OK. Are you ready to learn more about WriteShop Primary?
First, the program is geared specifically to children at the kindergarten level up through the second grade. It is a flexible program, however, that can be adapted to start at any point in those years by adopting a faster or slower pace and by including many of the optional, more challenging activities. It was written with the homeschooling family in mind, taking into account the unique needs and dynamics of a homeschool classroom.
Introducing Young Children to Writing
At this age, many children are considered “pre-writers” because they’re just learning how to write letters, words, and groups of words. Therefore, the experience of “writing” can be more of an exciting time to “communicate” through a visual medium such as an art project or picture.
It’s important for both pre-writers and beginning writers to explain the meaning of their picture and be encouraged to write a letter, word, or group of words on the project according to their ability.
Most of all, the writing experience for young children should be fun! Motivation, excitement, and a positive learning environment all help primary-age children build confidence in their writing abilities as they acquire the ability to write.
It won’t be long before WriteShop Primary is available for pre-orders. Meanwhile, I thought you might enjoy taking a peek at some of the engaging projects and activities that author Nancy Sanders has planned for you and your child!
Guided Writing Practice
Each day’s activities include 5-10 minutes of Guided Writing Practice, the teaching time and heart of WriteShop Primary. Its purpose is to provide your child with a daily, predictable, shared writing experience. During Guided Writing Practice, you and your child will write several short sentences about simple, familiar topics such as animals, friends, the weather, or upcoming events.
In later lessons, as your child’s writing skills increase, you will use the Guided Writing Practice time to gradually introduce new concepts such as choosing titles or identifying a story setting.
Guided Writing Practice introduces pointers to your child. Pointers are fun and educational. They help children track words better, strengthening reading and writing skills. You can gather or make a collection of pointers and keep them in a jar or can in your school area.
Picture Books
A picture book activity is part of every lesson Reading together opens up a whole new world for children that they might not have been aware of before. That’s one of the reasons reading picture books is a great tool for teaching writing! It sparks the imagination and creativity of children’s minds and gives them ideas to write about as they explore the mysterious wonder of the great big world they live in.
And because a picture book is all about pictures, pre-writers and beginning writers alike understand the value of a picture’s ability to communicate a story. This validates the artwork they themselves create as part of their own writing project.
Beginning Writing Tools
Creating a My Garden of Rhyming Words notebook, making portable word banks of vocabulary and spelling words, and assembling stories into books are just some of the activities in WriteShop Primary. Other fun elements include:
- Story webs to help plan and organize story details
- Story Ideas File Box to collect writing topics
- Can of Words to practice with spelling
- “Editing buddy” or stuffed animal to read his story to as the child develops self-editing skills
Designed to be exciting and fun, all these activities also have a purpose—to provide practical tools for a child to use while completing a writing project so he doesn’t just stare at a blank page. WriteShop Primary is chock full of engaging activities that motivate a child’s desire to write while giving him the skills to do so successfully at his own level of ability.
Writing Projects
Stories are meant to be published. Even at this young age, your five- to eight-year-old can publish her story in memorable and crafty ways. In WriteShop Primary, your child will have fun making hands-on projects such as:
- a rebus
- a giant caterpillar pull toy
- a story kite
- a Top Secret Detective File
Wow! Doesn’t that sound like FUN? Makes me wish I still had little ones at home myself so that I could play too!
Stay tuned for more about WriteShop Primary. And if you’d like us to notify you when pre-sales begin, just pop us an email!
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[...] See our full line of WriteShop products, including WriteShop Primary Book A. [...]
[...] See our full line of WriteShop products, including WriteShop Primary Book A. [...]
[...] week, I mentioned my excitement at finally holding the proof copy of WriteShop Primary Book A in my [...]