Catholic Homeschool Support

I have to say as a computer science major in college, that writing was never my favorite subject. Fortunately or perhaps that should read, unfortunately, most of my college level writing was technically oriented. User manual, installation directions, FAQ – yes, I feel comfortable with those styles.

When I began homeschooling, especially as my children got a bit older, I realized that I was not comfortable teaching nor evaluating writing. How could I break the steps down into manageable chunks? Even more importantly, how do I evaluate the finished product? The questions were so difficult for me that I became “paralyzed” and thus taught / required no writing until my oldest children were in fifth grade!

Well, like some other homeschoolers I have spoken too, I am not alone. Thankfully, one year at a local homeschool conference, I stumbled into the Institute for Excellence in Writing booth. After joining the fabulous online yahoo group and a number of questions later, I purchased the Teaching Writing: Structure and Style.

First of all, while the DVD set is very expensive, it is not consumable, and if you find that it is not the program for you, there is a 100% buy back guarantee. The next huge plus for me was that I could fit the program into my existing curriculum. I happen to use Mother of Divine Grace syllabi (I am not enrolled in the program).

I watched most of the DVD’s in the afternoon after school was finished – it was a bit more enjoyable because I invited three other mothers to view them with me. We worked the demonstrations as Andrew Padewa suggested. We were introduced to the concept and reasonings behind the program and to the KWO (key word outline) and then on to the 6 dressups and sentence openers and the various writing models. Finally, I taught a short writing program to the children of these moms using another IEW program, U.S. Based History Lessons, Volume One.

At the time, this volume was quite a bit cheaper, so it was an easy way to introduce the dress ups and sentence openers and KWO concept and writing models to the students using a scripted program. Once we completed about half the program, I felt comfortable simply making our syllabi writing assigments follow the IEW method. If I had to do it again, I would probably skip the U.S. program and just introduce the concepts, one or two at a time per week and work on one writing model a week.

My suggestion with the program is that you focus on it being a “spiral” program. We did not aim for “mastery” (as opposed to my favorite math program, MathUSee). Instead, I wanted to expose my children to the entire program and then come back and refine the various elements.

This program was a true blessing for my oldest child, a writing phobic, poor speller. It provided him a method to separate the gathering of facts (key word outlines) and organization (writing modules including essays, book reports and reports) from the actual writing process (dress ups, sentence openers and avoiding banned words).

For me, the program was a blessing because not only did I find a way to teach writing, I had a more objective manner to evaluate writing. Each assignment comes with a small checksheet and their writing manuals include the models to detail how the assigment should be structured.

I could go on and on about the program, but I’ll end with one other item of note. In an informal poll on a homeschooling list I particpated in several years ago. We came to the conclusion that IEW was especially appealing to more “technical” type mothers. Finally, for additional support, please consider joining the IEWFamilies yahoo email list. While the volume is quite high, all questions are answered and many years of experience are available to guide you.

A program that takes a much different approach to writing, BraveWriter, seemed to appeal to other families. So, IEW is definitely not the solution for everyone. Julia Bogart, from BraveWriter and author of “The Writer’s Jungle” has a beautiful approach to writing that you should definitely look into. In fact, she even offers online writing courses that have received rave reviews. I would love to have someone else offer a post about this program.