If you do not use a writing program, what resources do you use instead?

[Kfamily]

I know most of you ladies here are just gifted in writing and teaching writing...I only hope I can manage to do half as well!:001_smile: For those of you who teach writing and do not use a program, what resources do you use instead?

 

What do you use for just grammar (if you use a book/resource here)at the high school level? What do you use for grammar for grades K-8 to prepare for high school?

 

What books do you keep on hand for teaching writing?

 

I do have WTM and I own these recommendations for writing so far:

New Oxford Guide to Writing

Elements of Style

A Rulebook of Arguments

 

and I have

The Lively Art of Writing

Rhetoric in the Classical Tradition

 

If I get SWB tapes that I hear so much about, is this all I need?

I am little nervous about this. Don't any of you need an answer key...:D

I do have CW Maxim which I intend to use. I may go on with CW from there but I am considering dropping it. I feel overwhelmed with all that we need to still do (older dd will be in 8th this year) and all that will be coming in high school. I really want to focus, focus, focus and simplify too!

 

How does this all fit in? :lol:

[Tullia]

First, I'll say that I was never comfortable teaching without a writing program, but I did not hesitate to tweak what I did use to varying degrees. Also I don't consider myself a gifted teacher. That said, I would like to suggest another resource you might want to add to your already good list. It's a 60 or so page grammar workbook published by Robert Einarsson. He makes it available free of charge through his website in pdf. It's a great bridge between grammar and rhetoric, IMO. And, there are other good language arts resources available there as well; just click on the other icons at the top of the page.

 

http://www.classiclanguagearts.net/workbook.htm

 

I definitely suggest that you get the SWB audios and listen to them. They'll help you determine your comfort zone for "winging it" as opposed to following a curriculum. I also think that they will help you evaluate some of the different options available.

 

YMMV, but I found that using Classical Writing simplified my life in the long run. I was able to work through Maxim with my son before he outran the CW publishing schedule. If the later volumes incorporate logic and rhetoric as smoothly as the earlier volumes do grammar, you may find it worth the effort. One of the things I found most difficult during the high school years was trying to integrate logic and rhetoric into the rest of the curriculum. While it is possible to treat logic and rhetoric simply as stand-alone subjects, to really get the full benefit it's best to take things a step further. Just one person's opinion, though, and this advice may be worth no more than what I'm charging for it. :D:D:D

 

If you're unsure about continuing with CW because you found Homer difficult and time consuming, I'd encourage you to give Maxim a try. We found Maxim far easier than Homer even though we used the first edition which some folks feel is not as user friendly as the revised version.

 

FYI, here's a list of my favorite language arts resources:

1. Classical Writing Aesop-Maxim; Poetry for Beginners & Intermediate Poetry

2. Harvey's Elementary and Revised English Grammars

3. Mary Daley's book on diagramming; sorry but I've forgotten the title. I used it with Harvey's Elementary Grammar.

4. English Grammar Handouts (Prof. Einarsson's worktext.) For use after completing Harvey's Revised English Grammar.

5. Bob Jones University English Handbook for Christian Schools (mainly review and consolidation for SAT and ACT prep) because it has exercises with answers and an excellent section on traditional sentence diagramming.

6. Lost Tools of Writing Level 1 (I bought this because my son needed some work with the canon of invention and was working ahead of the Classical Writing publishing schedule. It is a stand-alone composition program, and I think it's a great choice for those who want an explicitly classical paradigm but don't want an integrated program like CW.)

7. TWTM for a general road map that will give you a realistic idea of how to prepare your student for college work.

8. TWEM for help in transferring language arts skills to reading, discussing and writing about history and literature.

9. Strunk & White's The Elements of Style--mainly for SAT & ACT prep.

 

HTH,

Martha

 

How could I have forgotten these(slapping forehead in frustration)??? D'Angelo's Composition in the Classical Tradition and Corbett's Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student. Both of these are college textbooks and priced accordingly. I bought new through Amazon Marketplace for much less than list price and you can often find real deals on used copies, too. I have Corbett's 4th edition, but it has only a tiny bit more material than the 3rd edition so if you find a good deal on the 3rd edition it would work just fine.

