Luv'N Lambert Life

A blog about living with Epilepsy, IBHS, Homeschooling and so much more

writing program

High School Essay Intensive {Crew Review}

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The Institute for Excellence in Writing is one of the best curriculum choices available for writing curriculum and one of our favorites.  So when we were offered the chance to review High School Essay Intensive with the Homeschool Review Crew, I was happy to jump on the review train.  I must admit I wanted this program both for me and to preview for my high schoolers.  I’ve not been disappointed, but then I never expected to be because the Institute for Excellence in Writing provides only the best in it’s products.
High School Essay Intensive was created by Andrew Pudewa, the Director at the Institute for Excellence in Writing.  This program is designed to provide high school students with a firm education in how to write essays.  Pudewa breaks down each element of an essay to make it easy to follow and complete the lessons provided for high school students.  This program is also designed to help your student preform better on the essay portion of the SAT®.
What We Received:

We were sent a box for the program containing a small DVD case filled with 5 DVD’s required to work through and complete the program.  The contents of the lessons are included upon these DVD’s. 
 Also included and needed for the program, is a cardboard three fold folder called Portable Walls for the Essayist.  This folder begins with the word “Essay” displayed in cursive, followed by the definition of what an essay is.  A list of essay types follows this definition.
The second page of the folder shows a list of essay models, breaking each down for better understanding.  The next page provides specific essay models such as the Argumentative Essay, Persuasive and Rhetoric among others.  In the center, the Essay Writing Process is explained.  Discussed on the pocket page are Essay Writing Strategies and Sentence Pattern Variety.
On the back of this folder is a full list of Transitional Words and Phrases as well as Prepositions to help guide your writing and expand your vocabulary when writing.  These are great for any writer to use.  The entire folder is a wealth of information that is great for all writers and a major asset for the program as well.
Inside, filling the folder, is a 25 page guide for the program.  This is where you’ll find the program’s questions and other required exercises for completing the program.  This is basically your student workbook.  I personally would have preferred it to be bound and a little nicer but it works for it’s need.
The DVD’s are led by Andrew Pudewa himself and he jumps straight into the reason for the course and the first assignment for you to complete.  The DVD’s are fully directed, telling when to pause and for how long, then you come back to complete more of the program.  The DVD’s are also closed captioned making it easy to follow along either by listening or reading the prompts as you go.  This helps to eliminate confusion as well.
How We Used It:
This program was for me and my two high school students.  I used it as a brush up for my personal writing and blogging and they used it as an introduction to high school essays and more structured writing for their high school assignments.  This program is styled more as formal classroom instruction, reminding me more of my high school college-prep courses.  I liked this and so did my kids because it gave them a more independent style in learning which they prefer.  It also gives choices for their writing instead of keeping them writing only one thing at a time.  Having a choice allows more thought to go into their writing and allows them to create better writing in the end.
Together we watched the program.  We discussed what we were learning together and then on separate sheets, we wrote our answers using the provided guide/student packet for the program.  As I mentioned, I would have preferred this to be an actual workbook but it was more like a classroom handout instead.
Where Can You Buy This Product:

High School Essay Intensive is for high school students to prepare them for Essay Writing.  It is available for order through Institute for Excellence in Writing for $79.  This includes the 5 DVD set for the program in it’s own DVD case, the Portable Walls for the Essayist folder and the printed Student Handout.
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High School Essay Intensive {Institute for Excellence in Writing Reviews}
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Create Better Writers {Crew Review}

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Create Better Writers allowed the Schoolhouse Review Crew to review three of their amazing products for this review: How To Teach The Paragraph, How To Teach The Five Paragraph Essay, and The Homeschool Writing Action Plan.  As reviewers, we were allowed to choose one or all three of these to work through at the pace we chose to do so for our children depending upon their ages.  Since my children are relatively young and also struggle with reading, we have only used How To Teach The Paragraph in our homeschooling thus far.

We received How To Teach The Paragraph as a downloadable e-book for use in our studies.  This e-book promises to teach children a simple way to determine paragraphs, organize their thoughts and write a well thought out paragraph.  We found it to be an excellent study on the paragraph and that it did indeed help my children understand and create better written paragraphs for their writing.

This 22 page e-book includes all you want to know about writing a paragraph.  It is broken down into two parts.  The first part teaches Paragraph Basics and is appropriately named The Basics.  It teaches the first 6 steps in writing paragraphs.  The second part of the e-book is called Improving the Parts of a Paragraph and teaches steps 7-11 in the paragraph writing process.  The end of the e-book also includes two appendixes for extra study of paragraph writing.

The Basics: Steps 1 begins with assessing the students paragraph writing skills.  Step 2 teaches the student the 5 basic parts of a good paragraph.  Step 3 helps the student memorize the parts of a good paragraph.  Step 4 begins the students paper set-up.  Step 5 allows the student to begin prewriting paragraphs and Step 6 concludes Part I: The Basics with an official written paragraph.

