Has anyone STARTED with IEW in HighSchool?

[ilovemy4kids]

Has anyone begun IEW for the first time with a student already in High School? We use writeathome.com but because of a financial issue, we may have to stop. :crying:

 

One DD grade 8 will be using Starting Points so we could use the IEW starting points lessons also.

 

The DS 10th grade will be using MFW WHL so he will already have writing, but IEW could maybe be helpful....not sure.

 

I am terrible at writing and correcting writing, let alone teaching it!

 

Sandra

[Julie in MN]

I used IEW a bit for my dd in high school. Since she only homeschooled during high school, then yes she started then :) The option I went with was one of the SWI courses, which shows how Mr. Pudewa runs a course on video.

 

But personally I wouldn't choose IEW in high school unless you are looking to remediate a specific weakness. IEW is a big program and spends a long time before it gets to typical high school type writing -- such as writing your own thesis & supporting it. For my dd, I chose IEW to pull her away from summarizing the encyclopedia, and prompt her to use her own words. She really needed to be forced to use her own words, change her own words, etc.

 

WHL goes through the book Writers Inc., which I would think would give lots of writing instruction. I might not add until you see how that goes?

 

Julie

[Tardis Girl]

I had 2 of my DDs start in IEW together in 8/9th grade. They did the SWI-C in a 4-5 week stint at the end of the summer, then did the SICC-C for that school year. They really enjoyed Andrew Pudewa teaching the lessons. Even now, several years later, we still speak fondly of "Andrew."

 

IEW has some great book publications like The Elegant Essay if you want to really focus on something like that, too.

[BlsdMama]

We began IEW this year and Ana is a freshman. Obviously she has had writing instruction up until this point, but IEW helped us to refine her writing. It also helped us to see flaws in her writing that weren't glaringly obvious. We knew that certain parts of her writing "sounded" better than others but not exactly WHY. The weakness of IEW is, if you have a natural writer, adhering to a strict formula only approach rather than using it as a heavy-weight tool to help your writing.

 

We've loved it. I liked Ana's writing before IEW but I humbly suggest that *I* am more capable now to critique and truly provide help to her writing. It may well be IEW has done more to equip me to teach than it has actually helped my children.

[angela in ohio]

Not my own (we've used IEW for years,) but I have taught several other children who didn't have IEW until high school, and it worked well. :001_smile:

 

Many people only think of IEW as the first two of its nine units, but IEW's last few units cover many of the skills you need for high school writing. A high school student will progress to those units very quickly.

[Myra]

I used IEW High School Intensive Essay (for SAT essay preparation & college essay )and Elegant Essay with my 11th grader this year! It worked out great and I saw many "refinements" in his writing.

 

Myra

[anneofalamo]

planning our strategy for next year, and weak writers (3rd year homeschooling) insert guilt, no no stop...okay focus

I have 3 in 6th grade and one 9th, wanting to start all 4 in Level B? Any thoughts, rants or go girl, that is what I would do?

[Abbeygirlsouth]

My dd used "Teaching Writing Structure and Style" and "Windows to the World" in 9th grade. In 10th "Elegant Essay" was added, and "Fix It" was used both years. Although dd sometimes is frustrated with the amount of "dress ups", overall she has enjoyed the program, and we are both pleased with her greatly improved writing skills.

[Abbeygirlsouth]

We began IEW this year and Ana is a freshman. Obviously she has had writing instruction up until this point, but IEW helped us to refine her writing. It also helped us to see flaws in her writing that weren't glaringly obvious. We knew that certain parts of her writing "sounded" better than others but not exactly WHY. The weakness of IEW is, if you have a natural writer, adhering to a strict formula only approach rather than using it as a heavy-weight tool to help your writing.

 

:iagree:This is how it was for my other child. Before we dropped the class, his instructor would send his papers back saying, "This is a good essay, but you did not follow the guidelines." :huh:

[BlsdMama]

planning our strategy for next year, and weak writers (3rd year homeschooling) insert guilt, no no stop...okay focus

I have 3 in 6th grade and one 9th, wanting to start all 4 in Level B? Any thoughts, rants or go girl, that is what I would do?

 

FWIW it is best to begin your own thread so that people can respond to the original poster and so your question can get the responses and attention it deserves as well! ;)

[Phoatogirl]

At the risk of offending the IEW "community", of which I am a part, I'd go out on a wire here and say that high school is a perfect time to BEGIN IEW, as opposed to beginning earlier. Here's why:

 

IEW is a program that teaches style. If a student can not put sentences together well, IEW is not going to teach him. If a young student already enjoys writing, then he is ready for IEW. Go ahead and order level A (for elementary). But if not, wait until their older. If they are balking at writing a simple journal entry or book report they are going to hate the checklist. That said, the strength of IEW for a young student is it takes the "what to write" about out of the equation....brillant!

 

What IEW can do for a high school student who already knows about sentence structure and paragraph writing is teach elements of style that take plain vanilla writing to a much high level. In the later units of the basic course, the tips on report writing are wonderful and highly useful.

 

I started IEW with my kids when they were in 6th and 8th grade. They both enjoy watching the videos and love listening to Andrew. My 6th grader hates writing, though he is a natural. I had to slow down and stop with him(level B). We tried the American History Writing 1 this year instead because it is less demanding, but he hates history so we've decided to just write reports the rest of the year and pick it back up with student writing intensive C in the fall. My high-schooler has had no problems with any writing assignment because he likes to write. This year his writing has improved tremendously since I have be requiring EVERYTHING on the checklists.

 

I chuckle at the persons post regarding the student who was told their paper was good, but they didn't include all the checklist items. This was discussed on the Yahoo Group and I learned that the reason for requiring every item is so that the student get practice in using all the components of style. Naturally they won't use all of them in every paragraph in all their writing at some point. There have been times when I've let a missing item go in an IEW assignment because I couldn't think of how to add it.

 

Remember that TWSS was designed as a workshop and the student writing intesive as a three day workshop for the student. You can take as much or as little time as needed to get through the material. Then utilize whatever other IEW program you wish to for the remainer of the highschool time. We are currently using Elegant Essay and Windows to the World with my 10th grader, and will pick up SWI continuation course level C next year. I'd also like to get the essay intensive at some point.

 

Hope this helps.

[Phoatogirl]

I just remembered. There are audio resources on the website which might be beneficial in general, and beneficial to uses of IEW specifically.