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    Writing Courses

    Note: The writing courses are under construction and only the first courses have been released. The rest will be completed in sequence and released in future updates to all paid users.

    Quick Instructions🔗

    Writing courses teach the student how to approach writing tasks by studying worked examples that show how a proficient writer tackles them. The general procedure is the same as for all lessons. For details on that procedure, see the general instructions or the full instructions below. This section contains quick instructions for writing courses.

    • Each lesson contains multiple worked examples. Unlike the word and sentence courses, the intervention is performed after each example rather than after all examples, because the examples are longer and require more discussion.
    • To determine whether the student understood the example, consider whether they can fluently read the text, explain the writer's choices, and answer follow-up questions about the content or structure of the example. Students struggling to read the notes should not always cause the example to be marked as incorrect, as the notes might contain words too advanced for the student.
    • Tier 0: If the student understood the example, no intervention is needed. Move to the next example immediately.
    • Tier 1: If the student struggled, go through the example in more detail. Walk through each sentence or section, explain unfamiliar words or concepts, ask the student to explain the writer's choices in their own words, and ensure they understand the text used in the example.
    • Tier 2 and above: Writing courses do not have separate Tier 2+ interventions. If the student consistently struggles with these courses, they may need more practice with the foundational skills through the word, sentence, or reading comprehension courses.

    Students do not produce their own writing in the writing courses due to the limitations of the deliberate practice approach. However, tutors can use the courses to generate writing production exercises:

    • Find a previously mastered writing lesson using the course filters.
    • Adapt its examples into writing prompts for the student.
    • Have the student write their own version based on the prompt.
    • Score their writing yourself using the worked examples as a guide. Do not submit scores through the program.

    Full Instructions🔗

    Before introducing the instructions for the writing courses, it is important to understand the methodology and rationale behind their design. The writing courses in Pictures Are For Babies heavily rely on the principles of The Writing Revolution, a methodology for explicit writing instructions that emphasizes the importance of teaching the mechanics of writing at the sentence and paragraph level and of embedding writing instruction into the content of the curriculum.

    For this reason, every reading comprehension course in Pictures Are For Babies is followed by a writing course that introduces the appropriate writing skills for that level based on the content of the reading comprehension course. However, there is a crucial difference in Pictures Are For Babies because the exercises are presented as worked examples that show how a proficient writer approaches the writing task instead of open-ended exercises. The reason for this decision is that the deliberate practice approach at the core of Pictures Are For Babies requires short repeatable exercises that can be verified by a tutor whose only qualification is to be a proficient reader. Open-ended exercises do not fit this model because the exercises require too much labor from both student and tutor.

    There are many types of writing exercises in Pictures Are For Babies, but all follow a similar format. Below is an example of such an exercise to illustrate the format.

    Study how the writer uses "because", "but", and "so" to different ends.

    To express a reason:

    The ugly duckling swam away from the farm because the other animals were mean to him.

    To express a contrast:

    The ugly duckling swam away from the farm, but he did not know where he was going.

    To express a result:

    The ugly duckling swam away from the farm, so he could find a place where he belonged.

    The notes in italics explain the purpose of the exercise or provide additional notes on the choices the writer made. The exercise above is an example of one of the core exercises in The Writing Revolution methodology, which is to teach students how to use conjunctions to connect ideas.

    The general procedure for conducting writing courses is as follows:

    • Each lesson contains multiple examples, which start as hidden. Writing courses contain only Reading and no Dictation lessons.
    • The tutor starts by revealing the first example and asking the student to study it. Studying the example means reading it carefully and understanding how the writer approached the prompt. The student should pay attention to the specific words and sentence structures used, the organization of ideas, and how the writing achieves its purpose. The notes included with each example guide the student's attention to the key features of the writing.
    • After the student finishes studying, the tutor determines whether the student understood the example. If the student understood, the tutor clicks on the "✗" button to mark the example as correct, which turns into a "✓". The tutor must use their own judgment, but some factors to consider include whether the student can fluently read the text, explain the choices the writer made, and answer follow-up questions about the content or structure of the example.
      • Students struggling to read the notes should not always cause the example to be marked as incorrect, as the notes might contain words that are too advanced for the student, especially in the lower levels. The tutor should focus on whether the student understood the example itself, not the notes.
    • Before moving to the next example, the tutor performs the intervention procedure described below.
    • The tutor reveals the next example and repeats the process for all the examples in the lesson.

