Customer Service Answers A Little Help Along the Wayâ€Additional IEW Resources

   At IEW, we want the courses we provide to be ones that will excite and engage both you and your student. We definitely don’t want to overwhelm anyone! In order to help support you as you teach your children, we offer a number of additional resources that will strengthen you both for the writing road ahead of you. Occasionally our Customer Service Team receives some questions about these resources. Over the next few posts, we will answer a few of the more popular questions we get and introduce you to a few resources you may not have heard of before. What are the differences between A Word Write Now, the Student Resource Packet, Student Resource Notebook, and the Portable Walls? All four of these materials are excellent resources for your students to utilize as they learn the Structure and Style method. A Word Write Now is a thematic thesaurus filled with helpful word lists that students can use to â€Å"dress up† their writing. For example, if a student wants a replacement for the word â€Å"courage,† he can turn directly to the pages on that topic and find well-curated and age-appropriate lists of words organized by parts of speech. Options include adjectives, adverbs, and verbs. Our Portable Walls also contain word lists, but are organized by type, such as â€Å"ly† words and â€Å"Strong Verbs.† Additionally, the Portable Walls show smaller sized posters of each structural unit as well as reminders for each of the stylistic techniques. They are printed on card stock and open up to form a handy â€Å"wall† for students to refer to while working on their writing assignments. The Student Resource Notebook contains grammar reminders, word lists, and practice pages. It’s included as a free download with many of our theme-based writing books. A brand new resource at IEW this year is our Student Resource Packet. It was designed to be a resource aligned with the revised Teaching Writing: Structure and Style course. This packet has helps for each of the nine IEW units as well as for Writing About Literature. Also included are templates and student samples for each of the units. Word lists and grammar rules also appear. Lastly, we made sure to make this resource parent friendly so that parents can utilize the information to help their students through any of our writing courses. What is the Writing Source Packet and how do I use it? The Writing Source Packet is a collection of additional source texts for Units 1–6 that you can use with students in Levels A, B, and C. They are perfect if a student needs additional practice in a specific unit or if you are in a tutoring or small group situation and do not want to purchase an entire student course. The packet does assume that the teacher has gone or is going through the Teaching Writing: Structure and Style training course. What are the differences between the Portable Walls and Portable Walls for the Essayist? Do I need both? The Portable Walls have word lists, style charts, and visuals for each structural unit as described above. By contrast, Portable Walls for the Essayist includes specific models to assist your student with essay writing. Word lists that are especially helpful to the beginning essayist, such as a list of transitional words, are also provided. Prominently placed on the wall is a visual guide to the essay writing process for both inventive and research essays. If you have a younger student (elementary or middle school), the Portable Walls are a great resource to utilize, while the Portable Walls for the Essayist are better suited to an upper-middle or high schooler who is learning and practicing essay writing. What resources would you recommend I purchase for my student? If you are just getting started with IEW, we would recommend purchasing a copy of the Portable Walls and the Student Resource Packet for each of your students. The Portable Walls can travel with them as they move up through their IEW courses and are easily kept close at hand to consult as they are working on their writing assignments. The Student Resource Packet is jam-packed full of more word lists and structural models, as well as helpful hints, tips, and reference guides for each of the nine IEW units. This post discusses a few of our printed resources available to you to assist you in your teaching, but we have even more resources to help! In our next blog post, we’ll describe some additional ones available electronically that will also enhance your IEW writing experience. And in the meantime if you have any other questions, we welcome you to contact us. We are here to help!