Tips for Supporting Young Writers
When it comes to literacy development, parents often have a better idea of how to help their child grow as a reader than as a writer. Many parents know the importance of providing access to high-interest books, reading to their child daily, keeping an eye on reading volume, and offering a variety of texts. However, encouraging writing development can be a bit trickier, especially if you don’t have the child who already has three journals going, a plan for a story he/she wants to write, and a special stash of writing pens. Thus, we wanted to offer five suggestions for how you can help your growing writer.
1) Declutter his/her schedule to allow time and space for writing. We cannot get better at things we do not have time to practice, so make some time. This might include time to work on a school project, or it could be time to work on something of his/her own design. Ideally, your child would be writing every day...or at least every other day. And maybe you could even sit down near your child and do some writing of your own (work emails count!). Modeling is a wonderful way to teach. In fact, collaborative story-writing between you and your child can be a lot of fun; you might try writing a story where you alternate sentences, trying to build a logical (yet imaginative) story by asking your child to write the first sentence, then you writing the second sentence, and so on.
2) Detach skills, like handwriting or spelling, from the larger concept of writing. Define writing as “coming up with ideas, organizing them, fashioning those ideas into a coherent piece, and communicating something wonderful.” If your child is concerned with spelling or handwriting, set aside a separate time to work on those skills. At Long-View, we choose not to spend time during school hours on direct, systematic instruction in these areas, but we certainly have programs and suggestions if you would like more information on how you can hold this at home.
3) Practice “writing” out loud, without ever taking pen to paper. Have your child practice telling stories aloud or work together to retell an event that happened to your family. Perhaps after a beautiful hike, on the drive home, you could have your child tell the story recounting the event, revising as they go. Or after reading an interesting article together about a new scientific discovery, you could have your “writer” tell the main idea and important points from the article, adding in her own thoughts as she goes. Oral rehearsal can be a powerful technique for young writers because the acts of organizing and revising are central to the writing process, and these skills don’t necessarily require pen and paper to practice.
4) If you are lucky enough for your child to share his/her work with you, the first thing you should do is point out what your writer has done well and should keep doing in the future. You’ll want to react to the content of the writing (after all, the point of writing is to communicate something), but also make sure to highlight a few things the child has done that he or she should keep doing in his/her writing. For example, instead of saying something like, “I like how you used the word green to describe the grass,” you could try, “When you described the grass as green, that helped me as your reader picture the scene. Providing details like that is so helpful for your reader. Keep doing that!” These compliments could also be about techniques or features the child has nearly achieved, or “approximated,” and which you want to push them toward.
5 If your child asks for help improving his/her work, offer one idea each session, and one idea only of how to improve his/her writing. Try to make your suggestion a point that will help your child as a writer not only in this piece, but also in any future pieces as well. Ideally, your suggestion would be a transferrable piece of advice. For example, instead of saying, “You should work on your ending,” you could try something like, “Endings serve as an important part of the story to bring closure for your reader. One way to end a piece is to end with a thought that connects with the main problem. What would happen if you tried that here?”
We hope these suggestions provide some helpful advice and aid you as you continue to nurture your child’s literacy development at home. Happy writing!
