Jump to content

Menu

IEW users, specific question. Please help!


Recommended Posts

We are finishing up iew-swi a. Next year we will be using following Narnia. I need more specific instruction on the story sequence chart. assuming you are familiar with this, it should make sense (I hope! )

Here is the list for paragraph 1:

Characters/setting

I. Who, when, where?

Who is in the story?

What are they like?

Where do they live?

Where do they go?

When does it happen?

 

Then on the right there is a box for students to fill in with a KWO.

I.

1.

2.

3.

 

 

What I don't understand is there are 5 questions listed, and only spaces for 3 sets of keywords. How do we use this kwo to write the story?

 

I'm sure the answer is obvious, but I just don't get it! Someone walk me through this story sequence chart. (If you have Narnia, it's first introduced on page 16 of the student pages and page 16 ofthe teachers manual)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The questions are examples of things your student can include in the KWO.  They give your students ideas of what to write.  All of the questions don't need to be answered. 

 

The main idea is to describe the characters and setting in the first paragraph.  Then the conflict/problem goes in the second paragraph.  Then the conclusion goes in the last paragraph.  Use the questions to help your student come up with the appropriate information for each paragraph.

 

HTH

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Agree with the above. Use the questions to gather the data needed to fill in the KWO. It's a little weird doing it the first (and second and third) time but eventually it will make sense.

 

Incidentally, at convention the IEW folks said Narnia is one of the hardest books. It is B level (6th-9th grade), but it contains some elements the other B books do not have. Let me encourage you to get on the Yahoo group (IEW Families) if you have questions as you use it. If you have only used SWI-A, which is a level A product (3-5th grade), there might be some questions as you work through this one.  =)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Agree with the above. Use the questions to gather the data needed to fill in the KWO. It's a little weird doing it the first (and second and third) time but eventually it will make sense.

 

Incidentally, at convention the IEW folks said Narnia is one of the hardest books. It is B level (6th-9th grade), but it contains some elements the other B books do not have. Let me encourage you to get on the Yahoo group (IEW Families) if you have questions as you use it. If you have only used SWI-A, which is a level A product (3-5th grade), there might be some questions as you work through this one. =)

This is interesting. I should have talked with them at the convention, but I didn't know what questions I needed to ask. is it really a B level book, it's listed as a level a in the catalog? maybe I should look at something else for fifth grade?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, unfortunately it is a B level book.  It's listed as B in the catalog on page 34.

 

Unless you have an exceptional 5th grader, they would not normally recommend moving up to B yet.  I would venture to say they definitely would not recommend the Narnia book if you were promoting early.  

 

I am guessing they would say to do SICC-A (Student Intensive Continuation Course--another video series) OR do a Level A themed book  You could do the Fables, Myths and Fairy Tales book. 

 

You could always ask on the IEW Families forum also.

 

IF you bought Narnia from IEW, they do have the 100% money back no time limit guarantee. Just call them and tell them your dilemma and they can send you something else. =)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, unfortunately it is a B level book. It's listed as B in the catalog on page 34.

 

Unless you have an exceptional 5th grader, they would not normally recommend moving up to B yet. I would venture to say they definitely would not recommend the Narnia book if you were promoting early.

 

I am guessing they would say to do SICC-A (Student Intensive Continuation Course--another video series) OR do a Level A themed book You could do the Fables, Myths and Fairy Tales book.

 

 

You could always ask on the IEW Families forum also.

 

IF you bought Narnia from IEW, they do have the 100% money back no time limit guarantee. Just call them and tell them your dilemma and they can send you something else. =)

Carp! I seem to be unable to purchase a writing program for next year correctly! ! !

I looked at that darn catalog four times, And yet I still manage to buy the wrong thing. I think I intended to purchase fables :-(.

 

Yes they recommended the continuation course, but said to use over two years. I don't want a two year program. And I don't want to pay $200 for a program I'm only going to use for one year. though since I'm on my third purchase (yes, you read that right THIRD ) I'm starting to think I should've just shelled up the money at the beginning. SIGH. I hate writing. Rather, I hate not knowing how to get to where I want to be, and struggling along the path.

 

ETA: thanks for your help! it may not sounds like it, but I really do appreciate it!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My first child completed SWI-A, and then I had him do SICC-B.  (I hadn't realized SICC-A should have been done first.)  SICC-B was somewhat of a jump for my son, and I realized there were some concepts in IEW he was supposed to know that he hadn't gotten to yet.  Nevertheless he did well with SICC-B since he is a fairly strong writer.

 

With my next child, we did SWI-A, and followed it with SICC-A over one year.  I think this is a better route than skipping straight into a B level course.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

With my next child, we did SWI-A, and followed it with SICC-A over one year. I think this is a better route than skipping straight into a B level course.

When I visited with them at their both the indicated that the reason for the price difference (between swi-a and sicc-a) was that is was 10 dvds verses the 4. And that it worked really well to spread it out over two years.

Was it easy to do in one? Too much? Would it have been better to do in two?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My kids did SWI-A in 5th & 3rd grades, then SWCC-A over two years, so it was 6th/7th for DS, and 4th/5th for DD.  I just required more of my older child as he got older.

 

I thought SWCC worked really well spread over two years.   We did writing almost every day of the school year, but did take a few breaks (like "no writing the week right before Christmas," or "no writing the first day back to school after a holiday") and I didn't feel pressured to complete every.single.thing in one school year.  

 

One thing I like about IEW products is their resale value.   If you did purchase SWCC and only used it one year, you may be able to recoup up to $175 of the $200 you are paying for it.   (There's a SWCC-A for sale right now on homeschool classifieds for $175.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We did SICC a this year (4th grade) after swi a last year. My goal was to complete it in one year. We were good until about a month ago; only had 4 or 5 lessons left. We still have 4 or 5 lessons left! I let other things get in the way or it would have been do-able. Technically the year isn't over yet, so we could finish, but...

 

A typical weekly schedule for our one year goal was: day 1. Watch lesson video usually 30-50 minutes), do Kwo, orally test it out on me ( key step!), and start draft of first paragraph. Day 2, complete 1st paragraph and edit. Day 3 2nd paragraph and edit. Day 4 3rd paragraph and edit. Day 5. Hand in final typed copy, minor changes maybe. There were weeks when they'd do multiple paragraphs in a day, and maybe we'd edit another day. But that schedule would give you a sense of the pace needed for one year. I purposely made day 1 the longest so the rest of the week felt easier!

 

Now he does have suggestions in there about what exercises kids on a one year plan can skip, but I chose not to skip anything. They did every assignment, up to where we paused. Come to think of it, we paused once we got to the five paragraph essays and took two weeks for them. It threw off our rhythm I think. The one week rhythm worked well for us.

 

I think the two year program allows much more time for editing and re-editing and re-drafting. If you do that, great. I think I would have lost some cooperation if I was continually having them change something. As it went, they'd hand write the first draft. We'd edit it. They'd type it up. If it needed another change, it was usually fairly minor at that point and since it was on the computer, editing was easier. But then I just called it done. I don't get the sense that IEW is about perfect papers at this age, and they were writing fairly well in my opinion.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...