Part II: Improving the Parts of a Paragraph starts with Step 7 which teaches topic sentences.  Step 8 is strictly for learning about closing sentences in writing.  Step 9 gives a Paragraph assessment of the skills learned throughout this e-book.  Step 10 is extra paragraph writing practice and Step 11 finishes out this part of the program reviewing and sharing your perfect paragraph.

The e-book itself is written simply, yet challenging enough for grade 3-5 students.  The activities are thorough yet fun, helping with student skill advancement in writing.  The program builds upon itself to create a complete understanding of writing that is unlike many programs available today and since it’s available in e-book form it is immediately available to teachers and parents needing to address these skills right away.

This program was great for both my struggling reader and my advanced learner.  It allowed them to work at their own pace, creating sentences leading to paragraphs that fit their own needs.  Neither felt ahead or behind while working on this program or using the How To Teach A Paragraph e-book.  They are really excited to begin on the next book in the series, learning more about the writing process.

How To Teach A Paragraph is available through Create Better Writers website for $7.99.  Create Better Writers also has many other writing programs available, including a complete writing package on their website.  For more reviews of this and the other books provided to the Schoolhouse Reviewers please visit the Schoolhouse Review Crew blog!

*Disclaimer – This e-book series was provided by Create Better Writers and the Schoolhouse Review Crew in exchange for my honest opinion in a written review for free.  No money was exchanged in the review writing process.


WriteShop {Crew Review}

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WriteShop is an incremental writing program that helps inspire successful writers from Elementary through High School.  Writeshop is an award-winning curriculum that allows homeschooling parents to teach writing with confidence.  Step-by-step lessons provide students with the skills needed to build the writing processes of pre-writing, brainstorming, writing and revising, while allowing the teacher to help edit and evaluate a students work.
For this review, we were sent WriteShop Primary B, Teachers guide and Student Activity Pack.  This curriculum was really easy to get started with right from the shipping package.  The Teacher’s guide is thorough with lessons already set up for you, yet still allowing for changes as needed to fit your style and your students.  After the introduction, a section on schedule planning is provided to help you with these needs.  You can set up lessons for one to three weeks depending on what you’d like and what your student is able to complete.  WriteShop can be used with younger or older students with no problems too!  
A brief description of needed supplies and materials is also provided before the lesson plans begin, as well as a section on how to create a Writing Center for your lessons.  Suggestions for both a portable system and a semi-permanent system can be found here and how to best equip your center for your writers needs.  
The next section of the Teacher’s Guide discusses how to teach lessons using WriteShop.  Lesson focus, theme and objectives are covered within this section.  Materials, Advance Prep and Before You Begin suggestions are also provided here.  Then ideas for hands-on projects, activities, and daily guided writing practice are also provided, as well as information on how to use the Activity Set Worksheets with your student(s), prewriting activities and teaching brainstorming.  This Welcome Section continues to discuss Writing Projects, Revision and Editing, Publication and Evaluation of a students work.  
The next section of WriteShop Primary B is called Before You Begin Book B.  In it pointers are shared, as well as suggested activities.  As you can see this book covers many needed aspects for the beginning homeschool teacher in Writing.
Lessons begin with Writing a Letter, Standard Spelling and Acrostics continuing to learning about Poems and Nursery Rhymes, News, Humor and much much more!  Activities begin with a lesson focus provided in bold at the top of the lesson.  Then objectives are provided, a list of advanced prep needs, and materials.  Each lesson plan provides project ideas and scheduling ideas pertaining to the provided lesson.  Then the lesson activities begin.
At the end of the book an appendix is provided sharing materials and supplies for lessons, lesson specific supplies, extra publishing ideas and picture book suggestions for lessons.  An appendix is also provided for finding specific lessons for specific needs.  
I must honestly say that WriteShop is one of my favorite curriculums thus far.  The lessons are thorough but simple enough for my struggling readers to be able to complete without frustration.  The lessons are also perfect for the grade level provided and a lot of material is covered within the pages of the curriculum.  The material cost is not too high and the enjoyment of learning is well worth the cost.  My children loved reviewing this product and have learned a lot in the few weeks we have been using it.  This will be one product we will be adding into our daily and yearly homeschooling.
This product is available through WriteShop online at various prices for various levels.  WriteShop Primary B is priced at $29.95 for the Teacher’s Guide in Print Edition or $26.95 for the eBook download of the Teacher’s Edition.  The Student Materials, Activity Set Worksheet Pack is $4.95 for print and $4.50 for download.  These sheets are reproducible to be used with more than one student.
As a Special Discount, WriteShop is providing Crew Blog Readers with an offer of 15% off of any WriteShop Primary or Junior products in the WriteShop Store, eBooks included!  Use the code CREW15 at checkout through June 15, 2012 to receive your product with 15% off the purchase price!!
For more reviews of this product, please visit the TOS Homeschool Review Crew Blog!!
*Disclaimer – This product was provided to me FREE in exchange for Review by WriteShop and the TOS Homeschool Review Crew.  No money was exchanged in the process of writing this review.