I know you’ve been thinking teaching essays is complicated and takes an English degree or some sort of truncated curriculum, but this isn’t true.
The world is filled with essays.
This post is an essay. Most magazine articles are essays. Most sermons are essays. If you’ve sat with someone and logically explained a movie, or described a family vacation, you were speaking in essay-eze.
Essays are simply a way we organize thoughts so we can communicate them to others.
And the best news is that they are easy to teach!
(And don’t worry if you feel you aren’t a good writer; there are ways to get around all that.)
I’ve graduated 15 children now, and I’ve learned a lot from my mistakes! Now, a number of our first group went on to college, but they were only average at writing, I am sad to say.
However, when I discovered the McGuffey readers and applied the age-old practices of copywork, dictation, and narration, the writing of my children improved greatly. They were almost over-prepared for college, so, instead of floundering with the basics of writing, they could concentrate on the actual content and get better grades from the beginning.
If I could go back and talk to myself while raising our first set of children, here is the advice I would give my former self:
- Immerse the children in excellent writing by having them do copywork, dictation, and narration with the McGuffey readers and other classic writing. Why? Because copywork allows children to become familiar with the style of the writer, dictation helps with mechanics and spelling, and narrations helps develop organization. These practices build the skills of essay writing in a natural, sequential manner with almost no extra effort.
- As soon as they are able, have the children use the vocabulary words included in the McGuffey lessons in sentences they create themselves. Don’t let them get away with the most basic type of sentence but expect something interesting and complex. (You can use my program, Gentle Grammar, to do this.)
- Begin using notebooking pages which require at least one written paragraph on the focus subject. This could be a biography, an explanation of why something was significant, etc. At first, don’t worry about formal structure. Let them learn to express complete thoughts. Once writing comes more naturally you can go on to more formal paragraph and essay structure.
- Continue with notebooking pages which leave more room for longer essays.
- Eventually have them write an informal essay on a subject of your choice weekly. If they wonder what you are talking about, just tell them to write something that sounds like a magazine article.
- As you get in the rhythm of doing weekly essays, start to teach them the formal mechanics of essay writing.
Just what are the mechanics of formal essay writing, I hear you ask?
Let’s list them.
First of all there are four main types of essays:
- Narrative: tells a story
- Descriptive: paints a mental picture
- Expository: explains something
- Persuasive: attempts to influence the audience
Next, there are is the structure of a formal essay:
- The main idea. This is the foundation on which you build the essay, which is often referred to as the “thesis statement.” For instance, the “thesis” of this podcast could be summed up like this: “Essays are important for human communication and it’s easy to teach your children to write them.”
- Thesis paragraph which includes the main idea and three supporting points for the thesis statement.
- The body, which consists of three paragraphs, each one concerned with expounding on the three supporting points.
- A conclusion paragraph which restates the thesis and the three points and includes a conclusion sentence.
Here’s a descriptive essay I wrote as an example:
Thesis statement: Our drive to the mountains refreshed us body, soul, and spirit.
Point 1: The surroundings were refreshing.
Point 2: The conversations with my loved ones on the way helped us connect on a deeper level.
Point 3: In the quiet times of the trip I was able to quiet my soul and pray.
Here is the introductory paragraph:
The other day our family embarked on a drive to the mountains which refreshed us body, soul, and spirit. The surroundings took us away from our daily stressors and the drive allowed us to connect both with each other and with God.
The first paragraph of the body would be a description of the scenery and how it affected the writer:
The mountains in our state are majestic; rising up to the clouds with jagged, snow-covered peaks. They beckon to us from our lowly city island, but it isn’t often we are able to get away and experience them. This trip allowed us to ride among huge outcroppings of ancient crags and tall fir forests bringing much needed perspective. We often rode with the windows down and drank in the scent of pine and the roaring of canyon rivers.
The second paragraph of the body would be about the different ways the writer connected with his loved ones.
As we left the hustle of our urban existence behind, we relaxed and started talking about trips we had taken together in the past, which brought to the surface our hopes and our fears for the future. This helped us reestablish connections that had been severed by our busy lives.
The third paragraph would be about the lack of distractions which enabled the writer to focus in on God.
After some time, the conversation died down and there was silence in the car. While some used this as an opportunity to doze, I took the time to look at the clouds and the massive peaks and think just how big God is. I imagined Him on His throne above all of my problems, and it made me realize just how small they all were. I told Him I was sorry for taking all of them on by myself, and I thanked Him for them, then I rolled them back onto His shoulders one-by-one.
The last paragraph would be a restating of the first paragraph with a concluding sentence.
Our destination was a lodge in a small mountain town where we stayed for two days as the benefits of our trip continued. The surrounding grandeur fed our senses and rejuvenated them. We spent time in conversation while lingering over food made more delicious by the alpine air, and the quiet helped us rediscover the God of our refuge in the stillness of our souls. We left refreshed and determined to make this personal retreat an annual occasion.
As you can see, even this very formal essay was not only readable, but even enjoyable. As you read the paragraphs, you become less interested in the form, and more interested in the content.
This is what essay writing should be about.
Remember, education is not about perfect form, it is about the whole person; it is about navigating college, yes, but only as far as college pertains to one’s multi-faceted life.
I know this sounds amazing in so many ways, but a big question many people have is:
“What about correcting all of these essays?”
I understand this question quite well. Not many of us have an English degree, and our failing public school system has not done well in turning out good writers, so how can we trust ourselves to steer our child’s writing in the right direction?
Here is the simple answer to that question: have your child read their compositions out loud.
Seriously, that’s the way I correct my own work!
This is because what we think we are writing and what we are actually writing are often two very different things!
I start out thinking I’ve just written some amazing thing, and then I read it out loud and find every little flaw. This is the same when I have my children read their writing aloud to me.
Of course, there is still room for correcting all the little details, such as capitalization and punctuation.
If you feel uneasy about the mechanics of writing, you can do something about it by taking yourself through a short grammar course, and I recommend Harvey’s Grammar for this. Why? Because it is short, sweet, and to the point.
And don’t worry that you didn’t do well in English grammar in school; you are grown up now and you understand the importance of learning it, and you’ll do much better than you ever imagined.
It’s all part of how homeschooling is reclaiming education for everyone; not just the children, but the adults as well.
Another way to correct written work is to give another sibling a chance at it, but this is not recommended for fostering brotherly love among one’s children!
If you are interested in hearing this post as a podcast (with lots of side-trails and laughter), be sure and click below:
iTunes: Raise Good Writers Without a Writing Curriculum
Spotify: Raise Good Writers Without a Writing Curriculum
Next, let’s talk about finding the right level for your child in the McGuffey readers, shall we?
