Our English courses train your student to master any reading genre or style of writing, intangible critical thinking skills invaluable towards their future success in English classes and personal essays.

General Writing Course

This course will teach students the most important techniques and skills to become a confident writer with great command of modern writing techniques. Students will become immersed and proficient in the major writing styles - expository, descriptive, persuasive, narrative, creative, Poem, fiction, non-fiction, etc. We will also explore fundamentals of writing structure and tone, inspiring students to develop their own written voice and express it clearly and effectively to others. Our experienced professors will serve as instructors, supplementing their guidance and advice with personally-picked materials from classic writing workbooks.

Scholastic Writing Contest Course

Each of the following 8 courses serves as an ideal introduction to the prestigious Scholastic Art & Writing Competition (grades 7-12), with our professional writers and professors helping develop students’ writing and critical thinking talents so they can compete and win medals in the 8 respective Scholastic categories.

• Critical Essay:
  The critical review is a writing task that asks us to summarize and evaluate a text.
• Short Story
  Short stories trade the length of traditional stories for intrigue and immediate effect, frequently showing us the world through colorful angles and sharp shifts in plot.
• Journalism Writing
  Journalists are inherently storytellers, adding shape and meaning to news, to public policy and to world events. The most important difference between journalism and other forms of non-fiction writing is the idea of objectivity.
• Writing Humor Essays
  Humor essays are narratives with a beginning, middle and end. Imagination and language is key -- students will be immersed in guided writing exercises that inspire them to craft their own pieces poking fun at their past experiences or the world around them.
• The Personal Essay
  The boundaries of a "Personal Essay" are vast and contain multitudes - humorous essays, opinion pieces, mini-memoirs. However, a great personal essay always successfully documents the writer's journey through a specific experience.
• Poetry
  Poems are among the purest forms of communication, describing the mystery and beauty of our lives through the poet’s experience, captured in image, music and line.
• Science Fiction
  Perplexing, larger-than-life, and surprising logical all at once, science fiction places unique twists on the everyday elements of life we take for granted.
• Fantasy
  Fantasy writing is magical, full of innovative characters and settings, and super fun to explore! Fantasy works differ from science fiction books primarily in the scope of the world around characters, where imagination and crazy powers suddenly become realistic!

Editing, Revising & Polishing for Competition

In this lesson in preparation for submission to the Scholastic contest we will focus on all stages of putting together a winning submission:

• Prewriting
• Drafting Process
• Peer Review and Editing
• 2nd Draft
• Revising
• Reviewing
• Publishing