This was so helpful and confirmed my choice to try Writing with Ease for my struggling writer.

I agree that some writing style is pushed prematurely when the focus should be reading comprehension and writing good sentences. I am working with IEW right now. However, after completing one course of this, I would consider introducing elements of Writing with Ease and Essentials of Writing. I am not married to one plan. Goal #1 is developing willingness to write.

This is really helpful! I am a planner and so am already planning for next school year (when my oldest will be in first grade). LOL...So, I am excited to see what the writing curriculum options are. I have LOVED using the "First Language Lessons" with him this year in kindergarten...so I've been curious about WTM's writing program and I keep hearing about IEW...so definitely going to look into it some more. Thanks for your video! You always do such a great job!! And, I would love to see more of a flip-through of IEW. :-)

In my opinion, I feel all this comes from lots of reading. Paragraphing, grammar, spelling etc, all can be learnt in a natural process through just absorption of reading good material. X

I always love your videos! I’d love a more detailed flip through of Jot it Down and Sonlight. These two are really jumping out at me!

Teaching Grammar and writing IS my strong area as a homeschool mom. I have a bachelors degree in Journalism and I am a devotional writer. I loved your review of all of the curriculums....and I am here to tell you...follow your gut for your kid! believe SOME children will just naturally WANT to write stories, but for many they absolutely DO NOT and the creativity necessary for this is a skill that we cannot FORCE to flow out of them! I like using Copy-work, narration, transcription and dictation for all of elementary school. Beginning in middle school I add in some composition instruction. I am looking to use EIW for that this year! For elementary school...begining in 4th grade, I like to use Simply Charlotte Mason: Using Language Well/ Spelling Wisdom. Great Review!

Your reviews are incredibly hepful! I think we process is very similar ways! :)

How'd you know that this is just what I needed for my kindergartener lol. Mahalo for another beautiful video

Well done. A strong foundation now will last longer in life.

Wow! I LOVED this video!!! I have recently taken upon the task of homeschooling a 6th grader as my job. When I started about two months back, they were using spectrum as a core curriculum, which is supposed to be supplemental. So, I have completely over hauled his curriculum. But I feel exactly the same way about ELA as you do, I love reading and write creatively on my own but feel clueless on how to teach it. I also never really have had a passion for literature analysis. Math and science have always been my comfort subjects. So in doing research about curriculum I feel like so many homeschool moms love literature and grammar and English is their comfort subject so I feel underprepared. We've been doing Grammar Galaxy these past couple of months and while its been going pretty well I feel like it focuses way too much on grammar and lit analysis and there's hardly any writing involved even though it is advertised as a complete English curriculum. In my opinion I don't find a grammar curriculum really important, I was homeschooled as well and never took grammar, but was able to start college at 15 and get mostly A's. I read another comment that said, "I feel all this comes from lots of reading. Paragraphing, grammar, spelling etc., all can be learnt in a natural process through just absorption of reading good material." and I couldn't agree more! My, dad who homeschooled me, really just pushed writing, writing, writing, and reading, reading, reading and it worked! (We did Institute of Excellence in Writing [it obviously worked but I hated that curriculum so I don't want to put another kid through it haha]) We've been moving through the Grammar Galaxy book rather speedily and are about half way through so I've been looking into what we are going to do next and was pretty much settled on Essentials in writing but in doing history curriculum research I stumbled upon the well trained mind website and so found Writing with skill (the middle school of writing with ease) and now can't decide which to do! I love the video aspect of EIW and the scoring tool for after 7th grade which we would be using next year. But I love how much WWS breaks down the lessons into really bite sized pieces and has a good amount of repetition. anyways sorry for the long comment, great video!

Thank you so much! I like that you have younger ages as well. It helps me as I also have 4 kids under 6!

This was incredibly helpful! Thank you so much for sharing!

listening to you talk made about as much sense as if I were listening to someone speak to me in German 🤣 in other words, you are not alone!! I appreciate this video especially because it woke me up to some learning I need to do before I can even begin to teach these areas of learning to my kids.

