Writing Across The Curriculum: Ideas, Please

[Penguin]

We are afterschoolers and DS11 is finishing up 5th grade.

His current school asks him to do minimal writing and I really need to supplement.

 

But in the interest of efficiency (his, not mine LOL), I am reluctant to follow a writing program and I would prefer that he just write across the curriculum.

I have a few ideas but I would love some more.

 

DS11 is not a reluctant writer, but I must take care not to burn him out. I would say that his skill level puts him ready (or nearly ready) for WWS. He does creative writing for fun, so I will surely leave that one alone.

 

My ideas so far:

 

Letters

 

We live an ocean away from the grandparents, so letters would really be appreciated. They'll actually be emails, but they will be written as proper letters.

 

Summarizing/Narration

We are reading through Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales. We live in Denmark so this is kind of an obvious set of fairy tales to read. I have had him summarize two of the tales. I just break it up into WWE4-size chunks. So far so good.

 

We do (Catholic) faith formation at home so I thought of having him retell a Bible story or write a biographical sketches of a saint. As we approach confirmation, he will need some sort of portfolio to present so I am eager to slide some writing into our "output."

 

Outlining

 

I think that he is ready to outline from a Kingfisher's History encyclopedia. I own the really old (1990-something), white version that is supposed to be good for outlining.

 

Resources!

Here is what I am considering. Within reason, I am fine with purchasing multiple resources so that I can draw from them and put together something on my own.

 

I am going to buy the WWS Instructor's manual and read through it. I just love the looks of this program, but it would probably be too time consuming for our situation. Maybe we will just pick out certain chunks to use rather than doing the program straight on through.

 

I am interested in Write Shop because it has a gentle, two year schedule that would suit an afterschooler and the web site says that you can adapt the program to make it Write-Across-The-Curriculum friendly.

 

Also, I am intrigued by what I read here about middle school IEW being good for writing across the curriculum. But I look at the website and I just can't figure it out. I have zero interest in DVD lessons or a steep learning curve just to learn the IEW-specific methodology. Maybe I just forget about this resource?

 

Sorry this got long! In summary, I would like some ideas for middle grade writing across the curriculum and thoughts on the resources that would best facilitate this type of writing. Thanks in advance!

Edited April 19, 2012 by Penguin
clarity

[Amira]

I think you already have some great ideas and I'm sorry I don't have anything else to add. We're just finishing up WWS and I think you could easily just use specific parts of it instead of trying to work through the entire program. I hope you get some more suggestions.

[Arch at Home]

For my children they much prefer to write when there is a tangible reward. Letters are great particularly if there are responses. Blogging, particularly combining photos and text, is another fun way of writing. I also incorporate a lot of Scout badge work. My girls are willing to put a lot of effort into a piece if it has a badge attached to it. Badge work serves as mini-unit studies and you can cover a multitude of topics. I tend to follow Bravewriter's.com which encourages the development of the writer's voice with format following. Check out that website for other writing opportunity ideas.

 

Sarah

[Elysian]

What is your son most interested in? Or what does he have strong opinions about? Maybe he'd enjoy writing about that.