Please share writing requirements for 8th grade

[Kfamily]

I have most of our plans for the new year ready but wanted to check with others about writing requirements. Please share how much and in what forms your 8th grader writes. (Ex. essays, narrations, etc.)

 

Thank you!

[Mandy4]

I have an 8th grader this year. For composition he will work on several different types of writing over the course of the year from essay to research report.

 

I also have him write reports on the books that I assign.

 

He takes notes for science and I ask him to take notes when we listen to the SOTW cds (this in not his main history, just want him to learn to take notes from listening).

 

Hope that helps.

[Kfamily]

Thanks Mandy, that does help.

 

You will be doing a research paper? Would you share a little more about this...how long, # of different sources, etc. I had planned on this next year for 9th but may need to do some preparation work for that this year.

Edited September 10, 2010 by Kfamily

[regentrude]

My DD will do most of her writing in connection with history since we are doing a Great Books study. She will write one or more essays for each of the books we study. Currently we are reading the Iliad; she is planning an essay on the use of epithets in Homer, and has several other ideas.

She will also write one or more research reports; either about a historical topic, or about a literary topic where she has to research analysis done by others.

She takes notes on her reading from Short History of Western Civilization.

She also takes notes from her physics textbook and during physics lecture.

For creative writing; she is writing a book with her friend and they are currently at about 90,000 words (started in July)

[Kfamily]

Thanks regentrude,

 

Would you tell me more about your research paper, please?

What book do you use to follow guidelines?

 

I think we are a little behind since my plan for this year included essays, short compositions, poetry, notes, etc. I think dd needs another year before she is ready for a research paper. I plan on having her write a variety of essays, but I think we are still in a foundational stage in writing.

[coffeegal]

This year ds (8th grade) will be writing reports, friendly letters, business letters, short stories, poetry, a year-long research paper, various styes of essays, lots of summaries and outlines, and notes in science for his schoowork this year.

[angela in ohio]

I spend seventh/eighth grade getting them ready for high school writing.

 

I went through the IEW syllabus one last time, and I made sure that they could easily write a well-organized, mature, grammatically correct 5-7 paragraph essay in one week or less. We wrote a paper per week all year, except for the last month, when we wrote longer papers over a two week period.

 

I also made sure they were proficient in note-taking, both from text and from lectures, and in answering short answer and essay questions.

[Kfamily]

Thanks coffeegal!

 

Angela, this is a great plan. I think practice in writing a good essay in one week is a goal we need to include with our goals. Thanks for sharing!

[regentrude]

Would you tell me more about your research paper, please?

What book do you use to follow guidelines?

 

 

What do you mean by guidelines? I will look up the standard way citations are done in the US.

Other than that, she'll just have to come up with a topic that interests her, get material about it, find an aspect she would like to write about, make notes on her material, write, and properly cite the sources.

I find this much more straightforward than writing formulaic persuasive essays.

My kids have done research projects before and presented their results orally with power point visuals or a poster. So this time, instead of making slides, she'll have to write it out as a paper.

[Kfamily]

Thanks!

 

I was just curious if you used a specific book/curricula for your student that teaches how to write a research paper. I'm sure as we get closer to that I'll sort all this out. :001_smile:

[coffeegal]

Thanks!

 

I was just curious if you used a specific book/curricula for your student that teaches how to write a research paper. I'm sure as we get closer to that I'll sort all this out. :001_smile:

 

I'm using History Odyssey for history, and it is walking my son through the process of writing a year-long research report. It also includes information about writing a bibliography, but not footnotes.

[Wendy in ME]

I am far from a writing expert, but I can share what my 8th grade ds is doing this year. He is working through Oak Meadow civics and English. He is writing about a full page a day for these subjects in the form of essays and some paragraphs. We are not adding any additional programs.

[Kfamily]

Thanks Coffeegal, I didn't realize History Odyssey included this...something to think about.

 

Thanks Wendy! I'm still planning on lots of essays, foundational writing work (we're working through Homer Core and then Maxim too), narrations and learning how to take notes. I also plan on having her work through a typing program and some logic. All of that with paying close attention to grammar will probably fill us for the year. I will add, either later this year or in the summer, some of the skills that I want to be sure she has in place that she will need for a research paper. (The research paper we will begin in 9th.) It sounds like we are a litte behind, but I'd rather get all of these basics settled before starting more.

Edited September 10, 2010 by Kfamily