Talk to me about Killgallon...(and other writing advice)

[TheAttachedMama]

Hi Everyone,

 

I am trying to plan writing for next year.   My son will be 9 (going on 10) and in the 4th grade.   Up until this point, he has done ZERO original writing.  

 

We have spent this year working on the basics:

getting his reading level up (he is a late reader, and slightly dyslexic)

grammar (FLL 3, first part of Treasured Conversations),

spelling and dictation (AAS 3, part of 4),

copywork/transcription,

oral narration,

poetry and shakespeare study,

lots of read alouds.

learning to type

letter writing to friends once every two weeks

--------------------

 

I *think* I want to use Writing with Skill eventually.  (I think.)  

 

But I am not sure what to do in the meantime.  (WWE is not a good fit for me as a teacher because the monotony of the routine wears me down after awhile!)    

 

I am considering Killgallon with a few WWE 3 lessons thrown in.   I noticed that that is what the WTMA uses in their remedial writing class.   However, I noticed that they start kids off with the Middle school book.   What is the difference between the elementary and middle school books?

 

My other questions are...

1)  How do people use the Killgallon books?   What book do I start with?  How do I schedule it?  

 

2)   How would you compare Killgallon's writing method with something like WWE or IEW for example?  Do people often use Killgallon's books as a supplement to other programs like these?

  

3)   What are the strengths and weaknesses of the program?  

 

4)  What type of students would it be a good fit for?   What types of teachers?

 

5)  Can you review the program?

[texasmama]

To throw another iron in the fire, you might look at Writing Tales 1 and 2.  

[Miss Tick]

I'll take a spot at a few of your questions. The reading selections in the middle school books are from higher reading level books. I know this because I thought that might be better for my strong reader, but decided that the writing (somewhat longer sentences and paragraphs would be overwhelming, so I purchased the elementary books.

 

We use the Sentence Composing book as an occasional supplement to WWE and other writing projects. Briefly we used the Paragraph Composing book to officially introduce paragraphs, and I hope to return to it when we finish the sentence book.

 

Sentence Composing is not nearly as small step, stay progress add WWE, so it wouldn't work for us as a main program. It has, however, done very nice things for the quality of sentences produced in our house.

 

We do a fair bit of it orally to avoid panic.

 

I think it assumes you are teaching the grammar of the terms elsewhere, asking with more practice identifying them. I don't think their grammar book is particularly more in depth, either.

 

It has been beneficial here as a supplement.

[TheAttachedMama]

To throw another iron in the fire, you might look at Writing Tales 1 and 2.  

Oh no!   Not more options!  I am already totally overwhelmed!  (Half kidding--I have spent all morning researching writing tales now.  So I am thankful for the suggestion.)

 

Writing Tales does look good.  BUT My concern with Writing Tales is that it looks a lot like CAP W&R Fable...which I already own.   For some reason, I feel like W&R Fable doesn't give me enough support as far as what I should expect in terms of output.   My son has only done two lessons from the book.  (we just tried it out.)  But I was always wondering...."OK, how do I guide him from here to make improvements?"   

[TheAttachedMama]

I'll take a spot at a few of your questions. The reading selections in the middle school books are from higher reading level books. I know this because I thought that might be better for my strong reader, but decided that the writing (somewhat longer sentences and paragraphs would be overwhelming, so I purchased the elementary books.

 

We use the Sentence Composing book as an occasional supplement to WWE and other writing projects. Briefly we used the Paragraph Composing book to officially introduce paragraphs, and I hope to return to it when we finish the sentence book.

 

Sentence Composing is not nearly as small step, stay progress add WWE, so it wouldn't work for us as a main program. It has, however, done very nice things for the quality of sentences produced in our house.

 

We do a fair bit of it orally to avoid panic.

 

I think it assumes you are teaching the grammar of the terms elsewhere, asking with more practice identifying them. I don't think their grammar book is particularly more in depth, either.

 

It has been beneficial here as a supplement.

This is actually really helpful.    Reading is NOT my son's strong suit, so this helps me decide that point at least.  

 

I also like your advice about using it as a supplement.   Thanks you so much! 

[texasmama]

Oh no!   Not more options!  I am already totally overwhelmed!  (Half kidding--I have spent all morning researching writing tales now.  So I am thankful for the suggestion.)

 

Writing Tales does look good.  BUT My concern with Writing Tales is that it looks a lot like CAP W&R Fable...which I already own.   For some reason, I feel like W&R Fable doesn't give me enough support as far as what I should expect in terms of output.   My son has only done two lessons from the book.  (we just tried it out.)  But I was always wondering...."OK, how do I guide him from here to make improvements?"   

I am not very familiar with CAP's W&R, but I will say that I suspect that Writing Tales is like W&R for Dummies.  :D  I find it very simple to implement and mostly independent.  It is, in my opinion, a very straightforward program without a steep teacher's learning curve.  Both programs are classical.

[TKDmom]

I did part of the Elementary Kilgallon book with my older DD, and I wish I cold go back and make my old self stick with it, instead of jumping over to CW Aesop. My DS12 is currently in the WTMA Pre-expository course and it has been wonderful! We started out the year doing selected exercises with Kilgallon, DS struggled with some of the exercises. But it was the kind of struggle that stretched him without driving him to tears. The hardest exercise I remember was a sentence (or maybe paragraph?) by Edgar Allen Poe. It was all scrambled up and he had to put it together in the right order and imitate it. There were multiple ways to construct that (long, convoluted) sentence, and I finally went and looked it up online. But I thought it was great that DS (and I) had to struggle with that sentence and read it closely and play around with it for 15 minutes. Close reading at its best. ;)

 

DS12's class also has written (typed) narrations from WWE3, and now WWE4. It's so much better than doing the whole, weekly schedule thing (I'm a WWE drop-out too). So I've been able to see how to use WWE as a supplement rather than mind-numbing repetition. 

 

I've realized I simply cannot do scripted programs (thus the WWE drop-out). Kilgallon feels so much free-er to me. It has sentences from good literature with sample imitations (then the student makes up a sentence using the same structure as the original and sample). DS12 was a very reluctant writer--I think partly because he couldn't care less about the topics that most writing programs suggest. But when he did the imitations, he was able to have fun with them and let all his fantasy-loving sarcastic humor come through. At the same time, he had to play very close attention to things like punctuation and parts of speech to compose an effective imitation. One mistake that I made with older DD, was that I felt like we had to do all 10 sentences in an exercise every time we sat down with the book. Which is ridiculous, but sometimes I get too caught up in doing things "the right way." DS just worked on it until he'd had enough and we would pick up where we left off the next day.