Anyone using WWE with 5th grade or older?

[praisefor3]

I did not do a good job of teaching writing in the last 3 years (when we started hsing.) It has taken me awhile to grasp this concept. DD10 is very strong on grammar - but not so much on writing. I've ordered WWE but not received it yet but I THINK it sounds like I will be able to use the text as a foundation for knowing how and what to teach and will just jump in wherever I think we are ready to start. I did not order any workbooks as I worried he would think they were too young. Just wondering if anyone else is going to use WWE for older grades and what your plan is.

[PeterPan]

Well WWE is going to lay a foundation, but is it only going through 4th, with a later book to follow, or is it explaining all the way through high school in the first volume? To me, in a situation like that, I'd get IEW and be done with it. WWE can be your theory to fill in some gaps, but IEW would be something practical to get done every day. I like WT2 a lot too, but for that age, given that she hasn't been doing much writing, I'd go for IEW. It will cover a variety of types and the videos will ensure it actually gets done.

[arcara]

I read a post on another thread this morning about WWE in which a Mom was going to use it with her 5th and 7th graders.

 

I haven't received my copy yet, but my dd (4th grade) will probably be in 3rd grade level in WWE. So, she'll be doing 4th grade WWE when she's in 5th grade in most every other subject. I don't know if it'll be possible to 'catch up,' but I'm not really concerned about that. I want my dd to have a good foundation in writing.

[Lori in MS]

I've skimmed through WWE and Susan is very encouraging in her advice for older relunctant writers who don't have the fundamentals down. She has evaluations and diagnostic activities for students 5th-12th grade. After you do those activities she gives recommendations on where to begin. She said not to be discouraged if your older child needs to begin in level 2 or 3. They will move more quickly through it. I plan to do those tests with my children but I think my 6th and 5th graders need to begin with level 3. One of my ds cannot hold the dictation in his head as he writes so I know he will need to work on this. I love how Susan breaks down the writing process into sequential steps. If these fundamentals are not mastered the child will always struggle. So regardless of age, I would start with this book.

 

Once my children master these skills, I will move on to IEW SWI B.

 

It may only take a few months or a year to accomplish this, I don't know but I am glad to finally have a plan.

 

Also for an older child I don't think you would use the workbooks. The text alone would probably work better for them.

[praisefor3]

1. When I look at it at the hs conferences the vendor makes it sound like I need to spend $1000 (or maybe $10,000:)) on videos.

 

2. It seems like I need a year just to review and learn the program by myself before I can even use it with kids. Considering that I relish even having the time to eat breakfast when it happens, I don't see being able to spend this much time learning this program.

 

3. I have a masters in education. I made the highest score in grammar on the act that is possible to make. Yet I shudder in my boots when I even hear the letters IEW in that order because I feel woefully less than able to get ahold of all that IEW tries to teach.

 

Now keep in mind that I have only been hsing 3 years. My oldest is a senior this year and my youngest is 3. I have read this board faithfully since the beginning and it seems like some people "get" IEW and some people don't. I think I must just be in that "don't" category as I have WANTED to like it, use it, understand it but, honestly, the marketing of this program tends to make the new learner very overwhelmed.

 

I guess I am drawn to WWE even though, (another frank admission), I do not care for SOTW, because it sounds...so...simple. Start here...teach this...have them write this...I don't have to watch hours of dvd's or understand Andrew Pudewa concepts or be able to know what order it all comes in because it starts with 1 and goes from there. :)

 

I truly say this in a rare moment of confession and not in wanting to slam IEW. It just finally feels good to say that (and I'm sure this is only a reflection on me) IEW overwhelms me and I just haven't been able to get it. :001_huh: Oh...and thank you for all your help over these last 3 years that I have read in silence but applied in many ways. And, yes, I do use VP Bible...but it did take me awhile to "get" that, too. :)

[Stacy in NJ]

Well WWE is going to lay a foundation, but is it only going through 4th, with a later book to follow, or is it explaining all the way through high school in the first volume? To me, in a situation like that, I'd get IEW and be done with it. WWE can be your theory to fill in some gaps, but IEW would be something practical to get done every day. I like WT2 a lot too, but for that age, given that she hasn't been doing much writing, I'd go for IEW. It will cover a variety of types and the videos will ensure it actually gets done.

 

WWE isn't just theory; it includes daily lesson plans for all four levels. IEW doesn't include daily lesson plans, it really takes some planning on the part of the teacher.

 

I plan on using WWE with my rising 4th grader. I think he's an average writer, but I'll place him on WWE on his ability to fluently do the assignments. For 5th grade, he'll either join his brother for IEW or move on to the next WWE books, if it's ready on time.

 

I'm using IEW with my rising 6th grader. We've had alot of sucess with the first 3 units. I'm looking forward to working through unit 6, or so, this coming year.

 

I don't think that IEW is all that terrific of a program for grammar stage kiddo's. I just think their time learning composition is better spent on basic and complex sentence and paragraph structure. I think the IEW is really perfect for the "middle age" group; grade 5 through 7 or 8.

 

Just my thoughts.

