HERITAGE ACADEMY students have won top state awards in the Letters About Literature contest developed by Laura Bush and have placed in the top three in the nationally renowned poetry contest through The American Library of Poetry. Students leave HERITAGE ACADEMY with fundamental writing skills that far out distance any other writing program.
Many children love to write and express themselves on paper. Many children hate being asked to think of writing anything down on paper. In a classroom both kinds of children are present. How does one encourage a child who loves the creative flow of stories and thoughts and a child who hates to write? Institute for Excellence in Writing has provided a framework for writing that has encouraged both sets of children at HERITAGE ACADEMY in grades 3-6. For the first child, the curriculum introduces exciting techniques to find new words and new ways of expressing thoughts through “dress-ups” and “sentence openers.” For the second child, the curriculum provides the outlines and frameworks for success by offering step-by-step sequential and concrete ways of writing.
The top reasons that administrators and teachers like IEW is as follows:
- IEW empowers teachers to empower students.
- IEW furnishes a consistent method of core instruction from classroom to classroom and from grade to grade.
- IEW develops balanced literacy because listening, speaking, reading, writing, and cognitive thinking are integrated into one process within each lesson. It is a holistic approach to learning.
- IEW cultivates higher order thinking skills because analysis and synthesis are taught from the beginning to the end of each year.
- IEW offers a step-by-step, sequential and concrete method of writing that provides both teachers and students the sense of security needed for good writing presentations.
- IEW simplifies (but does not limit) the invention process by using only one graphic organizer for all types of writing.
- IEW includes proven practices such as scaffolding, formative assessment, and differentiation to address varying abilities.
- IEW makes writing across the curriculum easy because students learn to critically read and carefully compose both fiction and non-fiction texts.
Adapted from iew.com
Most importantly, students love the writing success they experience through the IEW program. At the end of each year when the beginning work is compared to the end of the year, students delight in their achievements. Learning to read, analyze, to use key-word outlining, to write, edit and rewrite papers has provided excellent stories and essays that delight their authors and the instructors as well.