write on!
A Creative Writing e-mail Correspondence Course for Home Schools
Personal Critique: Your child will receive a personal critique on each assignment and will be evaluated according to his/her personal strengths and weaknesses. I find that most students who dislike (hate?!) writing, are actually bored with writing. Therefore, I offer students writing topics which are based on common hobbies and interests of young people, rather than topics that are of interest to a textbook writer! This has worked very well to spark interest in my students. I also give them opportunity to choose their own topics. I do not give grades. I prefer offering personal encouragement and looking for individual progress.
Writing Continuity: A "common thread" must be woven throughout writing, no matter what the style or purpose. Often the thread gets dropped in the middle and the reader is lost. This is a very common mistake in writing of all kinds and we'll learn how to avoid that.
Development of Characters: Through exercises in creating good dialogue, we'll learn how to develop "real", believable characters. We'll do this by observing and taking note of actual dialogue of those around us. How do people really talk? Is perfect grammar in dialogue believable? How can a character's personality be shown through dialogue?
Description: We'll make ordinary writing come to life! A thesaurus is a necessary tool for this course. Along with description will be exercises using imagination and experience. For example, I had my kids write about autumn--from the oak tree's point of view. My son wrote about how it felt to lose all of "his" leaves.
Persuasive Writing: We will have lessons focusing on how to effectively persuade the reader.
Narrative: First person, third person: when are each more effective? The student will experiment with both.
Compare/Contrast: We will do some writing comparing and contrasting ideas or things.
Point of View: We will stretch our imaginations to write from the perspective of other people, and even other objects. For example, what's it like to be a raindrop??
Also included are exercises in dialogue, writing for an audience, and more.
Write On!
creative writing e-mail correspondence
- About Write On!
- Course Overview
- How it Works
- Course Exclusions
- Target Audience
- Course fees/enrollment