In our house I am homeschooling one in elementary and one in Highschool. My Highschooler was always a natural writer, but my youngest was not. At one point in our homeschool writing was such a struggle! Even getting a simple sentence on a page was torture! Now my struggling writer is begging for just 5 more minutes before bed, so she can finish the story she is working on.
Teaching writing can feel overwhelming as it is such an important part of their learning. You want them to become good writers, but also enjoy writing. You want content that will challenge the ones who need it and be gentle with the ones who need more time. Below I will share some tips that have helped our family along with the numerous writing curriculums available to help you with teaching.
Homeschool Writing Tips
1. Read…a lot!
Children absorb so much from reading. The more the child sees what writing should look like, the more they will learn to do it themselves. Through reading they are learning sentence structure, grammar, vocabulary and spelling. Your child will also be exposed to story structure, characterization and plot. All things that develop good writing skills.
2. Free choice writing
Encourage your child to write for fun. They can write about anything, no matter how silly. Don’t worry about structure so much and just focus on getting something on the paper. Maybe try writing letters to friends and family.
3. Partnership writing
This is the strategy that took my daughter(Leopard girl) from hating to write, to it being one of her favorite things to do! She began writing once a week with a friend(Star Kitty) either in person or via zoom depending on our availability. We wanted to let creativity flow here, so we let them choose their topics and watched their imaginations soar. Right now the girls are working on their very own novel….stay tuned for their release!
4. Dictation
If your child is having a hard time getting something on paper, have them dictate their stories while you write them down or even use the chat to text feature on a tablet. This may feel counterintuitive, but in my experience they will generally grow out of this stage. The dictation just helps them be able to get the many many words flowing through their brains onto the paper or screen, especially as a lot of time younger writers have a hard time writing as fast as they can think or type. This can add to frustration, so dictation can be a bridge to get them past that point.
As an added exercise, if you are the one writing down what they dictate, be sure to make some mistakes then have them sit down and correct it once the creative writing time is done.
5. Alternative writing surfaces
Not all writing has to be done on paper. Get out the dry erase boards, write with chalk in the driveway or practice typing.
6. Go easy on correcting
In the early years of writing, I found it helpful to go easy on the correcting and focus more on the process. I found overcorrecting an emerging writer led to more frustration and anxiety around writing.
7. Harness their arguments and passions
If your child is begging you for the newest toy or asking to be able to do some special activity, have them write out their argument in an attempt to persuade you. This tends to light a fire under them when they are very passionate about convincing you to let them do something.
Homeschool Writing Curriculums
A question I have heard a lot…which writing curriculum is the best? Well, the answer to that is whichever one works best for you and your child!
IEW- k-12 – IEW offers a variety of writing, grammar and spelling products. Our experience was with IEW structure and style. While I found this curriculum to be very strong and I noticed improvement in my children’s writing, they both complained every time it was time to write. This curriculum also requires a lot of parent involvement, as it requires the parent to watch a 10-hour seminar to learn how to teach their writing system.
A note from my highschooler ” The videos are boring and way too long. I also feel like all the rules hinder my creativity. “
EIW- k-12 – EIW offers writing and literature products. Per their website, If you combine their writing curriculum with their literature program it is equivalent to a High school English credit. I made the switch from IEW this year for my 9th grader. I plan to switch my youngest as well after seeing the difference. We are only using the writing portion. I like how the videos are shorter and to the point, they are much easier to digest. My daughter doesn’t complain at all and some days will work ahead because its more enjoyable to her. It appears to be solid in building a strong foundation for writing. Another plus, is they offer a scoring service for grading papers.
A note from my highschooler – “I like how everything is broken up into bite size chunks, it makes it much easier for me to stay focused and absorb the information. I feel like I am learning new things, but also understanding things that may have been explained before in other curriculums, but now its in a way I understand and it’s sticking.”
Brave writer – k-12 – Brave writer offers digital products and online classes. Our family has enjoyed using their literature singles as a supplement. Its a great way to dive into a book. It involves dictation, copy work and activities to make it fun.
Lost tools for writing – 7th-12th
