Just wanted to share that my 9th grader loves Lively Art of Writing

[8filltheheart]

She is taking Humanities (lit and history) online this yr. I decided since we started school this week and she doesn't start with them until the 25th to have her read it over the 2 weeks. She is 1/2 way through and kept saying.....wow, this makes sense, this is easy, ok, I can do this. :)

 

Just thought I'd share. It is inexpensive and an easy read. I used it with my oldest as a crash course refresher over about a month when he was a senior, and he didn't complain either. ;)

[Anna]

Is your dd just reading it or is she also doing the assignments? I didn't think anyone could do all the assignments that quickly unless maybe that's all they do during the two weeks.

[8filltheheart]

Oh, no, she is simply reading the book and outlining the chapters. She is a fairly competent writer already. I just thought it would be a good idea for her to read some more ideas before she started taking the class on-line.

 

Even when I did it with my oldest, he did certain parts of the book, but not the whole thing.

 

She does do a good job touching in areas in a different way than I have presented them to the kids over the yr.

[kate in seattle]

I love "The Lively Art of Writing" and I think everyone of my co-op kids (for which it has been assigned) has both enjoyed and learned something from it.

 

Kate in Seattle

[flyingmommy]

Wow! The Lively Art of Writing!

 

I still have my copy from my junior year in high school. That was, um.......23 years ago. Is it still blue? I learned so much from that book and it really stuck with me. I plan to pull it out when it's time for my dd's to use it.

 

J

[8filltheheart]

I think the way info is presented makes it easily understandable. Her style is also appealing to teens.

 

(BTW.....I read my OPs on this topic....I promise that I am really more literate than my posts! Time to proofread here or even post w/o distraction simply doesn't exist in my household!!)

[Kareni]

Wow! The Lively Art of Writing!

 

I still have my copy from my junior year in high school. That was, um.......23 years ago. Is it still blue? I learned so much from that book and it really stuck with me. I plan to pull it out when it's time for my dd's to use it.

 

J

 

My old copy is blue too! I think the newer copies are whitish.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Colleen]

I'm glad you mentioned this, because it's a resource I purchased a number of years ago with an eye toward the future. That future is drawing ever-closer, but I've not determined how or when to incorporate the book into our studies. It's concise yet thorough and I look forward to putting it to good use once someone tells me how to go about doing so.;)

 

Does anyone have an opinion as to when this would be best used? If your student(s) completed the assignments, did you grade their work or guide their efforts? One of my greatest homeschooling challenges is how to go about helping my children improve their writing. It's so subjective! I don't know how I will ever assign grades for papers they complete ~ or for that matter, if I have to assign grades at all.:confused:

 

Any-hoo, I do want to use this book and could just use some more ideas in general. Both this and The Writer's Workshop: Imitating Your Way to Better Writing seem like invaluable resources. I only wish the typeset inThe Lively Art of Writing wasn't so horribly small! It's not very user-friendly in that respect.

[Colleen]

:)

[Kimber]

I just bought a copy of one these last year because of the reviews on Amazon. I thought it would come in handy, but I couldn't get past the small print too. And I also don't have much of a clue in how to use it. I'll be watching this thread.

 

 

Kimberly

[Lori D.]

One of my greatest homeschooling challenges is how to go about helping my children improve their writing. It's so subjective! I don't know how I will ever assign grades for papers they complete ~ or for that matter, if I have to assign grades at all.

 

 

Colleen -- I just got to hear Marcia Somerville (creator of Tapestry of Grace) speak on writing and how to comment on/grade writing this summer at our state's homeschool convention. Her workshops on teaching writing were extremely helpful, showing how to give very specific guidelines to your student so they know exactly what they need to include in their writing, and then she had some very helpful rubrics for you, the teacher, to help determine what needs improvement in the student's writing and how to assign grades.

 

An audio recording of her 2-hour writing workshop is available on CD for $12 at: http://www.lampstandbookshelf.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=TWTOGW&Category_Code=AUDIO&AFFIL=togintro

 

Also extremely helpful is her book Writing Aids, which comes with a CD-ROM of pdf files with all sorts of forms for helping your student organize their thinking, and then the grading rubrics. This quote from the Lampstand

website which sells both items sums up my impressions as well: "I use Writing Aids to teach writing, but I found the Writing Workshop CD's to be a great help for getting the "big picture" and for understanding how to grade various levels of assignments. I highly recommend the CD's along with Writing Aids." Here's the link to see more about Writing Aids: http://www.lampstandbookshelf.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=WRB&Category_Code=GSWa&Product_Count=0

 

 

I know it's a big chunk of change to purchase the Writing Aids, but I'm thinking this will help turn around the muzzy fuzzy writing instruction/grading issues we muddled through last year! Perhaps try out the CD of the writing seminar and see if any ideas in that might get you started?? BEST of luck! Warmly, Lori D.

