Book excerpt: Helpful instruction and plenty of practice for your child to master the basics of writing Understanding writing is essential for your child to write with competence and clarity. Practice Makes Perfect: Mastering Writing gives your child bite-sized explanations of this essential skill, with engaging exercises that keep her or him motivated and excited to learn. They can practice the writing skills that are challenging, polish skills they’ve mastered, and stretch themselves to explore skills they have not yet attempted. This title features 170 activities (plus answer key) that increase in difficulty as your child proceeds through the book. This book is appropriate for a 6th grade student working above his or her grade level, or as a great review and practice for a struggling 7th or 8th grader. Your student will learn how to: Find and develop ideas for topics Create first drafts Develop sentences and use correct subject-verb agreement Revise and proofread her or his own work Topics include: Finding and Developing Ideas for Writing, Discovering Ideas, The Value of Keeping a Journal, Focusing Ideas, Developing Ideas, Organizing Ideas, Writing the Draft Sentences: The Foundation of the Draft, Building Paragraphs Using Adjectives and Adverbs, Wisely Order and Sequence, Using Strong Verbs Point of View, Revision, What Is Revision?, Plan for Revision, Revision Peer Consultants, Proofreading, Proofreading Strategies, Proofreading and Computer Screens, The Value of Proofreading Partners