Learn how to minimize the struggle and help your child be a better, more enthusiastic writer with these classroom and parent-tested techniques.
The Importance of Writing
Emailing and text messaging aside, does writing come naturally to your child or is arm twisting involved? If the first option sounds too good to be true, and your child balks at the very thought of drafting even a single paragraph, you’ve got company. For many kids, avoidance is the way to go. Unfortunately. As noted in the Pennsylvania Literacy Framework, “Writing is an essential skill in most places, where it serves as a means of posing and solving problems, of making reports, and of persuading others to take a particular action.” So, what’s a parent to do?
Measures to Take
First, remind your child of College Board reader Jane Mallison’s advice: “Feed your brain with words. Read till your eyeballs fall out.” Wide reading translates into a strong sense of language, of how words are strung together so that the ideas imparted make sense to others. That is, after all, the whole point of writing.
Next, be sure you’ve got a thesaurus and dictionary. Then add these to your home library’s shelves:Harriet Wittels's How to Spell It for taking the guess work out of not-sure-how-to- spell words, and The World Almanac for Kids to spark curiosity, research, and the sharing of discoveries.
Also purchase two notebooks. One will serve as your child’s carry everywhere Writer’s Notebook, a place for recording interesting observations, facts, and quotes, like Sam Walton’s, “High expectations are key to everything.” These then become grist for future writings. Turn the second notebook into a Personal Dictionary for maintaining a running list of her personal word demons--one page for every letter of the alphabet.
Suggested Writing Activities
To expand vocabulary and language skills, have your child create a word wall by posting newly encountered words on index cards—together with their meanings, parts of speech, and used in a sentence. Then toss these words into your daily conversations.
To work on style, engage him in “copy-change” writing, using his own words but imitating the form and structure of a well-liked author.
Then take advantage of other ways he can hone his skills, such as creating an annual “Year in Review”—a record of your family’s doings over time. Suggest regularly sending personal notes to friends, relatives, and grandparents, too. Beats a phone call or email every time. And don’t forget thank you notes.
Then add letter writing to the mix—and a potential lifelong friendship--with a pen pal. Meanwhile, staying informed affords yet another occasion for purposeful writing: sending letters to newspaper and magazine editors expressing strongly held opinions.
Getting the Essay Written
For “I don’t know what to write” complaints, suggest this quick limbering up strategy: have your child “free write” for five minutes about a favored person, place, thing, or event before switching gears and, for another five minutes, tackling something distasteful, like bats or liver. Once warmed up, she’s ready to “brainstorm,” creating a list of words and phrases associated with her topic. These can then be clustered by sub-topic on a separate sheet or via a graphic organizer--a visual road map for the writing to come.
Meanwhile, suggest that she keep a pad, pencil, and flashlight on the night table, ready for jotting down sleep-induced ideas—a favorite author tactic. Though asleep, her mind is still working hard, mulling over that essay and producing possibilities that need to be captured before they fade away.
Finally, once done, she should read her first draft out loud, hunting for grammar and punctuation errors, while making sure every word counts—and makes sense. Then more drafting and proofreading follow until the polished final copy is teacher-ready.