Great review! I love your reference to looking for a "unicorn" program 🥰. I also have my literature picked out for the year. I mainly am looking for the writing component. I had also reviewed a few of these you showed for my just turned 9 year old student. I specifically wanted the review for the EIW 2. It was exactly what I was looking for, thank you! I agree with you about not pushing too soon, which is why I waited til now. Perhaps dial back to EIW 1 (which I have not reviewed)? My student is very traditional in her learning style, so this is the one. I got to meet Matthew Stevens, years ago at a HEAV conference, before his program was this well known. He was really nice 😃

I am having the same writing struggle right now. I have tried or seen others try all the curriculums you mention and just can’t decide what is the best approach. I also struggle teaching ELA (Math and Science are SO much easier, haha!) so I need a lot of hand holding. I hope IEW works well for you!

This reminded me so much of my journey! I’ve tried all of these two minus the fathers world and had the same reasonings as you! I’m also looking into EIW for this year or next. Thanks for sharing!

Last year (1st grade) we only did a workbook and it worked great. It was probably only once or twice a week (Scholastic Writing 1). They hated writing but they didn’t mind doing that particular workbook and it was the only thing we did writing wise really. So I got it again for 2nd grade and Evan Moor writing 2nd grade and it seems to be working fine! I hope you find your perfect curriculum!!!!

I felt a similar struggle when I began homeschooling. A great writer's handbook gave me the confidence that I needed. I now have a large collection of writer's handbooks and that is how I teach composition. In the elementary years I just adore Michael Clay Thompson for teaching grammar, mechanics, usage, vocabulary, and the art of sound through poetry. After we graduate from MCT we use Excellence In Literature (which includes composition) with a heavy focus on the online resources to round it all out. MCT and Excellence in Literature are more geared toward gifted learners. Even though my learners are science/engineering focused, the approach of these two ELA programs challenged them to grow into great writers; which is so important even in those STEM fields.

I started out homeschooling my children with only secular curriculum and have since almost abandoned all of them and moved on to more classical approaches to education, like Susan Wise Bauer. The classical method works so much better with my children. I love the focus on dictation, copy work and repetition.

I don’t know the ages of your children, but public schooled children really begin writing paragraphs in 1st grade, stories/summaries in 2nd-3rd grades, and then formal essays in 4th grade (at least in my state). I just ordered IEW for my 6th grader-I’m excited about it! But I also enjoyed seeing all of these other programs you reviewed. Thanks for the video!

Such a helpful review! Thank you! We used LL this year for my 5th grader but like you I felt it didn’t support me enough with writing. We’ll use EIW this year and I’m so excited. It looks like it checks all my boxes. For my 2nd grader we’ll do Writing with Ease and First Language Lessons. I agree, composition isn’t that much of a highlight at that age but I wanted to ease him into it.

So thankful for this! I also feel like I struggle to understand and there for teach ELA. I really want my hand held through the process but am also working with severely adhd children who struggle with any about of work load. So I too am in search of the unicorm curriculum lol I too hear people say that reading will teach writing but that just isn't true for everyone. I was an avid reader from a young age and always struggled to write and do wish i had more instruction on it when i was in school (homeschool)

Great video! For 4th-6th grades, I think you would really like BJU Press English. The writing is step-by-step and shows a grade-level example so that you and your child know exactly what the expectation is. I don’t like it for the lower grades or for middle school, but 4th-6th is great. Something to put on a list for the future perhaps. Best wishes!

Thanks so much for your video! We’ve had great success with lightning lit, but I think their composition section is the weakest portion of that curriculum. Much stronger for reading comprehension, literary analysis, and grammar. Our casual writing practice is based largely on Julie Bogart’s Writer’s Jungle - I haven’t used her curriculum, but I like how her philosophy encourages kids to find their own voice. With the K/1 level, we do a lot of story starters with magazine pictures or stickers, and we keep the writing expectations low in terms of volume (just a few sentences). My eldest has had remarkable progress in expository writing this year with IEW, and I have to make that video soon. We’re going to try WTM’s Writing With Skill next year for 6th to add some variety. I’ve been curious about Essentials in Writing, so this was helpful. 😊 Thanks!

