With the Writing Essentials courses, you can make sure your student knows the most important foundational skills of writing, to be able to move forward confidently into all upper-level writing

Together, the four courses cover one full year of English and writing — with each “semester” containing two courses specifically tackling punctuation, grammar, and specific, key writing skills students must master at the middle school level, to move forward with confidence.

The 6/7 Series courses lay the foundation for everything to come. With these courses, punctuation and grammar errors that are “common” can be avoided. Ensuring that your student is solid on the skills of using commas, end punctuation, quotation marks, and “tricky punctuation” — and knowing what common grammar errors to avoid — are both critical to writing anything well.

In the same way, writing simple sentences isn’t enough. Knowing how to choose and use deeper language — including strong nouns, active verbs, clarifying adjectives and adverbs, and detailed prepositional phrases — is critical to writing well-crafted sentences, paragraphs, and essays. In the 6/7 Series, your student comes away with a strong understanding and ability to craft clear text.

The Simplified Writing courses make sure your student knows the most important foundational skills of putting the pieces of writing together, to move forward into all upper-level writing.

Together, the four courses cover one full year of English and writing — with each “semester” containing two courses specifically tackling composition skills.

The 7/8 Series builds on the foundations laid in the 6/7 Series. Your student learns that composition depends on the ability to purposefully craft diction (word choice) and syntax (word arrangement) — so your student continues to practice choosing precise and powerful words and clearly arranging the words in clear, strong paragraphs with purpose.

Your student learns about essay writing and form, and how it’s key to all future academics — and finds out that there are many different kinds of writing, each with its own purpose, audience, and style (or way to write). Because learning to write isn’t just about academic writing, students learn to see those differences — and purposefully choose the writing techniques and styles needed for each type of writing.

And perhaps most importantly, in the 7/8 Series, students learn that there are “secrets” to crafting paragraphs and essays — ways to make writing easier and more enjoyable — so your student comes away with a strong understanding and ability to craft longer portions of text with confidence.