What grade/age for WWS

[Elizabeth86]

I think I would like to try this with ds in a year or two.I know 5th grade is on the young side and don’t intend to do it for 5th. I’m curious what has been a good age/grade for your child to do WWS. 

[wendyroo]

24 minutes ago, Elizabeth86 said:

I think I would like to try this with ds in a year or two.I know 5th grade is on the young side and don’t intend to do it for 5th. I’m curious what has been a good age/grade for your child to do WWS. 

My son started in the second half of 5th grade...but only with some logistical scaffolding.

Here are a few threads that I posted in discussing the challenges we had:
What age for for "Writing with Skill?"
Additional scaffolding for WWS1 (physical organization problem)
Please help me help DS with WWS.

Let me know if you have any questions that I might be able to answer.

[Elizabeth86]

20 minutes ago, wendyroo said:

My son started in the second half of 5th grade...but only with some logistical scaffolding.

Here are a few threads that I posted in discussing the challenges we had:
What age for for "Writing with Skill?"
Additional scaffolding for WWS1 (physical organization problem)
Please help me help DS with WWS.

Let me know if you have any questions that I might be able to answer.

Thank you.  I will read through these.  My son was early to start school, so is a younger 5th grader.  He isn't a big fan of writing for school, so I know he isn't ready right now.  I often think of him as a grade below due to his age in some subjects.  Am I correct that the student works through the lesson alone? 

[Lori D.]

I see a lot of people mention in threads here that for the typical student, 7th grade seems to work well for starting WWS1.( I would guess that might be a good year to consider it for your DS who is young for his grade.) That gives the student's logic and abstract thinking portions of the brain time to start developing, and there is far less frustration and wailing and gnashing of teeth at the writing by waiting. 😉

Have you had a chance to look through the samples? The Well-Trained Mind Press has generous sample pages in addition to the table of contents, for both the student book and the teacher guide, and that might give you a good idea of whether this is a good fit for your student, and WHEN it might be a good fit.

From the sample of the WWS1 Teacher Guide, it looks to me that the student first attempts on their own, but that parent does assist as needed. Just from my experience of teaching writing at our homeschool co-op, students are at such a WIDE range of ability that some students may need more hand-holding initially than what is described in the Introduction to the WWS1 Teacher Guide (quoted below).

Just my general observation from having had 2 boys who didn't love writing (and one had LDs in writing on top of it all): if your student is NOT ready to work independently, even if the instructions say the student is to do it independently, then either that's a sign to wait another 6 months or a year before trying to do the program, OR, adapt the program, and scaffold heavily as long as is needed by the student, and slowly work yourself out of the picture in the timing that is appropriate for the student.

 

"The directions in this course are targeted at the student. As the student moves into the middle grades, she is ready to take on more and more responsibility for her own academic work. Allow her to read the instructions and begin to follow them on her own before you step in with addi- tional help and guidance...

In your text, some instructions will be followed by the notation “(Student Responsibility).” These are to be completed by the student independently, with no assistance from you. When instructions appear without this notation, the student may need you to help with the assignment or to check her work.

When the student sees the symbol *, she should stop and answer the question asked before going on. Encourage her to answer these questions out loud; this will force her to come up with a specific answer rather than a vague idea.

NOTE TO INSTRUCTOR: Train the student to read the instructions thoroughly!

Students who are transitioning into independent work will be inclined to skim instructions and then tell you that they don’t understand. Your first step, when the student is confused, should always be to say “Read the instructions out loud to me.” Often, you’ll find that the student skipped or misunderstood the directions..."

Edited December 6, 2021 by Lori D.

[wendyroo]

22 minutes ago, Elizabeth86 said:

Thank you.  I will read through these.  My son was early to start school, so is a younger 5th grader.  He isn't a big fan of writing for school, so I know he isn't ready right now.  I often think of him as a grade below due to his age in some subjects.  Am I correct that the student works through the lesson alone? 

For my son, figuring out what he was supposed to do for each lesson, and organizing his work, was more difficult than the actual writing.

So he and I always went through the instructions together to make sure he noticed and understood all the steps. Then he would work independently for a while before I checked in again.

