruth Beechik so it uses a lot of her methods. It is comprehensive as well. I am torn between the two. We are currently using their blue book (first grade) but the phonics were behind where my son was at so we are doing phonics from somewhere else and I use the writing and literature from the blue book. I can’t decide whether or not to keep doing a combo of two curriculums or use something else in the phonics years and go back to LLATL when we’re done with phonics. I don’t know!
I so agree with you-I hope to use curriculum as a tool to get us where we want to go. Great video. I loved Language Arts in grade school. I am starting Sonlight K with my big girl in a week or so and will be interested to see how I’m feeling about the process of teaching writing over the next few years.
I, too, am a math/science type who hated writing papers. My 8yr old is the same way. Have you looked at Writing and Rhetoric? There is a detailed teacher’s guide. I may outsource writing next year because I just have too much anxiety about it.
I really could have made this video. I have the same thoughts. We have the same methodical personality and desire for structure while liking a middle point between Charlotte Mason and Classical. I have also had the exact same concern over Writing lately! I just don’t care to read all the books. Haha. I am content with having an idea of what they stand for. Since I don’t want tears yet and believe so much in Developmental readiness more than anything, I have decided I will use Writing with Ease Level 2 shortly while we use Logic of English writing lessons in the Essentials Reader. After that we might move to IEW temporarily to land in the Progymnasmata. I absolutely love Memoria Press Classical Composition path!
Oh my I am right here in the trenches with you. I have a 2nd grader and a kindergartener. I am totally comfortable with Math/Science but grammar, spelling, and writing is so far out of my league. I feel like I need very very specific hand holding as the teacher. It also doesn’t help that my 2nd grader has very little desire to write, just doesn’t naturally “get it” and he hates copy work. I’m at such a loss as to what to do. I feel like we have jumped around to so many things and just haven’t found the right thing. I wavier weekly between trying not to worry and stress and put it off until 4th grade and being frustrated that I have another son coming but I don’t want to reuse anything we used so far. The comment from the three r’s book and writing notes about the paragraph sounds a lot like the idea behind IEWs Structure and Style Program.
I feel like writing and music are similar. I enjoyed writing more when I saw how to be creative outside of the formula while still seeing how /why the formula worked or didn’t work. I think in college, as I started seeing how people broke the rules or stuck too closely to them, it helped me realize how to be free with within it and become a better writer. I still have a lot of doubts and I actually blame the system for it. Just as with music I think sometimes rule breaking or thinking outside the box can be the most interesting but there’s a way of doing it right and you almost have to feel it if that makes sense and I think the better way to feel it is to listen to music or writers who both break the rules and don’t.
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We use Rod and Staff English 4th grade orally, it usually takes around 10 minutes. I never let them do any exercises that require pen and paper. If we can't do it orally, we skip that part of the lesson. We also do Fix it Grammar; I absolutely love the review, it consist of only one sentence per day and copy work. We also do the Sonlight Language Arts Level D worksheets. Some days if we are running behind, we may skip Rod and Staff but we always try to include it. My 2 kids do it together and keep score lol. They treat it like Jeopardy, we even have buzzers. We also do IEW Structure and Style A Year 1
I highly recommend The Writing Revolution and then using those techniques in the content they are learning.
I asked a seasoned homeschooler her thoughts on teaching writing and this is what she told me. I think it’s brilliant. Dropping this here word for word as my mother in law texted it to me.
“Each child will be different as to what they are interested in accomplishing with writing and the only mistake is making them feel like writing is an assignment to plod thru rather than a fun way to get their ideas, interests amd information across. It is much easier for everyone to let them enjoy the process rather than push them thru. Sean was a visual learner so it worked best to start him that way, even something as simple as a 3 part 'storyboard' showing the beginning, body, and end of a story (simple, obviously...even a favorite joke) keeping it fun is the key, and continue adding things as their desire and skills progress... the actual Grammer and repetitive draft rewrites being the last things, like polishing.... or sanding.... gotta build structure first. Just brainstorming topics, then freewriting a few sentences to start, on a daily basis is good. No corrections. Just getting in the habit... they will show interest (hopefully) in wanting their writing to grow at their own timing, and you build from there... again, the parts, one by one... sentence structure, simple punctuation, paragraphs, dialog, hook statements, et al... If you feel like they are falling behind, you can add the next step, but if you push too hard, they will end up hating writing and it will be an uphill 'battle' for many years.”
