The Power of the Pen

Writing

Writing is often difficult to teach. I personally think it is challenging because, unlike reading and math, writing doesn't have a correct answer (at least most of the time). What I think is garbage someone else might totally enjoy and think it is brilliant. Writing is different than grammar, although they go hand in hand.

We use many different curriculums as our tools in teaching our children to be good writers. During the summer of 2002 I came across Shurley English (or here) and in it it had a writing program. We are currently using it to teach us formal writing and to a degree the creative part of writing.

We require a written report with every unit we do. Sometimes these are written reports (think research paper) with visual aides and sometimes the writing assignment is flapbooks. Both require research, notes, creativity and formal writing (to some degree).

Six traits of Writing I refer to this page often as I teach my children to write.

Creative Writing

Our biggest creative writing program is our children's own imaginations. We give them a pencil and paper and let them loose, so to speak. There are many creative ideas out there to spur children into writing creatively.

But before our children could get here, we had them narrate. This idea is taken from the Charlotte Mason method of teaching. You the teacher/parent have the child narrate or dictate their report, assignment or whatever to you and you type or write their words down. As a parent to boys who sometimes have a physical problem with putting the pen to the paper, I have them narrate or dictate to me their report. Fighting the impulse to correct as they narrate is the most difficult thing in this approach. I then print the paper and hand to them for revision, rewrite (or re-narrate) and eventually final draft. There are many other ideas that go with the narrate or dictate. Tape or video recording their spoken word is also a very effective tool and fun too. Let them use their creative minds to solve this problem as well. We use this method with all of the different styles of writing, formal and not formal.

Click here for writing starts.

The Physical Task

I have found in my teaching that my boys have a very hard time getting the creative, imaginative and cold hard facts from their brain on to a piece of paper if their hand is holding a pencil. If the idea is to have your child do the physical writing of the paper then don't expect the quality of writing to be there, just yet. If on the other hand you want great thinking, vocabulary and ideas to be formed in wonderful sentence structure, you may have to be the scribe while your child "writes" in his mind. Don't think you have failed, because you haven't. They are learning the ability to put their thought down on paper. The physical act of writing will happen, when they are ready.

During our unit on weather I asked my 9 year old to tell me all about clouds. With textbook answers he explained an alto cumulus cloud in great detail. I then told him to write what he just told me under the correct pictures in his flapbook. He wrote "fluffy cloud." When I asked him why he didn't write more, his reply was, "I just can't mom. It doesn't work," while looking at his hand.

Now I require a paper a week, usually in the form of a book report. Using the structure found in Shurley English, they have a paper due every Friday. Some weeks I require a hand written paper and others I let them type it. It really depends on how the week is shaping up and what that child needs at that time and place in their education.

I don't worry about the lack of formal putting the pen to the paper because in their own free time they are more often than not thinking of some game to design, letter to write, story or play that needs to be written down. As a casual observer in their play time, you will witness many times they put pen and paper together. Eventually it will come and if you don't push it, like most learning, it will come and so will the love of it.

Handwriting

Something else we like to do with writing is handwriting; the practice of penmanship. We follow Portland University's italic script, as it is one of the easiest to go from printing to cursive. It is also very easy to read without the extra loops that many other programs have to offer. We use copywork as a teaching tool. I will give them excerpt out of books, talks, scriptures etc. then they will either trace or copy onto their own paper. I have found this is very helpful in memorization. For the little ones it may be just a couple words. As they get older the words become sentences and then paragraphs. I have the italic font on my computer and just print out their copywork and put in their folder. I have built my own computer folder of quotes, scriptures and whatever for the kids. I have noticed when we are successful is when they do it on a consistent basis.

Stores that sell writing programs.

Last updated: November, 2006

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