The Writing Symphony Story

by MJ Gleichman, Writing Symphony Founder and CEO

Early on in my teaching career, I realized the need for regular writing practice for many of my students, regardless of what grade level I was teaching. When essay assignments were given, I could clearly see that the foundations of writing were missing. Students struggled not only with sentence structure, word choices, and knowledge of basic grammar but also finding the confidence to start writing. Unfortunately, district curriculum requirements forced me to focus on other subjects with little time in my teaching day to focus on writing. The curriculum was lacking in the schools and the grade levels I taught.

After becoming a mom, I chose to homeschool our son, Jacob, and our daughter, Anna in second grade and kindergarten respectively. After having observed challenges in each grade level that I taught, and having my master’s degree in curriculum and instruction, I became proactive in a specific curriculum focused on writing when my children entered the third and fifth grades. I chose to become certified by the Institute for Excellence in Writing. Using this curriculum as a base, I began to teach supplemental writing lessons in a private school cooperative. The word spread. A local after-school program asked me to share the lessons with students in their program and from there my teaching went into several homes of families who allowed me to teach around dining room tables with my whiteboard in tow. My business grew!

About two years later, I traveled to Beijing and Shanghai and was invited to share the lessons I had developed with highly interested international schools. Many of my local students spoke dual languages and parents began sharing my program with other parents that often struggled with English. While the many details and decisions of moving forward with a curriculum in a country on the other side of the world became too cumbersome, I began to train teachers in the United States to teach the lessons. Students in other parts of the world joined online classes to take advantage of the high-quality teachers and unique, effective curriculum. The market had come to Writing Symphony, so I decided to continue growing my business and market online. I added an irreplaceable staff and Writing Symphony’s students joined our classes from word-of-mouth referrals.

When Covid-19 changed so many things in education and schools had no time to train teachers in effective ways to run classrooms, students were thrown into hours of online classes which opened too many distractions with a loss of learning. Teachers were doing the best they could under these never-before-seen teaching challenges across the country. Writing Symphony became an effective way to teach an essential subject online during the pandemic since each of the lessons was created to be taught using PowerPoint.

In addition to our amazing faculty of fully certified, highly-experienced teachers, Writing Symphony has an amazing staff of women who assist me in running the program:

• Dr. Mary Kleymann, our Chief Operating Officer, plays an essential role at Writing Symphony working together with the staff and parents to bring an interactive, academic, immersive online classroom experience that is second to none. With over 25 years teaching in K-12 and collegiate classrooms, a doctorate degree in Curriculum and Instruction, and her research in student engagement in an online learning environment, Mary’s professional and academic experiences have given us many positive results with our students.
• Lisa White, our Director of Teacher Logistics, eloquently manages our teachers and their online classes.
• Wendy Howard, the Director of Curriculum plays a vital role in our curriculum development as she creatively, thoughtfully develops the slides and handouts that make up each lesson your students will experience.
• Lynn Chen leads our HR and bookkeeping department, addressing all the fine details involved in onboarding new teachers and maintaining Writing Symphony’s financials.

Each of these women has played a vital role in shaping Writing Symphony into a company that provides each student with the unique, individualized opportunity to grow.

Writing Symphony has grown from my passionate belief that students MUST learn to be confident, competent, and courageous communicators. Word of mouth is the best way for other parents to hear about how Writing Symphony can positively, dramatically impact your student’s future by giving them the writing and public speaking skills necessary to stand out academically and professionally. We offer a referral bonus ($50 Amazon Gift Card) as a thank you to those who refer our program to other families (Family Referral Form). We can also be found on Facebook, Instagram, and WeChat. (Links for these social media sites can be found at the bottom of this page.) Thank you for reading my story and sharing Writing Symphony’s passion for teaching students to learn to be confident and courageous communicators.