Loving a Kick Start to Writing!

My good buddy and I were having one of those mom chats last July. You know the one . . .

My kid is moving up to Middle School! (pick your level) We’re probably not doing enough! He’s probably not prepared! I haven’t researched enough! I don’t know if what we ordered was right for him. What is our focus supposed to be???

Which is a silly way to spend the afternoon with your bud when she’s raised two amazing boys already, & you have enough curriculum between the both of ya to move to a third world country and teach a full elementary school full of children and you’ve done enough research to obtain a teaching degree in several different countries. And our focus is on the Lord!

So – It was during one of these conversations – that English was brought up. She shared with me that a Middle School teacher told her – that if she can have her students graduate from her middle school class with a solid handle on Paragraph Writing – that she would count the year’s English Class a success. Yes, we both agreed that we would work on Paragraph Writing Skills for our 7th grade boys! But how?

That same evening – I checked my This Old Schoolhouse Review Crew to find that our family was going to get to try Time4Writing.com free of charge for the purpose of reviewing it for You – My Blog Readers! I was able to choose any course that they offered – for one of my children. It was exciting to see that they have several on line courses ranging from Elementary to High School Levels. As I was meandering through the Middle School topics – There it was! Middle School Paragraph Writing! Holy Crazy God Coincidence! Planning Batman!

We started around the 19th of July – and are now 7 weeks into the 8 week online program. Each week Nathan had 5-6 projects to complete – simple, short, – step by step increments to learn how a good paragraph is formed. He was graded on Spelling, Punctuation, Caps, and Content. (Using “stuff” for a noun or cut off sentences takes off points, too.)

I feel that we both have the structure for producing a well written paragraph. Nathan says that he liked the class because he enjoyed working with the class online – at home – and that it wasn’t too hard – but it still gave him a challenge. He still has one week to go – so far his overall grade is over 95% – which has also been a fun bonus – seeing his reaction to grades – being graded – for what he says and how he completes a task. 🙂 (like by not paying attention to the quiz answers and getting an 80 twice for hitting the wrong button)

If you are looking for an 8 week refresher – pusher- reinforce-er – introduce-er – to writing – I recommend this site.