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Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew.

I was so excited to have the chance to review Cover Story Cloud Set by Clear Water Press for the Homeschool Review Crew. My daughter is a writer, and we have been eyeing Clear Water Press courses for a couple of years now. So, when this review came up, we jumped on the opportunity to review this homeschool creative writing curriculum.

Table of Contents

• Cover Story Cloud Set- Homeschool Creative Writing Curriculum
• A Look Inside Cover Story
  • The Teacher’s Guide for This Homeschool Creative Writing Curriculum
  • Videos, Student Book, and Journal:
    • Videos and Student Book
    • The Remarkable Journal of Professor von Steuben
• Unit Tests
• Who Would Like Cover Story
• Who Might Not Prefer This Homeschool Creative Writing Curriculum
• Thoughts on This Homeschool Creative Writing Curriculum
  • My Daughter’s Thoughts on This Creative Writing Curriculum

Cover Story Cloud Set- Homeschool Creative Writing Curriculum

So, what exactly is Cover Story?

Cover Story Cloud Set is a homeschool creative writing curriculum for grades 6-9. Students work on language arts skills by creating their own magazines. That is why it is called Cover Story!

Through a wide range of writing assignments, kids create a magazine on a topic of interest. Kids create short stories, poems, reviews, editorials, and more.

When the year is over, kids have a completed magazine!

It is a very clever way to work on writing and grammar that is engaging for kids.

For the review, we received physical copies of a Student Book, Teacher’s Guide, and The Remarkable Journal of Professor Gunther von Steuben.

We received 12 months of online instructional videos along with the soft-covered books. However, if, for some reason, you don’t finish it in 12 months, you can purchase an extension to the cloud videos. Because we all know that life happens, and we might need extra time.

The course is taught by Daniel Schwabauer, a published author, and editor for Crosswind Comics. Plus, he has been involved in many areas of writing, from stage plays to non-fiction ghostwriting. So he has a depth of knowledge and a whole lot of enthusiasm. Also another cool thing is that Mr. S created this program for homeschoolers!

A Look Inside Cover Story

So, that was a quick overview of what you get with Cover Story. Now, let’s look at this homeschool creative writing curriculum a little more closely.

The Teacher’s Guide for This Homeschool Creative Writing Curriculum

When I received Cover Story, the first thing I did was look through the Teacher’s Guide. I wanted to see the details of this program.

Boy, I was VERY impressed with the teacher book. The instructions are very well laid out and detailed!

The teacher’s guide provides:

• Brief description of the program.
• How to teach the course: video lessons with workbook assignments 3 days a week and work in journal 5 days a week.
• One section gives you a heads up on things you will need to do to prepare for specific lessons.
• Suggestions for grading assignments, journal entries, tests, and optional grammar lessons.
• Run time on the videos.
• An outline of all the coursework.
• Weekly lesson guides.
• The reading materials for the Assigned Reading for the course.
• Answer key for lesson activities, unit tests, and grammar work.
• Super helpful sheets to keep track of student grades to help tally up their score at the end of the course.

I can’t express how valuable this teacher’s guide is for planning and grading your student. I was not intimidated by this homeschool creative writing curriculum. It is so well laid out that it makes it simple to assign work and let the videos and student book do all the work!

Videos, Student Book, and Journal:

Now, let’s look at the heart of the program: the videos, student book, and journal.

The course is laid out as follows:

• Unit 1- Works on grammar and the foundations of good writing. It also helps kids pick a theme for their magazine and begin writing things like reviews.
• Unit 2- This unit covers poetry, interviewing, and perspective.
• Unit 3- Students will work on editorials and short stories.
• Unit 4- Discusses the Four layers of meaning, writing personal experiences, humorous pieces, and chronological narratives.
• Unit 5- Works on an advice column and more work on short stories.
• Unit 6- Finishes with more poetry work and completing the magazine with layout and publishing.

Videos and Student Book

With each assignment, students watch the online video (most are 6 to 16 minutes long), complete that day’s Student Book assignment, and then do work in the journal.

Some of the assignments have assigned readings. These readings are found in the student’s book and teacher’s book, which is very convenient.

The best part of this creative writing curriculum is the online videos. The videos are engaging for kids. Mr. S truly speaks to the kids and explains things well.

Each video starts with a skit. The skits are pretty entertaining. After the skit, there is a recap explaining how it ties into the topic for the day. Lastly, the video then gets into the lesson.

After each video lesson, the kids work in their Student Book. These assignments reinforce what was taught, and kids will work on writing assignments for their magazine.

At the end of the core creative writing curriculum is a set of 12 grammar lessons. These are optional, though I find them very helpful for making this a complete language arts program.

