Writing for Reluctant Writer

Charlotte Mason used written narrations for her students’ writing assignments. She believed in letting the student develop her own writing style, influenced only by the authors of the well-written books that the student was reading. She did not use formulaic writing courses to teach her students how to write.

Different types of narrations are introduced as the student gains experience. By the time a student is in high school, she would be required to give oral and written narrations from one of four types: narrative, descriptive, expository, or persuasive. You can (and should) also ask for the narrations to be done in different styles. For example, Charlotte Mason sometimes asked her students to give their narration in the style of the poet they were studying. You could ask for a narration done as a script, poem, several days of diary entries of a person in history she is currently reading about, a letter, etc.

You may find these articles in our Learning Library that give more information on teaching writing with narration helpful.

Teaching Writing from our Subject by Subject series.

Written Narration: The Next Step in Composition and Raising the Bar from our Narration Q & A series.

We also have two resources in our bookstore that have even more information on language arts the Charlotte Mason way and narration. Hearing and Reading, Telling and Writing is a book that has all of Charlotte Mason’s writings about all aspects of language arts gathered into one place for you. It has some basic rubrics that can be used to help you evaluate your child’s writing. Your Questions Answered: Narration is the above linked narration Q & A series with more information, including examples of narrations from both Charlotte Mason’s students and modern students.