Sonlight introduces the writing process in LA3, using a system they call, “diamond notes.” It’s something we have found to work wonderfully. Just wanted to put that out there in case anyone assumed Sonlight lacks this structured teaching of the writing process from only having seen the lower levels.

I got the idea from another homeschool mom to alternate EIW with another ELA program (she uses Abeka) every other year so she teaches the strong grammar with Abeka then the next year she uses EIW for more focused writing instruction. I love this idea. We use TGATB for ELA which I don’t think has the greatest writing instruction either so I plan to try EIW next year (this is for my older kids but I think it could work for the younger grades as well.)

I never did any formal writing or grammar through Kindergarten and 1st grade for my kids (heeding the wisdom of others). However last spring, with the CAT, I realized that this ended up being an area of weakness for my 1st grader (and it's not an area of strength for her). So we are going IEW and EIW and I think they have been good. Institute for Excellence in Writing is definitely more of a challenge. EIW provides basic grammar intro, which I like. We are happy with our choices this year. My kids have pen pals too and I don't edit their letters or help them write those...so it helps to see where they are at without any influence from me. 😬👍🏼

We used Sonlight last year (our first year homeschooling) and switched mid year to EIW. Like you, I’m weak in the LA area and love having the videos to guide my kids (and me) through writing. Plus, my son has dyslexia and I had heard this program is very good for dyslexics. It’s an eat the meat, spit out the bones kind of curriculum.

We are curriculum twins 😂 Almost every curriculum video you post discusses something I have been curious about using in my own homeschool. I’ve been going back and forth in my mind over whether to use LL or EIW with my first grader. I too, am mostly a science/math person and so is my son. I need a lot of hand holding when it comes to ELA. He is a very strong reader but a reluctant writer. I’ve tried FLL and WWE but it’s so heavily scripted and very auditory whereas my son tends to do better with visual/kinesthetic learning. It’s so challenging to find a great program for these age groups. I’m also curious about write shop primary. We are currently using TGTB LA however it is very phonics/reading focused and my son is an excellent reader, reading several grades ahead so that isn’t really what he needs the most help with. I may end up buying both LL and EIW and just going between the two programs. Thank you very much for this review. 🙂

We are using EIW Level 2 this year with my 7 year old and she can now write!! She can do it and is so proud of herself. EIW breaks it down so much that it is possible for them to be successful! Hope you like it as much as we do. Also, if she is tired I answer and write every other question/sentence - this gives her a break but also allows me to model for her.

I have used Easy Grammar in the upper elementary grades. That was the curriculum that helped me to finally understand grammar. I think I will use Easy Grammar for each of my kids that is past phonics this coming school year. That will be 8th grade, 5th grade and 2nd grade. I am considering her Easy Writing book for my 5th grader. I think my 8th grader will be doing IEW while my second grader will focus on copy work, dictation and oral narration (similar to writing with ease). I pull copy work from the Bible and the McGuffey Readers. What I have done in the past is to have my child copy the same selection three or four days in a row and then do a dictation on that selection at the end of the week. That was a very effective method and I think I'm going to return to it this coming school year. Easy Grammar then gives the direct instruction while the copy work provides the examples.