[Lori in MS]

I saw some lesson plans available for download on the IEW site. They looked very thorough to me. It told you day by day what to watch, what paragraphs to use, and what assignments to complete each day.

 

 

I agree with you about IEW being more appropriate for grades 5th and up.

[Stacy in NJ]

Yes, I was refering to the TWSS program. You can buy separately the SWI and lesson plans to go along with that.

[PeterPan]

Praisefor3, just some thoughts on the IEW thing. I too cringed at it for a long time, but I had a long talk with Pudewa at the convention *and* used WT2 this year, which is strikingly similar in use of sentence beginnings, etc., even though Olsen has never used IEW, and both of those helped me finally get over that hill. My point was merely that something done is better than nothing done. The steps SWB is laying out in WWE don't seem to me, at least from the sample chapter online, to be so radically different from WTM. It's just they're laid out in a way that makes sense to people. But it was all in there, hidden in those various chapters of WTM, if you had wanted to sit there piecing it together.

 

There are free lesson plans for IEW available on their website, so I don't see how that's a hold-up. Something done imperfectly is better than nothing done at all. And if the SWI bugs you (which I can understand), look through the CC courses and consider SWI the ends to a mean. I think the CC courses, at least from the online lessons, look fabulous. This is spoken as one who is bending over backwards to make all this happen herself, without plunking out the money for IEW and without doing SWI. I think the CC courses look really cool and worthwhile. You'll notice from my sig, I did in fact piece together something myself. Made my own IEW-style checklists, pulled together my own models, etc. so that I could continue with the terminology and approach of WT2 without having to buy something new. But that's borderline insane, personally, and takes a lot of time.

 

Again, my point was merely that something DONE is better than nothing done. Absolutely work through the steps in WWE. It might not be so much that your student is remedial or has gaps in her skills as that she just needs something to get moving FORWARD. I like WT2 a lot (a LOT), but it doesn't cover non-fiction writing, which I assumed you would want.

 

If you look at the free online lessons on the IEW website, you can download them, print them, and really look at them and look at them till you wrap your brain around them. That's what I did. I actually spent hours pouring over the A and B levels if SWI and CC, making notes about new skills, how they laid out their checklists, etc. But that's pretty insane. Personally I'd just buy something and do it. Pudewa is funny as all get out, and it really might not be as torturous as you think. It's a means to an end, not the end.

[FlockOfSillies]

I'll be using the diagnostics in the TM to figure out what she'll need. If we end up progressing quickly through it, then I'll have her finish up Wordsmith Apprentice.

[Amy loves Bud]

Here is what I plan to do with my 5th grader. He has been a reluctant writer all along. He does fine, but doesn't like it. He went through WT1 this past year, and I was ready to go into WT2 with him beginning this year but I"m backing off for a bit. Here's my plan:

 

For the first half (18 weeks) of 5th grade he'll do WWE 4th grade. He'll spend half as many weeks as suggested on each step, unless he struggles then we'll slow down. But I'm pretty confident after reading it that he'll be able to go quickly through the 4th grade material.

 

In the meantime, he'll be reading Kingfisher Illustrated World History on his history days, and then he will outline this as described in TWTM for 5th grade *orally*. No writing of the outline yet, I plan to sit with him and have him tell me the main point of each paragraph, and we will discuss and refine that together, all orally.

 

For the 2nd half of the year, assuming he completes the 4th grade WWE successfully, he'll begin writing the outlines from Kingfisher, as well as summaries from the outlines. Also, at this point we'll bring in WT2.

 

I've thought a lot about it and I think this will reinforce his foundation nicely before going full force into the logic stage.

 

Hope this helps!

[karensk]

I did not do a good job of teaching writing in the last 3 years (when we started hsing.) It has taken me awhile to grasp this concept. DD10 is very strong on grammar - but not so much on writing. I've ordered WWE but not received it yet but I THINK it sounds like I will be able to use the text as a foundation for knowing how and what to teach and will just jump in wherever I think we are ready to start. I did not order any workbooks as I worried he would think they were too young. Just wondering if anyone else is going to use WWE for older grades and what your plan is.

 

...for ds11 who will be in 6th grade this fall and is an average writer. I'll have him do the Level 4 Evaluation to see if he's mastered the Level 4 skills or not (there's an Evaluation at the end of each of the 4 levels to determine where to place your student).

 

If he can skip Level 4, I'll just do the same activities as described in Level 4 but make the everything longer and slightly more complex...longer copywork & dictation selections, selections with more difficult words & sentence structure, longer narration selections. We'll do the copywork/dictation/narration as described for Level 4 until the next book is out for Levels 5-8 in late 2009, hopefully.

 

If there are some skills he still needs to work on at Level 4 (or below), then we'll do that. The Evaluations make it easy to figure out what the student needs to spend more time with and what he's already mastered. So, if ds is doing great with everything but narrations, we'll do the narration lessons from a lower level and continue with copywork/dictation at a higher level. In addition, we might do the narrations more frequently (maybe 3x/wk instead of 1 or 2x) and copywork/dictation less frequently.

 

Note: I only have the WWE text and not the Workbook, as I'm planning to customize our writing lessons.

 

HTH!