Edited July 16, 2010 by Martha in NM
to better address the op

[MomsintheGarden]

Hi Kfamily,

 

I have all of what you have :) plus a lot of IEW and other stuff. I've graduated my two oldest, and they used R&S Grammar through 10th grade and IEW mostly for writing. My dd also studied for the two English APs, but that's another story.

 

For my younger children's grammar, I will continue to use R&S through 10th grade, and then SAT prep should review some concepts. They do FLL for 1st and 2nd grade, then begin R&S 3rd grade grammar and keep going. R&S has been a good fit for our family's grammar needs. They do some, but not all of the writing assignments in the R&S books. I especially like the outlining lessons.

 

I used CW Aesop and Homer for Older Beginners with my middle child this year. He liked it but it was just too much for me. It has too much flipping back & forth in the books (it drove me crazy - I have post-it's all over the place), and too much grammar combined with R&S (which I prefer over Harvey's). I also do not like the parsing in CW. Sorry to all you CW lovers out there!

 

I plan to use SWB's writing plan that she talks about in her new downloadable lectures, and in the WTM. I'll probably also use the Lively Art of Writing (which I love) and maybe some IEW. I will also continue with making my high schoolers read The Elements of Style at the beginning of each school year.

 

I have been homeschooling for a long time, and have finally figured out that quantity does not equal quality one-on-one writing coaching. Those years I was so busy with babies and plunked my older two in front of Andrew Pudewa, as wonderful as he is, did not really help them. I'm hoping to do a better job with my next batch!

 

GardenMom

[Faithr]

Martha in NM! That is an incredible resource from classic language arts! Thank you so much for the link.

[Tullia]

Martha in NM! That is an incredible resource from classic language arts! Thank you so much for the link.

 

You're most welcome! Prof. Einarsson surely must be a gifted teacher, and he was always happy to discuss my questions not only about his worktext but other things he's posted on his web page.

[LatinTea]

Yes, wonderful site. I love how he loves language. It definitely shows through his words.

 

Another author to consider is Michael Clay Thompson. I am in the process of trying to decide if I want to jump on the bandwagon and order some of his materials. His site is http://www.rfwp.com/mct.php

 

Another interesting thread: http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=189933&highlight=writing+swb+tapes

Thanks for the question; it's helped in some of my decisions too. :)

[Kfamily]

Martha, thank you so much for your thoughtful reply. It was very encouraging too.

 

I downloaded the workbook at Robert Einarsson's site and saved his site to favorites. It looks great and I plan on using this now too. I'll add the D'Angelo and Corbett texts the next chance I get.

 

I really like Classical Writing but I have been struggling with this since dd started it late and is an 8th grader this fall. We were working through Homer but felt like there was still so much of it left and that she needed to move past retelling narratives and into writing essays. I just these past three days sat down with only the Homer core book (not the workbooks) and went through each day and each skill level left in each day. Doing this was worth the effort, I think I have a plan to get us through all of Homer in only 22 lessons (and I mean 22 daily lessons not weekly lesson sets) and then use our own books for history and literature as our models. This is exactly what I needed to do. I had always been told that Homer was not very good for using across curriculum but I found that if you use only the core book that it is actually quite good for using across curriculum. The only exception with this plan is that we will work through the grammar, diagramming and 6 sentence shuffle at a different pace. This sounds very messy but I think it will solve most of our problems and yet still use Homer as a base. Whew! I can then use Maxim (which is where we need to be :001_smile:) sooner. I agree that CW may still give me a foundation in the higher levels even if I only use the core books. I am hopeful I will get it together!:lol:

 

Thank you again so much Martha.:grouphug:

[Kfamily]

Gardenmom, thank you so much. I have a 2nd grader in the fall and I am often considering what to use for her as well. I may try Rod & Staff for her. We use their texts for math already. I agree it is all about the quality. I also have realized that I need to put myself through some of these books. I think I will be a better teacher after I learn the material.

 

Margo, thank you too. I will definitely get SWB's tapes. I have heard so many good things about them and I can use all the perspective I can get. Thanks for the thread link too.