This video is a long time ago, but i wanted to share what has worked for us in writing for this age. We use Abeka for most of our LA but added Building Writers by the company of Writing Without Tears, and it has been so great! Its gentle and eases kids into different writing styles, its also pretty fun. No complaints by my 2nd grader. They have different levels so we are going in order until we need something more challenging. Since our main focus is reading, Abeka does the job while Building Writers does the job of gently easing into fun writing. 😊

Thanks for the comparison. Our plan next year (for 1st) is to use the Growing with Grammar and Winning in Writing series from Jacs Kris Publishing. If that goes well, then at some point I do have interest in moving to EIW in 4th grade, when I look to get a bit more "serious ". But the other resources will give us a solid foundation till then. :)

This video has made it on to my homeschooling writing (private) playlist for future reference! I am using WWE for my 2nd and 4th graders and I love it! But as the older kiddo continues further into middle grades, I am open to changing her. We will be starting Lightning Literature level 3 with her second semester this year when she finishes All About Reading Level 4 (I chose the lower level of Lightning Lit. because I want to get done with it in a semester.) I like the writing exercises in Lightning Lit, but I really like Writing and Rhetoric too! I didn't really think that we'd use the writing portion of Lightning Lit until I saw a video about their creative writing process broken down in such a fun and logical way. I can see using Writing and Rhetoric next year in 5th grade and supplementing with some of the Lightning Lit creative writer. There are so many good programs, It's hard to choose!

We are using EIW Level 3 with the online videos this year and the short videos are perfect for my ADHD kiddo and for me to let someone else take the wheel lol. I have heard some kids don't love that it's grammar intensive for the first half of the year but it's working well for us. I do supplement with The Writing Revolution exercises and I think the combo is working well.

Thank you

Would love to hear pros/cons and comparisons of IEW Structure and Style program vs Writing with Ease/ FLL? I am currently using FLL/WwE, and we are enjoying the curriculum. My daughter's hybrid homeschool/charter school is asking for more writing and comprehension in the curriculum as they feel FLL/WwE lacks in that. So, I am gravitating towards IEW Structure and Style program. We also are giving All About Reading and All About Spelling a go for the upcoming school year, and would love to hear from those who have experience with these two programs. Thank you!

I’m close to having a kid in this age as we adopted a daughter who is 4 but I’m not sure what my older kids did in this area as they where in public school but when we pulled them out they had tons of gaps and in language arts. TGTB level 1 had grammar and writing. The joy it down looks awesome!!! I’m Not good at teaching writing either. The older levels of TGTB keep books as the main focus of teaching writing and we love it. We’ve found this way of teaching is awesome especially as my kids can see grammar without me being that good at it. I don’t need to be as my kids can see it themselves. Idk if it’s as they are older. We love copywork!!! I don’t have an issue with my youngest kid doing copywork in a year or 2 when she’s able to write and read a little bit. We love video math lessons so videos for language arts seems awesome!!!

I have the same opinion of lightning literature. I love the concept and setup but I need more step by step instructions on how to teach writing.

We've tried a few different curricula for LA and I also am looking for structure for me as well as for my 4th grader who does not like to write. We are currently doing Lightning Literature 3 and we are enjoying the book choices and the student book (grammar) pages. The composition portion is not working for either of us. I just bought Write On! level 2 to try and am looking ahead to Jump In after we finish level 3 of Write On!

I am using EIW6 for my 4 older kids and I’m loving it. They don’t really care for it, I don’t think, but they don’t like any of it. Lol aI am debating on if I want to switch my Kinder next year and start from the beginning with her or not. But we just started her LA program a few weeks ago, so still have lots of time to see how it works for us, it’s been going well though so that’s why I’m torn!

I feel you on this. I'd rather teach just about anything besides writing. I wonder how IEW compares to these programs.

In case you or anyone is interested, I wanted to add… Bravewriter offers grammar, copy work, dictation, literary elements and mechanics teaching in their darts, arrows and boomerangs, and is also a literature based curriculum. Jot-it-down never claims to incorporate all the LA components. Their curriculum is more complete when you use all the parts/products.

First off, great video! We tried BW (not structured enough for us) and WWE (too repetitive for us). I was thinking of trying EIW at some point. LL looks great too, BUT... I really think you make love Core Knowledge Language Arts. I turned to it specifically for writing, but comprehensively covers every strand of ELA: Phonics, Spelling, Reading skills & Comprehension, Grammar, Handwriting, and Composition. It includes a lot of great stories (not exactly lit-based though) and it really holds the teacher's hand. Very detailed Teacher's Guides! It also covers a lot of content across subjects like History and Science. So far, all the early writing seems very gentle and developmentally appropriate. Plenty of scaffolding and explicit teaching. We are loving it so far! Plus it's free... Ok, I am probably overselling... It is designed for a classroom and very "schoolish" but yeah... It was exactly what I was looking for personally. I will make a video on it soon.

