Question about In Their Sandals writing program

[LynnH]

My son is using this with the AH1 guide and is finishing up his first story. The directions say that there isn't a set amount of words, number of paragraphs or length required. My son is one who isn't going to write something lengthy unless directions specifically sat to do that. His first story has good sentence structure and vocabulary and tells the story, but there isn't a lot of extras. It is fairly short. So my question is has anyone else had the issue where their dc didn't write very long stories and if so did you say that was ok or did you push for them to make their stories a certain length or number of words? My son and I are both used to EIW where you knew exactly what was expected so this one is just a little tougher for me to grade and figure out expectations.

[Carrie]

Lynn,

As we did In Their Sandals, I found that the length of my son's writings varied quite a bit throughout the year. Since this writing program has more of a creative writing bent, I think that it's fine to have pretty big variations in length. Grading-wise, as long as my son did a good job completing the planning sheets, made sure to include what was asked of him in the writing, tried to apply the grammar/writing tools mentioned, and did his best proofing and editing, I allowed quite a bit of leeway in the length. This is because for this program it is meant to be freeing for the students not to have a set length to attain, but rather to write in a way that suits their intended purpose.

For this particular program, if we place a certain length requirement on the student, he/she will begin writing to attain the length rather than allowing the writing be whatever length it needs to be in order fulfill the idea in his/her head. Freedom in writing - figuring out how to take an idea from its inception to finish - with fewer constraints is actually a skill to be developed for this year of writing. It can be tough to write outside of a formula, yet that is where a student's voice develops and appears.

From what you've shared, it sounds like your son did very well with this first assignment. I would be pleased with his work.

Blessings,
Carrie

[LynnH]

Thanks for responding Carrie. What you described is what I have been thinking since writing this post. He hadn't gotten to the grammar application lesson when I wrote it and once he did he went back and added what they told him to and fixed a few other things along the way. I did help him with ideas for how to open a story, since he is more used to writing a introduction paragraph for an essay. We talked about different styles we have seen author's use such as taking the reader back in time etc. I ended up pleased with his finished product and he then presented it to dh to read and my husband really liked it. I think he will show more and more voice and personality as we go along with this program. He told me he misses Mr. Stevens, but he likes this program also. I had to laugh!

[Tiffini]

Hi, Lynn! We have had the opposite problem - the stories my twins wrote were sooo long! But they did such a great job on them! Now that we are into the second writing assignment, I can see how this one may be much shorter. I like what Carrie said in her response. I think this is a skill they haven't had to work on yet - learning how to figure out the length they need to do a good job on the assignment without someone telling them exactly what to do. This program is a lot of fun and so different from the ones they have done in the past. My twins are really enjoying letting their creative voice come out! Maybe we could share the stories with each other and so the kids could know their writing is being appreciated by others? And it could get their creative juices flowing even more!