The instructor does an excellent job explaining grammar. His focus on grammar is on the practical use of grammar in writing and how it works. He doesn’t want kids to get hung up on specific names of grammar terms.

The lessons do a great job of making sure kids don’t feel intimidated by grammar. In the end, Mr. Schwabauer wants kids to learn how to find answers for grammar, so they can communicate clearly. By making grammar less intimidating, it makes grammar fun and easy.

For example, the video teaches a whole class on sentences in one grammar lesson. The instructor explains the formal names for the types of sentences but breaks them down into common terms for kids. Then, he uses a story to explain why these terms have such formal names, making it more fun and exciting.

The Remarkable Journal of Professor von Steuben

One of my daughter’s favorite parts of this writing curriculum is the journal. The Remarkable Journal of Professor von Steuben is a journal on this fictional character. Through his journal entries, students receive writing prompts that help them work on writing techniques in a unique and meaningful way. In addition, students write in this journal from the Professor’s perspective, allowing them to create their own story of who this man is and how his story will end.

The journal entries are short assignments. For example, in the first unit, kids write questions 5 days a week. Through this exercise, students are learning to ask good questions, meaningful questions.

Later, kids will write paragraphs, dialogue, and more.

Again, this is a clever way to engage kids in writing and thinking about writing.

Unit Tests

At the end of each unit, kids take a basic multiple-choice question test. They are a quick check-in with their understanding of the material covered. For example, in Unit Test Six, one of the questions is as follows:

To keep your audience engaged, give them story events that produce

A. expectation and surprise.

B. surprise and shock.

C. relevance and shock.

D. exaggeration and timing.

The questions are simple and to the point.

Who Would Like Cover Story

So, who would like Cover Story?

• Busy Moms– With Cover Story, you have little prep work, and the videos teach writing for you. As a parent, you only need to spend some time every four weeks grading work.
• Reluctant Writers– If you have kids that are reluctant writers, this program might get them engaged in writing. There is a purpose to writing: creating their own magazine. The videos may engage them, and the laid-back approach to grammar may be appealing.
• Independent Learners– This program is perfect for kids that like to work independently or to use with kids you want to start teaching to work independently.
• Kids that love creative writing– As I have found with my daughter, this is a lot of fun for kids that love creative writing.
• Enjoy a variety of writing styles– Because kids are creating a magazine, they are learning various writing techniques and styles. Therefore, they work on more than just telling a story.

Who Might Not Prefer This Homeschool Creative Writing Curriculum

Is this program for everyone?

No program is for everyone.

However, Cover Story might not be for your family if:

• You like to be very involved in teaching writing. Of course, you could watch and discuss the videos with your kiddos, but this program does lend itself to more independent learning.
• Kids that have no interest in creating a magazine will probably not like this.
• If kids don’t like journaling, they may not like this program. However, there are ways you could modify this.

Thoughts on This Homeschool Creative Writing Curriculum

As you can probably tell, we like this creative writing curriculum. This is a great way to teach writing in a meaningful and engaging way. I love finding authentic learning opportunities, and Cover Story does an excellent job creating this for middle school kiddos.

One thing I love about the program is how easy it is to use. My daughter could easily work on this independently. It has an easy schedule to follow and great tools to help with grading your kids. Plus, I REALLY appreciate the workbook pages to record grades on. Record keeping is a weakness for me, so the pages help a lot.

I also like that Mr. Schwabauer recommends grading at the end of a unit. It might sound strange initially, but since this is a creative writing program, he feels kids might become discouraged. Also, as he mentions, if kids see red marks all over their work, it may stifle their creativity on their next assignment. So, do the correcting at the end so kids can write freely.

My Daughter’s Thoughts on This Creative Writing Curriculum

My daughter has said she wants to finish the program and continue working on it throughout the summer. She finds the video lessons fun and helpful. Plus, she really enjoys the journal.

When it comes to writing, my daughter is kind of picky with writing programs. My girl has self-published one book and is working on another. She looks for writing programs to help her become a better writer. For her, writing isn’t something to get through and move on; she really wants to improve and gain as much knowledge as possible.

Overall, my girl feels she is getting a lot out of this program. She loves the idea she creates her own magazine on gothic horror of the 20^th century. She is thinking of all the possibilities of things to write about (she is fascinated by H.P. Lovecraft and other early 1900s authors like him).

Cover Story Cloud Set from Clear Water Press makes a fabulous homeschool creative writing curriculum. We loved it. Now check out other reviews from fellow Homeschool Review Crew members. Click the banner below to learn more.