Writing Tales

[AimeeM]

Has anybody used this? From what I understand (per the website) it is an all encompassing composition and grammar program?

My daughter is 10 and formally entering fifth grade. While she places at about 7th grade in grammar, her reading, spelling and composition skills are severely lacking (she is dyslexic). I know it is odd that her grammar is so much better; I have no real explanation for it. We pulled her out of school this past April, so this fall will be our first full year home schooling.

I love the *look* of Writing Tales for gentle composition instruction, but I hesitate because I cannot really find reviews for the worktexts that aren't directly linked to the seller's site.

So, if you have used this program, what are the cons and pros of it?

[ednkirstin]

I don't know if it helps or not, but we've just started using it this year. I'm really excited about it. However, I'm using it mainly as a writing program. The grammar looks okay, but my kids will also be doing Easy Grammar Daily Grams this year. In the past, they've done the full EG program, so they're already familiar with the DG material. I figure between the two we'll have it covered. Maybe your dd doesn't need extra grammar.

 

As for spelling, I continue to use All About Spelling. I don't think Writing Tales has enough in there to help my kids in this area. Spelling has definitely been our weakest homeschool subject. AAS has radically changed that, and I'm not about to rock the boat! Have you considered AAS for help with dyslexia? I don't have experience with dyslexia (although at one point I thought my dd was), but I know AAS claims to really help dyslexic students.

[purplemama]

We have been using the first book this year. I mainly use it as a writing curriculum and it just happens to reinforce grammar skills. Spelling practice is included, in the form of writing the correct spelling of any misspelled words in the rough draft 2 times each. My daughter has never had to do this--yes, she has never misspelled a word in her rough drafts. The lessons basically are formatted as follows: read story and do a narration; grammar concepts introduced and practiced; write rough draft; spelling; vocabulary; write final draft.

 

We plan to use Write Shop D-F which are coming out soon over the next year and a half or so, then continue with Writing Tales 2; then move on to Write Shop 1.

[WishboneDawn]

I used it with my daughter and we both enjoyed it. It's a classical program so it uses imitation rather then creative writing. It looks "light" but has a lot of depth, especially the writing portion. It's a great all-in-one program for English.

[AimeeM]

Thanks ladies.

I should have mentioned in my OP that we are currently using a separate grammar program, but I hesitate to move forward any more in grammar (she is very advanced in grammar) until she is caught up in spelling, writing, reading.

We are also using Intermediate Language Lessons but, to be honest, I'm not feeling the love there :(

Our "plan" is to use Vocabulary From Classical Roots 4 or 5 and Writing Tales 2. From the sample pages viewed in WT2, there is nothing in the grammar that she isn't very, very comfortable with - I would be using it solely for composition as we are having very little luck with ILL.

[Lily_Grace]

We used it and it was a godsend. We had tried Writing Strands before but the amount of work expected with it was not suiting my son- he'd freeze when it came to thinking up ideas. The next year we switched to Writing Tales and he adored it.

[PeterPan]

Loved WT2. Go for it! :)

[Suzanne115]

We used both Writing Tales 1 and Writing Tales 2. My daughter absolutely loved it. She is sad that there isn't another level to use.

 

 

Suzanne

[AimeeM]

Suzanne - this is also a concern for me. I have heard rumors of the author creating a WT3, but I do hesitate to start any program that we might love and then have to leave. Lol.

[JoyfulMama]

I love love love Writing Tales. I do use a separate grammar, and allow the grammar in WT to be review. I don't think you need to, but that's what we do.

I have only used WT2. I am very visual, and so I created a visual weekly plan, as written in WT2. I ran it past the author before I made it available on Lulu.com.

I then edited it, and created a 4xweek plan, which I would be happy to email to anyone who is interested.

[PeterPan]

I wouldn't sweat the WT3 thing. She would have kept going, but her dh lost his job, making for a lot of stress and changes. You'll slide into CW Homer from WT, no problem. BTW, dyslexic doens't = dumb. Of course your dd can be advanced in grammar. My dd has no problem understanding concepts. She just has problems with language expression and output, lol. Anyways, for us WT2 was relatively independent. I taught it as a co-op class, so we used the weekly/co-op lessons. I highly recommend that or at least found it worked well for us. She then could do the exercises on her own, prep her draft, and be ready for class.

 

If your dd is a bit gifted as well as dyslexic (2E), what you might find is you end up either double-pacing the WT2 and going into Homer 2nd semester OR doing WT2 regular pace (more sane) and going into Homer for OB (Older Beginners) in 6th. Don't be afraid of that. If you go to the hs board there's a whole thread going right now of kids who are dyslexic, VSL, etc. who don't do well with extremely sequential, paced materials and actually do better when you JUMP a bit and get to the end game. CW is the logical follow-up to WT, but boy is it just blood-suckingly sequential, dry, and boring. Ok, somebody else sing the praises. I'm saying it kills my dd. With Homer, I could go all the way to the end of the book and she could already DO the skills. She just needed the practice. In other words, it's all inside with a dyslexic; the trouble is getting it out. I finally gave up on the books, put them aside, and started teaching it my own way. (New imitations daily, upping the ante each time on the analysis and skill, till you reach a final product that you polish.) THAT actually worked. I have CW Diogenes (got the co-op lessons) and finally got them printed to look at and see what I can do.

