John Fitzsimmons has a love for the mechanics of writing and a powerful command of the written word. The magic is in his overall approach to life. Time with him is a gift to your child.  While they are becoming stronger writers and meeting their project goals, they are absorbing John’s life lessons on practicality, positivity, hard work and generosity.

~Anne Elton

Fitz is remarkable as a writing teacher for his help with technique, for his impressive role-modeling, and for his inspiring personality. I wanted to write well when I wrote for Fitz!

~Paul Michaud

John has tutored all three of my boys. He engages his students with a creative, effective and dynamic toolset that includes technology, humor, compassion and a deep knowledge of students to enhance and deepen his or her writing skills and self-confidence.

~Gari Palmer

When Jack entered Fenn in 4th grade he literally could not sit and write two sentences together.  He could speak without hesitation to any adult and share his ideas but to put those thoughts on paper was an enormous challenge - there would literally be tears.  As his mother, it was heartbreaking to watch.  He was so creative and had so many wonderful ideas, he just did not know how to express himself on paper.  In his words, he thought he was ‘dumb’...

Thankfully, Fitz became his teacher and they started doing something called “blogging”.  Jack and his friends started  writing and sharing their stories, and I remember hearing myself saying “Jack, will you STOP writing!” I had tried for years to get him to write, now he has Fitz for one semester and I can’t get him to stop! 

~Maureen Pellegrini

A Dynamic and Interactive Learning Platform

All course content, including private discussion threads, is accessed through the Itunes app and can be completed and submitted on an iPad or iPhone. All a student needs to do is paste the code--and the whole course is available to use in a self-paced time.

Timely, Clear & Consistent Feedback

Students receive timely and specific feedback on all work. Each submission is guided and assessed with audio and written feedback, as well as private discussion threads for each assignment. 

Essential Sentence Building Techniques

A series of exercises, tips, tricks and techniques to help create clear, concise and compelling sentences.

Paragraph Writing

Rubric-based paragraph construction to help writers craft unified and insightful narrative, analytical, and expository paragraphs based on clear topics and themes.

Punctuation Rules and Practices 

Includes Fitz's Top Ten Comma Rules, semi-colons, colons, ellipses, long dashes and other tricks and uses of effective punctuation.

Grammar Rules and Conventions 

90% of all writing mistakes can be traced to ten common writing errors. Students will learn proper usage and learn how to avoid these common mistakes.

 Essay Writing 

Each unit will include a study of an effective personal essay and an opportunity for a student to create his or her own essay, including memoirs, personal narratives, persuasive arguments and literary analysis.

Vocabulary  

Quizlet-based studying of the top 100 SAT words, literary terms, homophone exercises, and the top 100 roots.

Reading

Each unit has its own short story shown to have "stood the test of time " for its literary value and quality of writing. Students are guided towards writing insightful and well-constructed literary analysis and personal reading responses.

Poetry & Song 

In each unit, students will study and explicate a genre-specific poem selected for its age-appropriateness and literary quality. It includes poems written in a variety of poetic genres including ballads, free-verse, blank verse, sonnets, haiku, and epic poetry.

Journaling 

Each student is encouraged to face the empty page and engage the possibilities that only a journal can offer. The habit of writing in a continual and thoughtful way is critical to developing fluency and skills as a writer, and it is the quickest and most effective way to develop a true literary lifestyle.

Creative Media

We live in a changing world, and the ways in which we can deliver our words has changed, too.   Every Writers Toolbox unit includes options to create podcasts, interactive books, videos and presentations that can be shared in a beautiful and compelling digital portfolio or in public or private Crafted Word blog. 

How do I get all this stuff...

The course is set up using an easy to use online learning system. We send you an email with a code that automatically enrolls you in the course—and then all of this "stuff" is right there for you to access to all of the materials and resources and for us to give you feedback and help you as you work through each unit.

How much time does each unit take...

To do it well, you will probably need to spend 8-10 hours on each unit, which, if spread over the summer, is less than an hour per day. You could also power through it in a week! Everything depends on how you work best, but it is certainly a good skill to learn to use time wisely and productively--and you can spread the units out over the entire summer or you can put in some extra time for one or two weeks and get it done sooner, so don't worry if you are away at camp for a while or on a fun summer trip.

  Will it really help me...

Yes; it really will help you!  In fact, if you earnestly and sincerely "do the work" now, you will more prepared for the assignments that are coming to you in the school year—and you will be able to tackle these assignments with more confidence and ease!

  Will you grade my work...

The short answer is no! Two of the guiding principles of The Crafted Word are to "assess" and "reflect." We do assess all of your work and help you reflect on what you have learned, and most importantly, to write about your experience of what you learned, how you learned it, and how you could possibly "learn better" the next time. Every unit does include self-grading quizzes that you can take and retake until you feel confident that you know your stuff.

I am curious to see what a Writers' Toolbox unit looks like...

Good! Check out the pdf download. This Level II unit designed for a specific school will be slightly different, but not by much.

You can also contact me and we can discuss any questions you have.

Curious? 

Download a Pdf

Level I:  Grades Four–Six is an introductory course. Each unit requires four to six hours of work, including journaling, narrative paragraphs, and personal reading responses.

Level II:  Grades 7–9 builds upon the techniques and skills taught in Level I. Each unit requires eight to ten hours of work, including two 600 word essays.

Level III:  Grades 10–12 is our most challenging course. Each unit requires ten to twelve hours of work. The literature is longer and more complex; it covers uses of all punctuation marks, more specific grammar work, extensive vocabulary work, and four 1000 word essays.