Love this - thank you for sharing!!
This video was wonderful! Thanks for sharing all of your research. It was very helpful.
We love Brave Writer around here! And like you I felt like the grammar would just take a long time to get through it all. So we added Fix It! Grammar from IEW and it is wonderful! My daughter loves it so much. And now I think we have the perfect pair for both inspiring the excitement to get their ideas on paper as well as teaching grammar. It's the right puzzle pieces for our homeschool.
I loved when you said, “I love her stuff… I don’t have the right personality…”. Years ago I wanted desperately to send my son to a specific Waldorf school so when we started homeschooling we used a Waldorf curriculum. It was a nice, gentle entrance into homeschooling and I am grateful in many ways that we used it, but I quickly realized that I don’t have the right personality to teach in that style! So often I hear people talk about what programs do or don’t fit their children’s learning styles, but programs also have to work for our teaching styles. In my case I can use something that doesn’t fit my style, but I won’t do it justice. My child was not getting the beauty of a Waldorf education from me, he was getting a watered down version which would have left him really wanting had we used it longer. Thank you for clarifying this in my mind.
We are a couple of months into third grade and my approach thus far is to teach grammar explicitly, read tons of high-quality literature and non-fiction, do some copywork (though not much, maybe once a week) add in more writing to other work (such as writing answers in full sentences) and beginning to work on more creative writing assignments with gentle discussion of flow and writing for both interest and clarity. For my son my gut tells me to just let him write without too many rules (aside from correcting grammar and spelling) so that he doesn’t feel like writing has to be rigid or formulaic. To me it feels similar to how many things kids learn first through play (think playing catch or batting a ball in the back yard) and then later you teach them how to put all their skills together in a formal game). This is too long a comment for RUclips, so I’ll stop, ha!
Waldorf rhetoric sounds great … but I realized it’s kind of whack for us too…
What exactly does “copy work” look like for younger children? Is it those workbooks that have the little sentences that your child traces, then writes below, “The turtle has a shell”? Or is it taking short passages from the literature they are reading and set-up our own “copy work”, like two sentences from Farmer Boy that you’re reading? Poems?
@@katiejon17 , it varies from family to family. For us we primarily used short verses, such as nursery rhymes and little poems, when my son was young and now we use poems, quotes and favorite passages from our literature readings. I want copywork to feel like something my son might use in real life. I have a commonplace book where I copy poems, quotes and passages I want to remember, so him doing the same doesn’t feel like busy work as learning to do what Mom does.
@@maggiepanning356 I like that idea - thank you.
If you're looking for something that uses narration, copywork, and so on, but is more organized and structured, you might want to check out Writing & Rhetoric by Classical Academic Press.
Thanks for the recommendation!
I once heard someone say that Shurley English in the early years to learn basic writing structure. Then IEW for the middle grades and then back to Sonlight.
I had the same exact feelings as you 3 years ago! I had to pump the brakes from starting too much too soon with writing and I followed the wise advice of so many who know better than I in the HS community. After years of doing darts and copywork my child simply needed more by 5th grade. I thought she was ready for more. We had done TONS of narration. I had her orally narrate her audiobooks for me when she finished, I had her keep a reading journal grades 1-5 ( I wrote her early entries for her) and she loved telling stories. I decided after much research to introduce Evan moor 6 Trait writing workbooks for 5th grade. We actually did grade 4 in first semester and grade 5 in second. She flew through them and loved them! She thrives with structure and likes checking off her boxes. While I didn't want to outright crush her natural creativity I wanted to give her structure and was hopeful these workbooks would work. They did NOT disappoint! It was a great introduction to more formal writing and she looked forward to doing her pages .They have that workbook for younger levels but I do not think they are necessary. I say all this to share that we now are using Writing with Skill level 1 from the Well Trained Mind for 6th grade. She is CRUSHING it!!! We LOVE it! It was down to IEW vs MCT vs Writing with Skill. I'm sure any of these programs would be great. We may even try something new next year. My main takeaways are that when they are ready, they will soar. You don't need too much too soon and that narration is the root of all of these programs so if you can get that down, you can do anything! Have a great homeschool year!
