Miss Peregrine Posted November 29, 2012 Share Posted November 29, 2012 My 11th grade dd needs some good practice in writing essays. Can anyone recommend a program that will give her practice in this area? She took a literature class last year that a friend taught and I was appalled at her writing. We have been using Rod and Staff all along and I am dismayed that the writing portion has not been enough. :bored: I do have her going through Writing with Skill but is there anything else that will give her good solid experience, especially with essays? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lolly Posted November 29, 2012 Share Posted November 29, 2012 I finally put my kids in Write at Home's classes. They have high school workshops that run for....about 8 weeks. I do not like the way they teach writing an essay, but it is okay. And, it gets my kids to write without having to answer to me. It does a good job of teaching the basics of the 5 paragraph form. My oldest took their research paper class a couple of years ago. It was excellent. My twins will take it after the essay classes this year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LearningMomm Posted November 29, 2012 Share Posted November 29, 2012 The two that come to mind.. Essentials in Writing. I'm tutoring my 15 year old niece who just came out of ps. I really like it! It starts back with basics of sentences, paragraphs, then essays and a research report. If you only want something for essays - IEW has two(?) essay books. I've never seen them before but we loved every IEW product we've tried! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mom31257 Posted November 29, 2012 Share Posted November 29, 2012 Have you looked at Lively Art of Writing? There is a member here who has a free workbook to go along with it. It is highly recommended here on the board. I am going to use The Elegant Essay next semester, so I can't recommend it yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mom31257 Posted November 29, 2012 Share Posted November 29, 2012 Sorry, double post! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miss Peregrine Posted November 29, 2012 Author Share Posted November 29, 2012 I finally put my kids in Write at Home's classes. They have high school workshops that run for....about 8 weeks. I do not like the way they teach writing an essay, but it is okay. And, it gets my kids to write without having to answer to me. It does a good job of teaching the basics of the 5 paragraph form. My oldest took their research paper class a couple of years ago. It was excellent. My twins will take it after the essay classes this year. The two that come to mind.. Essentials in Writing. I'm tutoring my 15 year old niece who just came out of ps. I really like it! It starts back with basics of sentences, paragraphs, then essays and a research report. If you only want something for essays - IEW has two(?) essay books. I've never seen them before but we loved every IEW product we've tried! Have you looked at Lively Art of Writing? There is a member here who has a free workbook to go along with it. It is highly recommended here on the board. I am going to use The Elegant Essay next semester, so I can't recommend it yet. I have had Lively Art of Writing in my Amazon cart for awhile, LOL. I will look at all these suggestions, thanks! Any more? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blue Hen Posted November 30, 2012 Share Posted November 30, 2012 I put my 11th grader in a college level writing class at the CC. It has worked out quite well and has been worth the 45 minute drive to get there too. DS luckily got a Prof who requires lots of papers, 2x a week, for the first 8 weeks of the semester. Then I think they moved to 1x a week but this week he was back to having 2 assignments due. Next week he has to givee a presentation and the following week he has a 10 page research paper due. A friend's child was in the class last year and only had to write 3 papers the entire term. It has meant quite a lot of work for me too cause I played the role of writing coach, giving DS feedback and forcing him to revise and revise and revise until the piece was free of grammar errors, contained sufficient detail and was well organized. The change in his writing has been dramatic. Yesterday he handed me a 2 page paper and I think I found only one sentence DS needed to re-write. I don't know if a CC is close to you but I'm happy with our choice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miss Peregrine Posted December 21, 2012 Author Share Posted December 21, 2012 I put my 11th grader in a college level writing class at the CC. It has worked out quite well and has been worth the 45 minute drive to get there too. DS luckily got a Prof who requires lots of papers, 2x a week, for the first 8 weeks of the semester. Then I think they moved to 1x a week but this week he was back to having 2 assignments due. Next week he has to givee a presentation and the following week he has a 10 page research paper due. A friend's child was in the class last year and only had to write 3 papers the entire term. It has meant quite a lot of work for me too cause I played the role of writing coach, giving DS feedback and forcing him to revise and revise and revise until the piece was free of grammar errors, contained sufficient detail and was well organized. The change in his writing has been dramatic. Yesterday he handed me a 2 page paper and I think I found only one sentence DS needed to re-write. I don't know if a CC is close to you but I'm happy with our choice. Just saw this. She goes to CC already. We tried to get freshman comp but as a high schooler she got the last registration date. Lots of competition for so few classes here. :/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThisIsTheDay Posted December 24, 2012 Share Posted December 24, 2012 Agreeing with The Lively Art of Writing. It's already on your radar (obviously, since it's in your basket!); you may be as surprised as I was with the great info it gave and how it laid everything out. I'd also suggest Lively Art before Elegant Essay, if you plan to use that. My dd used Lively Art last year in 11th grade, and then took College Comp at CC in 12th grade/fall semester. She was very prepared for the college class. It was great confirmation for her (and me!) to do so well in the class. Our writing instruction has always been hit or miss. It was also perfect timing for college applications/essays . . . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lori D. Posted December 24, 2012 Share Posted December 24, 2012 Agree with Blue Hen -- dual enrollment in the Writing classes at the community college really improved our struggling writer's work ethic AND his abilities. For essay writing about Literature, IEW's Windows to the World has a fabulous, specific, clear set of instructions on how to write a literary analysis essay. (See it here.) The other thing that helped was all through high school doing a timed essay once a week from a past SAT essay prompt. Both DSs and myself did it all together, and then we did a mini-critique of the 3 essays. Really helped their thinking, organization of writing, and practice in supporting their contention. Doing it together set the bar higher, knowing we'd be sharing our writing with everyone else. Knowing I was not grading it helped take the stress off so they could focus on the writing process. Because we did this all through high school, we started at a very gentle level and worked up to the full-length essay and full time of 25 minutes. See our schedule below in case it helps -- adapt as needed on time frame. :) BEST of luck! Warmly, Lori D. Level A (about 6 weeks) - 10 minutes - 1 paragraph at least 5 sentences long - with an introductory sentence which introduces the topic - at least 3 "body" sentences which support the topic sentence/contention with at least 1 specific example - and a solid concluding sentence ("clincher") Level B (about 18 weeks) - 15 minutes - a longer paragraph, at least 6-8 sentences long, or 2 paragraphs - with a "hook" in the introductory sentence - a topic sentence/contention (can be in the same sentence with the "hook") - the body sentences all support the topic sentence with at least 1 specific example - and a solid concluding sentence ("clincher") Level C (about 12 weeks) - 20 minutes - 3 paragraphs - intro paragraph can be short -- 1-2 sentences -- still must have a hook and topic sentence/contention - body paragraph sentences must all support the topic sentence/contention, and must have at least 2 specific examples all supporting the contention - and a solid concluding sentence ("clincher") Level D -- next year (about 12 weeks) same as C above, but now must add an additional "extra" in the concluding paragraph, not just a restatement of the opening sentences -- add a thought, "reason why", "what this leads to" -- this is something out of the student's own thoughts and reasoning Level E (about 12 weeks) - 25 minutes - 3 to 5 paragraphs - intro paragraph can be short -- 1-2 sentences -- still must have a hook and topic sentence/contention - body paragraphs must have 3 specific examples which all support the topic sentence/contention, AND must include a sentence for each example which explains WHY the example proves or supports the topic sentence/contention - concluding paragraph which sums up the essay, plus adds a little "extra" from the students own thoughts Level F (about 12 weeks) like E above, but must also finish 2-4 minutes before the time is up in order to quickly proof the essay for typos, capitalization, punctuation, run-on sentences, forgotten word, etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miss Peregrine Posted December 27, 2012 Author Share Posted December 27, 2012 Agreeing with The Lively Art of Writing. It's already on your radar (obviously, since it's in your basket!); you may be as surprised as I was with the great info it gave and how it laid everything out. I'd also suggest Lively Art before Elegant Essay, if you plan to use that. My dd used Lively Art last year in 11th grade, and then took College Comp at CC in 12th grade/fall semester. She was very prepared for the college class. It was great confirmation for her (and me!) to do so well in the class. Our writing instruction has always been hit or miss. It was also perfect timing for college applications/essays . . . . I will definitely get Lively Art. Agree with Blue Hen -- dual enrollment in the Writing classes at the community college really improved our struggling writer's work ethic AND his abilities. For essay writing about Literature, IEW's Windows to the World has a fabulous, specific, clear set of instructions on how to write a literary analysis essay. (See it here.) The other thing that helped was all through high school doing a timed essay once a week from a past SAT essay prompt. Both DSs and myself did it all together, and then we did a mini-critique of the 3 essays. Really helped their thinking, organization of writing, and practice in supporting their contention. Doing it together set the bar higher, knowing we'd be sharing our writing with everyone else. Knowing I was not grading it helped take the stress off so they could focus on the writing process. Because we did this all through high school, we started at a very gentle level and worked up to the full-length essay and full time of 25 minutes. See our schedule below in case it helps -- adapt as needed on time frame. :) BEST of luck! Warmly, Lori D. Level A (about 6 weeks) - 10 minutes - 1 paragraph at least 5 sentences long - with an introductory sentence which introduces the topic - at least 3 "body" sentences which support the topic sentence/contention with at least 1 specific example - and a solid concluding sentence ("clincher") Level B (about 18 weeks) - 15 minutes - a longer paragraph, at least 6-8 sentences long, or 2 paragraphs - with a "hook" in the introductory sentence - a topic sentence/contention (can be in the same sentence with the "hook") - the body sentences all support the topic sentence with at least 1 specific example - and a solid concluding sentence ("clincher") Level C (about 12 weeks) - 20 minutes - 3 paragraphs - intro paragraph can be short -- 1-2 sentences -- still must have a hook and topic sentence/contention - body paragraph sentences must all support the topic sentence/contention, and must have at least 2 specific examples all supporting the contention - and a solid concluding sentence ("clincher") Level D -- next year (about 12 weeks) same as C above, but now must add an additional "extra" in the concluding paragraph, not just a restatement of the opening sentences -- add a thought, "reason why", "what this leads to" -- this is something out of the student's own thoughts and reasoning Level E (about 12 weeks) - 25 minutes - 3 to 5 paragraphs - intro paragraph can be short -- 1-2 sentences -- still must have a hook and topic sentence/contention - body paragraphs must have 3 specific examples which all support the topic sentence/contention, AND must include a sentence for each example which explains WHY the example proves or supports the topic sentence/contention - concluding paragraph which sums up the essay, plus adds a little "extra" from the students own thoughts Level F (about 12 weeks) like E above, but must also finish 2-4 minutes before the time is up in order to quickly proof the essay for typos, capitalization, punctuation, run-on sentences, forgotten word, etc. Wow! Great information. Thank you so much for sharing that! I have a 9th grader that can start on this now, too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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