If you have used Jump In...

[Nakia]

can you tell me what you think and how it worked for you? I bought it and like the looks of it. I don't quite understand the scheduling. Any advice?

[...................]

Didn't work for us...

 

Here's my review copied from another place:

 

Jump IN did not work for my son. We wanted something that would keep his writing skills up to date in an affordable, easy to use format, just for 7th grade. He had done an extremely advanced and intense writing course through Calvert School last year in 6th grade and this year I wanted it to be a little lighter.

 

Unfortunately, Jump In is not working. Here are our problems with it:

 

1. It is too broken down into bits. Learning to do something step by step makes sense. But Jump In is broken down too much for my son. Each step is broken down into many tiny other steps, making the writing process drag out for weeks.

 

2. The organization of said steps is even worse. For example, you are often asked to write the body paragraphs before the Introduction. This makes no sense. I can see revising the introduction after writing the body paragraphs, but my son was really frustrated by the illogical order presented in this book. We have re-written the process many times.

 

3. The ridiculously simplistic writing prompts/subjects/themes. In my experience (and maybe this is just my kids), kids want to work hard, and they want something they are really proud of to show for their hard work. My son complained several times about writing assignments with Calvert, but in the end when he had very deep essays about literature, the world, choices he had made, and history, he was extremely proud of these papers and even called grandparents to read them. Jump In's writing prompts are, well, fairly lame, and shallow.

 

4. The fonts and colors are annoying and distracting, and therefore insulting to the age range this book was written for.

 

Here's my final take...(and I am really really stretching for something nice to say here)...maybe if you have a 5th grader that just wants to "play around with" writing and produce a few very simple papers and he or she doesn't mind if any given day is hardly connected to any previous day, then maybe this might be fun?

 

But, in the end, I cannot grasp the illogical order of many things presented in this book. Whole chunks of concepts are introduced over the course of up to 20 days. During that process, side exercises are used to get the kids to practice aspects of thought and writing (but they aren't really writing their paper or even pieces like their paper)...then they finally start writing the paper and by that time they wonder what those 20 days of introduction and exercises were for. And then, once they start writing the paper, it's often done out of order.

 

I just cannot recommend this to anyone . The book actually gets worse and worse as it goes on.

[Nakia]

I think I read your review somewhere else but thank you for taking the time to post it here.

 

My current 6th grader is what many would consider "behind" in writing so I'm not worried about Jump In being too simplistic for her. My oldest did WWS 1&2, and I just don't think my next one is ready for that yet. WWS often (or maybe always) has the students write the introduction after the body of the paper so maybe that is a common way of teaching. I don't know, but that doesn't necessarily bother me. I will have to look more closely at the topics to see if they will appeal to my dd or not.

 

Thank you again!

[Lori D.]

If you have used Wordsmith Apprentice… Jump In reminds me of a more in-depth version of WA.

Just as WA worked well with our delayed / reluctant / struggling writer (due to mild LDs in writing) in 7th grade, Jump In did, too, in 8th grade. We found it to be a good next step from WA; it was esp. helpful in guiding our struggling writer into how to think of *what* to write, and how to organize his writing logically.

Also similar to Wordsmith Apprentice, scheduling is very flexible. We did as much or as little of a unit each day as worked for our student. One thing we tweaked: Jump In is designed to take 2 years, by doing a unit, and then taking a few weeks break to do "free writing" from the prompts in the TG. We dropped the prompts for 2 reasons:

1. We found all of the prompts to be extremely similar, lame, and dull (kills ANY interest in writing)
2. "Free writing" was unnecessarily slowing down the program, and was a distraction

We did the program without the prompts / free wring, and also dropped the last 2 of the 14 units (Storytelling and Poetry -- DS had NO interest in creative writing), and finished Jump In about 2-3 weeks before the end of the school year. That also takes into account that one day a week, instead of doing Jump In, we practiced doing timed essays from past SAT prompts, starting with just 10 minutes and 1 complete paragraph of 5 sentences, and working our way up to 4-6 paragraphs in 25 minutes, focusing on practicing different parts of essay writing a little at a time.

JMO: I think writing is THE hardest subject to find a good match up for students. Every student matures at different rates when it comes to all the technical skills needed to be able to write (thinking of what to say, supporting your contention, organization and logical flow, expressing *your* unique writing voice, revising, proofing…) And it's such a difficult and subjective subject to *grade*. That's why there are SO many programs out there! Each with a different spin on how to teach or approach writing. 

Sounds like Jump In was not a good match up for the above poster because it was taking a big step backwards for an advanced writer -- hope they quickly found and shifted over to what *was* a good match for them! 🙂 On the other hand, Jump In did work here -- informal tone and small enough bites at a time to help DS from feeling so overwhelmed that he could actually manage the writing.

BEST of luck in finding what works best for writing for your family! Warmest regards, Lori D.

Edited November 20, 2022 by Lori D.

[SilverMoon]

DD/9th used Jump In in 8th grade and thoroughly enjoyed it. It got her writing varied projects, more comfortable with her pencil, and it was painless to use. She worked on it for X minutes a day and just picked up wherever she landed the next day.

 

When I pulled it out and suggested DS/6th use it next year for 7th, DD/9th remembered it fondly and told him he'd have a great time.

 

eta: We don't hesitate to craft our own topics to suit DC if needed.

[clemota]

We are using it this year with my dysgraphic 6th grader.  It has been a really good fit for her - the short answer writing in the book is short enough that it doesn't wear her out, and essays are broken down into daily steps so she knows what she is supposed to be working on without getting overwhelmed by the whole process.  Like Lori D., we also skip the writing prompts and work only from the main text.  We are not doing all of the exposition sections (she already knows how to write a book report) or all of the narration (that's a LOT of creative writing if you do them all!), but the book is big enough to keep us busy through the year.

 

We are old earth Catholics and tend to use secular curriculum, but I've  been pretty happy with Jump In, so we can ignore or discuss the very few religious references that come up (giving a topic sentence to the "God created man and dinosaurs at the same time" paragraph comes to mind - we just let it become a discussion of what some people believe, and how it can be different than what we believe, but we can still make up a topic sentence for it. :001_smile: )

 

I would show the curriculum to your kid(s) and see what they think.  When I showed DD it last summer, she was really impressed with how it taught how to write without expecting an entire paragraph every day.  And the tone is just right for middle/early high school students: a light sense of humor with a you-can-do-this attitude.   And having that breakdown of how to plan each essay was fantastic.  We will keep using those for years, I think.

 

We  do one skill (lesson) per day.  Sometimes they are quick and easy - I let DD have those without making her do another one so that writing does not become that "Ugh! Am I done yet?!" subject.  And since she knows she only has to do one a day, she doesn't fight me when the longer ones come around.  This then transfers into the essay writing breakdown.  She has taken control of that on her own: I don't need to tell her what she needs to get done, she just follows her plan.

 

I think we made up our own topic once or twice when DD didn't like the topics given, but that's an easy thing to substitute.  Over all, it has been a really good fit for us.

 

 

[JadeOrchidSong]

Ds finished WWE 1--4. He also did IEW Student Writing Intensive A. Then I had him do CAP W&R Book 3 and Book 4. He did WWS 1 for a couple weeks and didn't want to continue. I had Jump In! on my shelf, so I pulled it down for him to try. I allowed him to write in the book. It has been only a little over a week, but I can say he likes it and is producing decent writing.

When I first bought it and looked at it, I wasn't impressed at all, but as long as it works for ds, I am happy!

He will do IEW Student Writing Intensive B in the fall with some of his friends.

[Nakia]

Thank you all for the advice and reviews!