Thank you for sharing - I love hearing your process!!
This blessed me!
My 7 year old excels in reading and math, but hates to write! I find it very awkward to expect her to write original compositions because the lack of spelling knowledge at this age. She doesn't want to guess at the spelling ( which I'm glad because I think that just develops poor spelling skills) so she basically has done no original written composition yet. Which sorta worries me, but this is the approach that Charlotte Mason teaches so that makes me feel better! The other day when she needed to personally respond to a question about a chapter in a book she read, I just guided her thoughts towards a complete sentence, wrote it down and she copied it onto her page. I think that's the approach I'm going to take. At least until she knows how to spell a lot more words. We will see how it goes!
I think you are on the right track. I found myself finally back to Sonlight all along with IEW being the spine and utilizing some other more direct grammar tools. I was where you were about 10 years ago. I now use a blend of Shurley English/Hake grammar /Fix-It /Killgallon Sentence Composing and Sonlight LA sheets. Those are the tools we use and basically have a writing/grammar meeting before we have our structured IEW at home video course that we follow. I intuitively know now I'd it is too much or not. I had finally realized that what I needed and wanted for the kids I have and me as their mom didn't exist. So I had to brush up on my skills as I could, begin teaching the children in front of me, and knowing where I wanted to take them in an area that has been a weakness of mine. We have finally found our sweet spot.
Love it! I’m leaning towards a bit of IEW and maybe some using language well before circling back to Sonlight!!
We have started Michael Clay Thompson’s curriculum (MCT) this year and it has been a game changer. The first level is the Island and it teaches the compete foundation of grammar. It’s all written through stories and is incredibly engaging and thought provoking! The second level is the Town and it focuses on sentences and review of grammar. The next level is the Voyage and it focuses on paragraphs and then continues. The vocabulary is heavily focused on Greek and Latin roots. It’s absolutely incredible! Definitely worth checking out. It is to be implemented when the child has already learned to read and is ready to read to learn.
Im so tempted by MCT!
Great video! Thanks for sharing 🥰
We used MCT and writhing and rhetoric book 1 fables. This combination worked great. MTC covered grammar, vocabulary, and structure. Writing and rhetoric was really fun writing. It’s very gentle and the classical approach, and it’s so fun. It also has a lot of fables which are a requirement in public school. My kids loved the fables so much I added Evan Moore fables which had extra stores, games, and activities.
I've always been so curious about MCT!
P.S. I love that you added that you are cautious trusting just one curriculum to get you (and your children) where you want to go and so you are instead doing your own research. I love this!! I am a researcher as well and I also have a third grade boy who is really entering the world of the written word in a new way and I take that responsibility very seriously, so I appreciate this conversation and you sharing your process and the resources you are using.
Happy you are a fellow researcher 🤣
Rooted In Language used sell their early literacy under Brave Writer - their Pinwheels program is a very thorough and seamless reading/handwriting/phonetics/grammar/spelling for beginners and even struggling beginners! Highly recommend.
I've heard amazing things about Pinwheels :)
I'm super excited to watch this video. I lean Charlotte Mason and want to wait to introduce it much. I love the idea of developing their "voice" before pushing mechanics.
This is the one area we still haven't quite figured out. I have a 4th, 6th, and 1st grader. We tried Writeshop Jr last year, it was too many parts and too time consuming for us. Then we went to Essentials in Writing. The first half is grammar and since we didn't start until later in the year we didn't get to the writing part. I ordered EIW again and then my boys told me they really didn't like it. 😑 So we tried something very different. I got Writing with Skill for my 6th grader and Writing With Ease Level 3 for my 4th grader. My 6th grader worked mostly independent with his. My 4th grader was with me. I was loving both! I really like how they work. But after a few weeks my 6th grader begged to go back to EIW. He couldn't really give me a straight reason why he didn't like Writing with Skill. So that is where we're at. I don't know if EIW will continue to work. I've thought about switching back and forth between the grammar and writing portion too. Because I don't love that he spends half the year not really working on writing. I'm also using Writing with Ease with my 1st grader. I love it for him too. My 6th grader is also using The Creative Writer from The Well Trained Mind. He does it about once a week. He is very creative with his stories so I wanted to encourage that too. So far that's going well.