 

None of that is probably coherent, mercy. I'm just warning you that the sequential nature of some of these programs can drive some kids batty. Don't be afraid to flex it. The structure and consistency of the co-op lessons is what made WT2 work for us. I loved it, because using it *I* learned how to teach and work with the kids. Using it you'll understand better where CW is going and be a little more fearless about adapting to fit your particular child. But yes, CW Homer, either A or OB, is going to be the logical next step after WT2. You'll be fine.

[AimeeM]

Elizabeth,

I was not trying to infer that Autumn's learning difference makes her dumb. Not by any means. I only meant that it did surprise me to find how advanced she is in grammar, when all other LA concepts seem to cause her struggle and tears. Lol. She can diagram a sentence with no problems - but she cannot spell the word "diagram" to save her life, nor can she read many of the sentences without help.

And no worries - your post was very coherent. Other than the fact that I'm new to The Hive and had to look up most of the abbreviations! Lol.

One thing that was pointed out to me by her teacher when she left brick and mortar last year is that Autumn tends to grasp most concepts easily; it's the application that she struggles with.

[PeterPan]

You've probably already talked about this in another thread, but what are you doing for spelling? Freed's book "Right-Brained Child in a Left-Brained World" has some interesting ideas. We've used SWR, WRTR, AAS, and so on, and I think that analytical part is helpful for opening that thought process (sound to written correlation, syllabification, etc.) even if it doesn't actually help them learn the spelling, kwim? Dictation has also been good for us. At this point I'm lightening up our approach, but that is because we've worked on it for years. On a good day she'll test above grade level, and on a bad day she'll test right at or just below, very average. And yes, she's dyslexic. I'm just suggesting that if you haven't done any of those things, you would have some options to play around with to see what might help. With my dd dictation was actually the turning point, because, done as a team effort, it caused her to start thinking about WHETHER SHE KNOWS the word or not. If they turn that off, then it's pretty hopeless, eh? LOL So for us, that was big.

 

There was also a point where I did the Calvert spelling cd's (now an online service) with her. I'm not sure how much she learned, but they were really marvelous for rebuilding her confidence, which had been shattered by too much straight SWR. (Straight SWR, to her, came across as a test. And of course if you don't know the answers on the test, you're dumb. It just totally backfired and mangled in her brain.)

 

Homeschooling will be interesting for you, because you'll see more of the areas where she really, really excels or has strengths, in addition to the weaknesses. I'm not sure if this is true of every dyslexic, but mine is quite good at history, connections, stories, people. It's her thing, and we make a lot of room for it in our day. I've opening myself up more and more to non-linear, non-sequential ways of approaching things and new outputs.

 

Well I'm probably boring you. Did you pick out her grammar for next year? If you want to do grammar in addition to WT, a light touch would be fine, at least that's what I always say. However in your case I was just going to toss out that she might enjoy AG (Analytical Grammar). There's no need to wait or hold her back. If she's actually gifted at it, there's always more room to advance, lol. She could do the season 1 of AG for 5th, and continue into seasons 2 and 3 and 6th and 7th. Just a thought. My dd met Erin of AG at the convention this year and had a sort of mind meld with her, is wanting to do AG now. :)

[AimeeM]

OhElizabeth,

We have an appointment on Thursday at a Learning RX to have her go through a complete "cognitive learning differences test" to determine her strengths and weaknesses. I think that it will be CRUCIAL for us in deciding what areas to push in, what areas to go gently in and where we may need help. The center also provides "tutoring" in helping children overcome certain problems (short term/long term memory issues that often attach to a dyslexic child, critical thinking etc revolving around what the tests determine your child's strengths and weaknesses to be. Not exactly "tutoring" in that they will teach me how to use her strengths to get past her weaknesses. It's something we will consider after we see the test results.

I had heard of AG. Does it require the child to read at an advanced level? She can grasp anything provided she doesn't have to READ it herself or it doesn't mark dependent on spelling.

At the moment we are hoping to use Vocabulary From Classical Roots for spelling and vocabulary... but I'm finding that I will need to be flexible in our curriculum choices; even if that means deviating from the classical model that we so badly want for her.

[PeterPan]

The VT (vision therapy) place we used also does PACE (Learning RX). They wanted us to finish the VT first. We got most of the way through and hit a roadblock with her working memory. They wanted us to do more OT (pausing the VT) to try to help with that a bit, then come back and finish the VT. We got through all the VT stuff for focusing, convergence, etc. and were working on visual processing, visual memory, etc., the stuff where the working memory deficits really show up. Personally, I would suggest getting a developmental optometrist evaluation *before* you do PACE/Learning RX. It's good, and in fact our VT place did some of the worksheets with dd. (The therapist doing our VT does both VT and PACE.) It's just you want to make sure she has the proper foundation. PACE/Learning RX is going to move forward, building on what they have. You want to make sure they have the skills to work with.

 

To find a developmental optometrist, you go to http://www.covd.org and do a search.

 

If her reading isn't going well, I double-reiterate that you need to get her eyes checked by a developmental optometrist. Do that THEN do the LearningRX place. Almost certainly they'll tell you they can help you. I would just check the eye thing FIRST.