[FloridaLisa]

Does anyone have an opinion as to when this would be best used? If your student(s) completed the assignments, did you grade their work or guide their efforts? One of my greatest homeschooling challenges is how to go about helping my children improve their writing. It's so subjective! I don't know how I will ever assign grades for papers they complete ~ or for that matter, if I have to assign grades at all.:confused:

 

Hey Colleen,

 

Hooked up the laptop to our generator and I'm so happy to do something other than watch the rain and limbs falling from our trees!

 

Anyway, I would use Lively Art when your student is ready for formal essay writing. I discovered the book from these Boards sometime during my oldest's 9th grade year, so we worked through it the second half of the year.

 

I didn't assign grades for the writing. I suppose you could come up with a rubric to try to make it less subjective but that just wasn't my goal. My goal was to get him writing and to work alongside in the editing process. He had read Strunk & White and the assignments in Lively Art were perfect ground to implement the editing rules and suggestions of Strunk & White.

 

You could easily work through the book at one chapter per week, though we stretched it out at times, usually because *I* didn't have time to sit down with him. I had my ds read the chapter and answer the questions in writing on his own at the beginning of the week. We then met together, discussed his answers and the meat of the chapter and I assigned a longer piece. He wrote the longer paper, turned it in, I made comments on sticky notes (I don't like to write directly on their papers), we discussed it and he re-wrote. For certain papers, he would complete two re-writes.

 

One thing I didn't like about Lively Art was the suggested essay topics. I found it dry and uninspiring to write gobs about school problems or race cars or popularity. :001_huh: Next go round, I'll try to be ready with suggestions that better suit my child and his/her interests. It's hard enough to get boys to write in quantity (notso with my dd) and an engaging topic probably would have helped.

 

Having used Strunk & White and Lively Art in 9th grade, IEW Intensive C and Continuation Course last year (which served a purpose), I'm ready to jump back in with Sentence Composing for College Students and our recent find of The Writing Workshop. Those look terrific!

 

HTH,

Lisa

[Chris in VA]

We were exposed to LAW thru Write@Home--they use it for their essay courses. I think the $ I dropped on Essay 1 at WAH was pretty well-spent. I'm planning on going ahead and enrolling ds in a couple more courses there.

 

Excellent resource.

[Colleen]

I thought it would come in handy, but I couldn't get past the small print too.

 

It's annoying, isn't it? I can tell the content is good but try as I might, I keep putting the book down because of this...

[Colleen]

Thank you for sharing those resources; I'll keep them in mind. I know this is an issue for many homeschoolers, so it's good to hear what's helping others. The older my boys get, the more I also lean on my friend Julie Bogart of Bravewriter, who is another fount of wisdom on this subject.

[Colleen]

We were exposed to LAW thru Write@Home--they use it for their essay courses. I think the $ I dropped on Essay 1 at WAH was pretty well-spent. I'm planning on going ahead and enrolling ds in a couple more courses there. Excellent resource.

 

 

Good to know! I'm friends with Julie Bogart, who owns Bravewriter, and I have my eye on some BW online courses.

[Colleen]

Hooked up the laptop to our generator and I'm so happy to do something other than watch the rain and limbs falling from our trees!

 

Stormy down your way, eh?

 

Anyway, I would use Lively Art when your student is ready for formal essay writing. I discovered the book from these Boards sometime during my oldest's 9th grade year, so we worked through it the second half of the year.

 

Sounds like it can be put to good use pretty much any time during high school.

 

I didn't assign grades for the writing. I suppose you could come up with a rubric to try to make it less subjective but that just wasn't my goal. My goal was to get him writing and to work alongside in the editing process.

 

That's how I'd handle it, too.

 

You could easily work through the book at one chapter per week, though we stretched it out at times, usually because *I* didn't have time to sit down with him. I had my ds read the chapter and answer the questions in writing on his own at the beginning of the week. We then met together, discussed his answers and the meat of the chapter and I assigned a longer piece. He wrote the longer paper, turned it in, I made comments on sticky notes (I don't like to write directly on their papers), we discussed it and he re-wrote. For certain papers, he would complete two re-writes.

 

Thanks for the specifics. I know this isn't rocket science, but it's good to hear how others actually put it into practice.

 

One thing I didn't like about Lively Art was the suggested essay topics.

 

This is the one recurring criticism I've heard, so I'll keep it in mind. Thank you for posting!