Sometimes parents worry that they don’t know enough about writing to help their student. The great thing about IEW and Writing to Learn classes is that you will learn to write along with your student as you read the handbook pages, review the skills we are practicing, and act as a second pair of eyes for your student on each assignment.
Your MOST IMPORTANT JOB as the Parent Editor is make sure your student stays on track with the 9-day writing schedule, a job that does not require actual writing skills. You will make sure the work is being done according to the schedule that I have laid out for each of the nine days on the assignment sheet, so he/she doesn’t get behind, which is the WORST thing in writing.
You will also read the handbook pages that explain each skill so that you can review paragraphs according to the assignment sheet instructions. Each assignment slowly adds new skills to the previously learned skills. When your student brings the work to you as instructed on the assignment sheet, you will read over the paragraph and help correct whatever you notice is missing or incorrect.
It is WAY easier to catch someone else’s mistakes than it is your own, and you will be able to help. You may not catch everything, but that’s ok. The process of review and rewriting works wonders in a student’s writing skills.