Writing Help for 4th and 6th Grade

I’m not sure how involved you want it to be.  We’ve used Write Shop before in the elementary levels and it’s step by step for each project, with games and activities.  For me it was fun but too much work with all my different ages.  We still pull some of the project ideas occasionally, but I feel free to adapt.

What we have found that works well for us is Brave Writer.  I would suggest browsing her site (including blog) for a lot of information.  Then download free samples.  With your ages you would probably choose either Jot it Down or Partnership Writing for projects for a year.  I use her projects in these two and the next level up (Faltering Ownership) and just adjust them for all my kids ages.  So, for example, with my younger elementary kids they simply narrate and I jot down their words, while one of my kiddos I jot down his narration for him to copy, and two do their own writing down but I will partner with them and take a turn writing their narration (helps prevent writing fatigue and encourages them to really dive in and write a lot because they don’t have to do all the handwriting themselves, they get breaks).

Brave Writer usually breaks the projects up over a whole month too, so you are doing the project a couple days a week and on other days they suggest things like copywork, read alouds, poetry, etc.