Oh! My 4th grader also tried out Writing Rhetoric. I also really liked that one and it's very similar to Writing with Ease with narration and dictation. He said he much preferred Writing with Ease though.
It kind of kills me that we've jumped around so much in this area but I'm hoping what we're doing now will be what works so we don't have to change any more!
Not sure if that was helpful at all but I've been thinking about this topic for a long time. 😄
Very helpful - thank you!
I completely relate to your feelings. My oldest is 3rd grade and I've started to become a little anxious about writing instruction. Grammar isn't a struggle but writing seems to really be difficult for my oldest. I'm going to look into the resources you've mentioned. Thanks for this!
PS - I also relate to your feelings about Sally Clarkson. Everyone I know loves her stuff but I too just often feel left thinking, "this just isn't me." Glad to know I'm not alone!
I have been getting anxious about writing since my daughter started reading more fluently, because I know it's the next step 😬. For second grade I decided to just keep focusing on reading and just dip our toes into grammar and writing through Evan Moor. When we get to third grade though, or even fourth, I know we will need more. I'm just all over the place as well on where to go.
Teaching writing is one of those things that few feel confident about. Confidence will come as you do it. Keep in mind that your little writers only need basics such as using a capital letter at the beginning of a sentence, having a subject and verb, and end punctuation. You can teach that!
Later you can find a curriculum to teach difficult concepts such as punctuating dialogue. It's ok to tell your child that you will learn that part later. Too much too soon will frustrate your child anyway.
I appreciate the discussion here about different teaching personalities and confidence in teaching writing. I struggle to find curricula that both me and my children are comfortable with. My children enjoy the ones where I am writing with them or writing the content, but I lean towards more structure.
Their favorites were Writing Wizardry, a writer's craft curriculum, and Caught'ya Grammar where I wrote 100 daily sentences.
It's challenging, but the more I am personally invested the better they do. Don't be afraid to look up answers together or leave some topics for later.
Also, for older grades you can trade another Mom, use a writing class, or hire someone to check their compositions. You got this!
Angie, I agree with you that Brave Writer and Sonlight are very similar. They only differ in the source of the copywork; BW uses read Alouds and SL uses readers.
I have a 14 year old that only did copywork, narration and dictation and now is able to write really well. I would have to say, in my experience, narration across the curriculum is everything. This narration, or oral composition is the precursor to written composition and the transition while it takes years, it works really well and it’s gentle. By the time the kids are in middle school they can write fluently about everything. But it takes time.
As you ca see in Karen Glass’ book, the only thing needed is a form Al composition book in highschool to polish paragraphs, learn how to format outlines and add some variation to style. IEW is a good resource for that.
I am newer and only just starting getting into even thinking about writing with my oldest. Can you clarify what you mean by “narration” (versus earlier when you said “narration and dictation”)... or did you mean them interchangeable? Do you ask your child to narrate a story for you... and you write it down?
Thank you!!
I also need someone to hold my hand and teach ME how to do it. English is not my first language and I need that. I tried brave writer with my second grader and I was so confused. I do love her idea but I wish she could provide more for the teacher.
I wish that I had never strayed from Sonlight. I also think just writing something a little each day, l Ike copywork is just fine until things are sorted. Just fun with writing and building stamina.
Yes thanks for starting this discussion- to me copy work does not help with original composition and creative writing - as Fred lybrand said - its better to write effectively than correct. So I started my 7 yo in writing sentences of his original thoughts … we’d go from there . An essay a day according to the Robinson curriculum
Also I have read similar books as you. I did have to throw away my Well Trained Mind Book eventually because of the pressure that I had with it. It made me want to strive in a direction that I could not maintain. I learned a ton and used their writing resources too. I also dove deep into Brave Writer too. I really enjoyed all of Ruth Beechick's books as well as Charlotte Mason.
Loved this! Its like you read my kind. I am trying to figure out how I want to teach this as well. You’d think that I would have more confidence because my degree was in English, but I have my doubts too! The only thing that I could tell is that for me and I think also for my daughter I want to be able to somehow show her that there are formulas without boring her/ limiting her with them. I think for me the formulas took away creativity and I wasn’t able to get it back with confidence until I was like in college.
