3rd Grade Writing: Writing Strands or something else?

[Rasa]

My daughter is entering 3rd grade and can independently write a decent sentence. She can chat forever on any given topic, but if I suggest to write her thoughts down, she will condense all she has to say into one basic five to seven-word sentence using the shortest, simplest words possible.  

 

She is a relatively late reader (~7) and not a natural speller.  At first I thought that spelling skills were holding back her writing. Her spelling skills have greatly improved with AAS, which we started in 2nd grade (we are mid-level 3 now), but her confidence in her writing abilities has not caught up with her spelling skills yet.

 

I would like to help her, since she says that she wants to be a writer when she grows up.  I am thinking about Writing Strands.  Do you think it might work for this child?  What level would you recommend? I am leaning towards Level 2.

 

 

[rutheart]

Writing Strands does a great job of breaking down writing tasks into small steps done each day, so it never feel too burdensome. In just two years of using Writing Strands, my oldest went from hating writing to spending her free time writing fanfiction. She started with Writing Strands 3 in 4th grade, but she had already written paragraphs by then. My understanding is that Writing Strands 2 gets kids from writing a single sentence to writing a full paragraph. I'll probably be starting it with my second grader in January. I have Writing Strands 1, and it is just a collection of word games to play (no actual writing involved), so more for the 2-5yo level.

 

Ruth