Also, the teacher's guide often tells you to help with sections if necessary, and it includes dialogues to have with the student sometimes. And I spend a lot of time helping DS revise and edit after he writes.

So, not exactly working "alone". But it definitely does require some level of independence.

[Miss Tick]

We have started (both times) in 6th grade. Having seen it once, I think ydd can get through in 3 years since we know where some of the pitfalls are, but my older two took 4. I think with my older two we did some alternating between WWS and some other writing programs I either had or created during the first year.

In our house the notetaking is the longest step (and I have no idea how to make this a more natural, faster process). I also generally add a single round of editing what is turned in, and then we discuss what, if anything, would need additional attention if it were to be a "polished" paper. I had to slowly overcome both "what rolls off my keyboard could not possibly be improved" and also the idea that editing is a reprimand of some kind.

[Lori D.]

1 minute ago, SusanC said:

...I had to slowly overcome both "what rolls off my keyboard could not possibly be improved" and also the idea that editing is a reprimand of some kind.

lol! This 100%.

[EKS]

1 hour ago, Lori D. said:

ust my general observation from having had 2 boys who didn't love writing (and one had LDs in writing on top of it all): if your student is NOT ready to work independently, even if the instructions say the student is to do it independently, then either that's a sign to wait another 6 months or a year before trying to do the program, OR, adapt the program, and scaffold heavily as long as is needed by the student, and slowly work yourself out of the picture in the timing that is appropriate for the student.

This a million times!

This whole "the student must work independently" thing, both in this resource and in others, is idiotic.  I would argue that as long as students are able to manage their schoolwork in an institutional setting whenever they end up entering such a setting, it is far better to keep instruction interactive than it is to train them to sit alone with a textbook.

[PeterPan]

22 hours ago, Elizabeth86 said:

I’m curious what has been a good age/grade for your child to do WWS. 

I'm getting fuzzy on the timeline, but I think we did WWS1 in 8th. It was the year we did National History Day, which substituted for the final project. Dd was VERY adhd and the "independent" instruction was over-written and a mess. I ended up going through every lesson with a highlighter. Because she was on the older side, she did it at an accelerated pace and skipped things that were unnecessary for her. (She was already strong at copia, etc.) 

Later is definitely better and I wouldn't bother till they can wrap their brains around it and own it. 

Also, the assignments have a severe lack of audience, which was just death knell for my dd. If your dc needs joy in writing, it will be up to you to bring it as the curriculum itself does not. That's another reason we waited and did it later, because I knew it was going to be torturous (which it was).

It's like saying when you should eat brussel sprouts. They're still going to taste like brussel sprouts, no matter what  you do to them. Nuts, I made a recipe with alfredo sauce and 5 cheeses and they STILL tasted like brussel sprouts. You can roast them, do whatever you want, but with brussel sprouts better to wait till they have the maturity to get it done fast. Just saying.

Btw, with a 5th grader who is young and doesn't enjoy writing I would do WT2, anything progymnasta, and outline interesting magazine articles. Work on typing.

Edited December 7, 2021 by PeterPan

[knitgrl]

Dd is in 7th and we are doing WWS 1 this year. She is on the young side. In 5th grade we used Teaching Writing Through Guided Analysis.

[Elizabeth86]

On 12/8/2021 at 9:30 PM, knitgrl said:

Dd is in 7th and we are doing WWS 1 this year. She is on the young side. In 5th grade we used Teaching Writing Through Guided Analysis.

This is actually what we are using for5th too. I just kind of like to have an idea of what is next.

[knitgrl]

2 hours ago, Elizabeth86 said:

This is actually what we are using for5th too. I just kind of like to have an idea of what is next.

For 6th grade we did Bravewriter Faltering Ownership. She really enjoyed over all, I kind of lost steam with it over the course of the year. The big project at the end of the year was to throw a party, which doesn't really work out in the middle of a pandemic.....

[JazzyMom]

I had one kid do WWS 1 in 6th grade and one kid in 8th.  They were both able to do it independently with me just checking their work, which is what we needed at the time.