I think its hard to judge the quality of a writing program with a 1st grader... we have used two levels of EIW and while I love it as a parent, eventually my kids were dying of boredom, and refused to go on. We are going to be using Core Knowledge as our main writing instruction going forward, but I plan to sign my oldest (4th grader) up for Schole Academy's Writing and Rhetoric class. I think in a perfect world I would suggest... just do copywork until 3rd grade (I liked Spelling You See and All About Spelling for copywork/dictation better than WWE,) and then EIW in 3rd. I think that would give a really great foundation for anything you'd like to do after...either IEW, or W&R or Core Knowledge are all amazing options...I am curious about later levels of Lightening Lit...although I have heard that the composition feels like an afterthought, and it needs more explicit instruction and scaffolding...

Great video!! I’ve been considering Lightning literature or Michael Clay Thompson. Have you ever tried MCT? If so, I’d love to hear your thoughts!

Have you looked at Write Shop Jr? I was thinking of trying it next year because it seems like a more structured version of Brave Writer. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Might try Writing with Ease. Anyway, I know for Charlotte Mason, you don’t introduce grammar until Grade 3. You just do mostly copywork and narration. And read a lot of living books. For grammar, worksheet style, try looking for Gentle Grammar by Mom Delights.

I think my plan for EIW is to do the grammar portion one year and then the next year do the writing portion because I dislike how the grammar and writing are divided between semesters rather than interlaced with each other. I am also looking at Gentle Grammar and Once Upon a Pancake or the Usborne Write Your Own for creative writing.

Don’t worry, I have found that the essentials in writing goes just at the right rate and doesn’t ask of the students anything it hasn’t already taught them to do. My advanced kindergartner and second grader are able to do level two with no problem. It’s a great program, just be consistent doing it each day so you can get all the way through. It is totally worth starting grammar early. Everything down the road will be easier.👍

Once you've completed EIW, would love to see how you compare it to Writing with Ease

Oh this video spoke directly to my heart!! I will admit, I have no idea what I was doing during Grammer and writing class growing up, but it was not learning. I'm nervous about teaching it to my daughter. Due to the nervousness I keep saying oh that will be something I will do in a few years... Of course my daughter enjoys making up stories. Her motivation to finish AAR1 is she knows we will start AAS1 and she will learn how to really spell words and write her stories. My husband has notebooks upon notebooks of stories and songs he has written since childhood (maybe he should be the ELA teacher...). I admire your bravery to address it now, and appreciate the time you put into making this video! Thank you.

I am interested to see how EIW works out for you. I feel like I am of the same mindset as you are when it comes to teaching writing.

Very informative! Teaching writing composition to my 10 yr old has been a challenge. We use Sonlight E for HBL and Science and I'd really love to transition our LA towards Sonlight next year. Currently using CLE for grammer and EIW for writing which is great. However I can't help but love the idea of writing composition being taught together with the literature they are reading in Sonlight. Decisions, decisions 🤕 Thanks again for this video.

Evan Moore Writing workbooks?

Let me know if you find the unicorn. I am in the same boat. I can't decide between IEW and EIW. IEW sounds amazing I might outsource it on outschool.

Have you looked into Michael clay Thompson?

I haven’t found a “unicorn” language arts program for this age group either. My son is 6, first grade. We’ve pieced together a few different ones to make what works well for us right now. All About Reading, Handwriting w/out Tears, Jot it Down, and First Language Lessons. My main focus has been to develop a love of reading and make it enjoyable at his age. I know I’ll want more structure in a few years so leaning towards First Language Lessons and Writing w/ Ease. But for now we are enjoying our plethora of pieces together curriculum.