Writing and rhetoric: fables

[Little Green Leaves]

Hi everyone. I tried searching the archives because I'm sure this has been asked a million times before, but I had trouble with the search function.

I'm looking for reviews of Writing and Rhetoric. I'd be using the first level with my soon-to-be fourth grader. He's very solid on the mechanics of writing. What I want is something that will get him writing more -- right now, he's a very hesitant writer. I like that W&R seems to have a lot of structure, but with room for some creativity too. 

Anything I should know about the program? Also, am I right that it doesn't include any grammar and I'd have to do that separately?

[purpleowl]

I like W&R a lot, and I do think my girls have benefited from the "structure but room for creativity" approach. They have just started book 7, and I like how the program has helped them develop writing skills. 

One thing someone here suggested was to use the book The Most Wonderful Writing Lessons Ever prior to starting W&R. I did that found it very beneficial to get them thinking creatively. I think I spent about a semester on it. Certainly not a requirement, but it did work well for us. I think the activities there would be great for a hesitant writer to build confidence.

W&R includes a tiny bit of grammar, but if you want thorough grammar instruction you'll need a separate resource.

[Little Green Leaves]

Thank you! The Most Wonderful Writing Lessons Ever looks perfect and I've just ordered it. I think that kind of logical, clear approach is just what my son needs. I'll get W&R next. This is great -- now all I need to do is pick a grammar book.

 

 

 

[Emily ZL]

We just finished Fable with my 4th grader last year. I started it at mid-year because I felt guilty that we hadn't done any writing really. I liked it, and my son liked it. I don't have an unlimited time for LA because I don't like to load up his day and we also do Latin and school only 4 days per week, so this was our schedule: one day of spelling workbook, then 3 days of grammar. The following week it would be one day of spelling again, and then 3 days of W&R. In those 3 days we could get everything done for the lesson. So doing it every other week and starting halfway through the year, we got through about half the lessons. I'm going to just move on to Narrative 1 next year. Later on the program looks like it gets more serious, but Fable was nice and gentle (by design) for young kids, and I am happy with what we got out of it. My son was usually very silly in his writing but that was ok with me (like, they would ask him to replace the adjectives and he would write "The ugly mouse with the sleepy teeth.." and I'm kind of annoyed because it's not good writing, but his point was "look, I know what an adjective is and I liked replacing them with crazy ones." Maybe I should have cracked down on that but I sort of saw the curriculum as playing with stories and language.)

My one major "con" is that it didn't seem to *instruct* so much as provide detailed prompts for changing and playing with stories. I do think that was by design. From what I've seen, it ramps up fairly quickly. That first book is like somewhere between IEW on one side and bravewriter on the other. It also has a little Charlotte Mason because it incorporates oral narration and dictation. I hate doing CM but knew those skills were valuable, so I liked that W&R forced me to do them. And he has gotten a lot of mileage out of them, especially the dictation. Not sure if that continues in later books.

[Little Green Leaves]

1 hour ago, Emily ZL said:

We just finished Fable with my 4th grader last year. I started it at mid-year because I felt guilty that we hadn't done any writing really. I liked it, and my son liked it. I don't have an unlimited time for LA because I don't like to load up his day and we also do Latin and school only 4 days per week, so this was our schedule: one day of spelling workbook, then 3 days of grammar. The following week it would be one day of spelling again, and then 3 days of W&R. In those 3 days we could get everything done for the lesson. So doing it every other week and starting halfway through the year, we got through about half the lessons. I'm going to just move on to Narrative 1 next year. Later on the program looks like it gets more serious, but Fable was nice and gentle (by design) for young kids, and I am happy with what we got out of it. My son was usually very silly in his writing but that was ok with me (like, they would ask him to replace the adjectives and he would write "The ugly mouse with the sleepy teeth.." and I'm kind of annoyed because it's not good writing, but his point was "look, I know what an adjective is and I liked replacing them with crazy ones." Maybe I should have cracked down on that but I sort of saw the curriculum as playing with stories and language.)

My one major "con" is that it didn't seem to *instruct* so much as provide detailed prompts for changing and playing with stories. I do think that was by design. From what I've seen, it ramps up fairly quickly. That first book is like somewhere between IEW on one side and bravewriter on the other. It also has a little Charlotte Mason because it incorporates oral narration and dictation. I hate doing CM but knew those skills were valuable, so I liked that W&R forced me to do them. And he has gotten a lot of mileage out of them, especially the dictation. Not sure if that continues in later books.

That ugly mouse line sounds like something my son would also write and would find hilarious : ) I'm glad W&R has space for that kind of thing. Sometimes I want to crack down on that stuff too but then I think how I'll miss it when it's over...

Thanks for explaining the scheduling, too. I'm planning to do some grammar, and French, and yes not overload things. So it's really nice to hear that W&R starts out gentle and doesn't take too much time.

[Sarah0000]

If I remember right there is some grammar in Fable. More like a brief reference and review than full teaching though. Depending on where he is in his grammar studies, you can have him parse the dictation sentences in Fable if you don't want to do a separate grammar program. My son did MCT Island before Fable and that approach is working well. Bonus, you can also use Dictation Day by Day or some other progressively building dictation for spelling program instead of the dictation in Fable and quickly hit everything with the one program. That left more time for my son to spend on the creative writing parts of Fable.

[Little Green Leaves]

13 hours ago, Sarah0000 said:

If I remember right there is some grammar in Fable. More like a brief reference and review than full teaching though. Depending on where he is in his grammar studies, you can have him parse the dictation sentences in Fable if you don't want to do a separate grammar program. My son did MCT Island before Fable and that approach is working well. Bonus, you can also use Dictation Day by Day or some other progressively building dictation for spelling program instead of the dictation in Fable and quickly hit everything with the one program. That left more time for my son to spend on the creative writing parts of Fable.

Thanks. Yeah,  I think I am probably not going to use W&R exactly as directed. We'll be doing grammar for the first time next year too, and I need to see how everything is going to work together. I'm guessing it'll be a bit experimental at first, but I'm excited.

[purpleowl]

23 hours ago, Little Green Leaves said:

That ugly mouse line sounds like something my son would also write and would find hilarious : ) I'm glad W&R has space for that kind of thing. Sometimes I want to crack down on that stuff too but then I think how I'll miss it when it's over...

I say things like, okay, you're doing six of these change-the-adjective exercises, so you may give silly answers for two of them. The silly answers take longer than the others sometimes because they want to get as ridiculous as possible. 🙂

[Little Green Leaves]

12 minutes ago, purpleowl said:

I say things like, okay, you're doing six of these change-the-adjective exercises, so you may give silly answers for two of them. The silly answers take longer than the others sometimes because they want to get as ridiculous as possible. 🙂

Yeah ridiculousness counts for a lot here too. I've had my son write me whole paragraphs in Pig Latin when English would definitely have been faster and easier! It's fun to be subversive:)