    Tier 0 Intervention🔗

    If the student understood the example, no intervention is needed. The tutor can move to the next example immediately.

    Tier 1 Intervention🔗

    If the student struggled, the tutor goes through the example in more detail, studying the choices the writer made with the student, and clarifying any words or meanings they missed. The tutor can perform some or all of the following actions:

    • Walk through the example step by step, pointing out how each sentence or section contributes to the overall purpose.
    • Explain the meaning of specific words or concepts the student is unfamiliar with.
    • Ask the student to explain the writer's choices in their own words.
    • Ensure the student understands the text used in the example, following the same procedure as in the reading comprehension courses.

    Tier 2 Intervention🔗

    Writing courses do not have a Tier 2 intervention or above. If a student consistently struggles with these courses, they may need more practice with the foundational skills through the word, sentence, and reading comprehension courses. The tutor can use the available course filters in the interface to practice these skills before returning to the writing courses.

    Writing Production🔗

    Due to the limitations of the deliberate practice approach, students do not produce their own writing in the writing courses. However, the writing courses can be used by the tutor to generate writing exercises for the student to practice writing production. The procedure for generating writing exercises is as follows:

    • The tutor opens the program, goes to the "Practice" tab, clicks on the "Filter Courses" button, and selects the "Writing" filter. This will cause the program to display only the writing courses.
    • The tutor then clicks on "Skip Lesson" until they find an appropriate lesson. Ideally, the lesson has been previously completed by the student and has a "Mastered" (blue emoji) or "Good" (green emoji) score. The lesson's score is displayed in the header.
    • The tutor then adapts the examples in the lesson to create their own writing exercises for the student. Not every example is readily adaptable, but most are with some minor adjustments. The tutor can also create their own examples based on the same format and structure as the examples in the lesson.
    • The tutor uses the worked examples to score the student's writing production. No score should be submitted through the program, as writing production happens outside of it.

    Exercise Examples🔗

    This section contains examples of the types of exercises found in the writing courses, pulled from the actual Level 1 writing courses. It is not exhaustive, but provides a representative overview.

    Sentence expansion exercises show how a kernel sentence can be expanded with detail.

    Study how the writer expands the kernel sentence by answering the questions.

    It flows.

    • Who? the river
    • Where? to the ocean
    • Why? it starts in the mountains

    The sentence becomes:

    Because it starts in the mountains, the river flows to the ocean.

    Fragment exercises show how to turn incomplete sentences into proper ones.

    Study how the writer turns the fragment into a proper sentence:

    tall trees with green leaves

    becomes:

    Tall trees with green leaves give us shade on hot days.

    The writer adds a verb and more details to make the fragment a complete sentence.

    Sentence type exercises show how different sentence types can be used to express the same topic in different ways.

    Study how the writer uses each sentence type to express information about cats.

    To set forth an idea:

    Cats have whiskers on their face and claws on their paws.

    To express strong emotion:

    Cats can see in the dark!

    To ask a question:

    How do cats keep themselves clean?

    To give advice or instructions:

    Tell me what sound a cat makes when it is happy.

    Single paragraph outline exercises show how outlines organize ideas into coherent paragraphs.

    Study how the writer creates a single paragraph outline:

    • Topic Sentence: When hot rock inside the Earth pushes up through a mountain, a volcano erupts and creates new land.
    • Details:
      • Cause: inside Earth, rock gets very hot and melts into liquid (magma)
      • Cause: magma comes out of volcano and is called lava
      • Effect: lava flows down side, cools into new rock
      • Effect: can be dangerous
      • Effect: also makes new land (some islands made by underwater volcanoes)
      • types: active (can erupt anytime), dormant (not for long time, might again), extinct (never again)
    • Concluding Sentence: Volcanoes can be dangerous, but they also build new land on our planet.

    And how they turn that outline into the paragraph below:

    When hot rock inside the Earth pushes up through a mountain, a volcano erupts and creates new land. Inside the Earth, the rock gets so hot that it melts into liquid. This liquid rock is called magma. When magma comes out of a volcano, it is called lava. Some volcanoes are active, which means they can erupt at any time. Some are dormant, which means they have not erupted in a long time but might again. Some are extinct, which means they will never erupt again. When a volcano erupts, lava flows down the side and cools into new rock. Some islands were made by volcanoes under the ocean. Volcanoes can be dangerous, but they also build new land on our planet.