I am really interested in Dart right now and it looks like I might try that alongside a simple grammar workbook. I feel like we have enough to deal with with spelling and reading to not bring into much writing worries yet for my second grader. The Charlotte Mason approach and literature focus seems to be our calling for now. I feel like I learned a lot through reading more than even my teachers teaching me the grammar concepts so my hope is that the same will apply for my daughter. I plan on teaching it to her explicitly but not worrying about whether not she could define an adjective for example.
Still not sure how I’m gonna do creative writing but I think I like the idea of doing it with them like in the Writer’s Jungle. for them not to get discouraged by a script or writing it perfectly but kind of putting their ideas on paper.
I do like IEW a little in the organization aspect, so maybe in the future I’ll do a little bit of both that and Dart for example.
This is exactly what I’m thinking about currently for next year. I have a first grader but am trying to decide what direction to go for writing in 2nd grade and beyond. I love Ruth Beechik and Susan Wise Bauer’s philosophies.
Did you use writing with ease? I am leaning towards that for second grade.
Have you looked at Learning Language Arts Through Literature? It is inspired by Ruth Beechik so it uses a lot of her methods. It is comprehensive as well. I am torn between the two. We are currently using their blue book (first grade) but the phonics were behind where my son was at so we are doing phonics from somewhere else and I use the writing and literature from the blue book. I can’t decide whether or not to keep doing a combo of two curriculums or use something else in the phonics years and go back to LLATL when we’re done with phonics. I don’t know!
I so agree with you-I hope to use curriculum as a tool to get us where we want to go. Great video. I loved Language Arts in grade school. I am starting Sonlight K with my big girl in a week or so and will be interested to see how I’m feeling about the process of teaching writing over the next few years.
I will definitely keep you all updated 😊
I, too, am a math/science type who hated writing papers. My 8yr old is the same way. Have you looked at Writing and Rhetoric? There is a detailed teacher’s guide. I may outsource writing next year because I just have too much anxiety about it.
I really could have made this video. I have the same thoughts. We have the same methodical personality and desire for structure while liking a middle point between Charlotte Mason and Classical. I have also had the exact same concern over Writing lately! I just don’t care to read all the books. Haha. I am content with having an idea of what they stand for.
Since I don’t want tears yet and believe so much in Developmental readiness more than anything, I have decided I will use Writing with Ease Level 2 shortly while we use Logic of English writing lessons in the Essentials Reader.
After that we might move to IEW temporarily to land in the Progymnasmata. I absolutely love Memoria Press Classical Composition path!
That sounds like a really good plan, I love bother WWE and LOE!!
Also have you looked into fix it grammar by IEW? I have not used it myself but it sounds like something that may be up your ally.
Oh my I am right here in the trenches with you. I have a 2nd grader and a kindergartener. I am totally comfortable with Math/Science but grammar, spelling, and writing is so far out of my league. I feel like I need very very specific hand holding as the teacher. It also doesn’t help that my 2nd grader has very little desire to write, just doesn’t naturally “get it” and he hates copy work. I’m at such a loss as to what to do. I feel like we have jumped around to so many things and just haven’t found the right thing. I wavier weekly between trying not to worry and stress and put it off until 4th grade and being frustrated that I have another son coming but I don’t want to reuse anything we used so far.
The comment from the three r’s book and writing notes about the paragraph sounds a lot like the idea behind IEWs Structure and Style Program.
I agree that it sounds a lot like IEW, which is making me want to try it 🤣
I feel like writing and music are similar. I enjoyed writing more when I saw how to be creative outside of the formula while still seeing how /why the formula worked or didn’t work. I think in college, as I started seeing how people broke the rules or stuck too closely to them, it helped me realize how to be free with within it and become a better writer. I still have a lot of doubts and I actually blame the system for it. Just as with music I think sometimes rule breaking or thinking outside the box can be the most interesting but there’s a way of doing it right and you almost have to feel it if that makes sense and I think the better way to feel it is to listen to music or writers who both break the rules and don’t.
I have no idea how to keep my kids engages with copywork.
We do 60 second stories when we lay down for sleep. Back and forth