Part of the journey I am really working on this year is helping my son to help himself and included in this little adventure is nurturing the creative writers in both of us. I honestly think that everyone that loves to read, enjoy good music, can type or dictate words can write something really wonderful from time to time, they just need a tiny bit of guidance and the mental permission to jut got for it.
Yesterday we work on descriptive sentences. Little guy, was able to choose the words he wanted to describe. I am posting them here so that we can all take a look in a couple of weeks to see the progress of creative writing with the guidance these three steps.
1. Reading examples.
2. Step by step process.
3. Lots of praise.
4. Recognizing and embracing personal talent and accepting that there is always room for growth.
Okay, so the last one is the toughest, but when children love to learn or enjoy the process of what they are learning they naturally want to do better.
First Lesson we read a wonderful example of an essay and then created simple descriptive sentences without mommy (me) chiming in her opinion every two seconds and letting little guy do his thing. I just asked him to add a little each time to describe his subject choice.
- cookies and milk
- drink the milk and eat the cookies
- drink the very cold milk and eat the warm cookies
- drink the very cold milk and eat the warm white chocolate chip cookies.
- Two months ago, I drank very cold milk and ate warm, white chocolate chip cookies.
- troll
- troll pranks
- The mean troll pranks.
- The ugly mean troll pranks.
- The ugly mean troll pranks destructively.
- The ugly mean troll pranks destructively in Minecraft.
- Tobuscus
- Tobuscus films
- World famous Tobuscus films
- World famous Tobuscus films often
- World famous Tobuscus films often make viewers laugh.
At the time I had no idea what he was talking about most of the time, excluding the cookies and milk. Now I am well versed in a couple of aspects of Minecraft.
I really enjoyed hanging out and doing this exercise with my son and am looking forward to seeing what he creates next!
I would love to hear your suggestion on nurturing creative writing in elementary aged children!
Lisa says
January 11, 2014 atIn her elementary school years, her teacher made them write a journal entry daily. Sometimes they were given a topic but other times they were able to write whatever they wanted. I was amazed when she brought it home and read some of the entries.
Pam List says
January 11, 2014 atThanks, that sounds like a good plan. I use practice writing, something I learned from Crescent Dragonwagon and really love it. I will take a photo and share somet time. I draw, doodle and write.
I bought Johnny a journal but will add some free time writing on the days he has more spare time. I am trying to do all of the exercises within 15 minutes or less because this is coupled with homework from his regular school time. He is really so good about his extra studies, I am one lucky momma.
Thanks again for the helpful suggestion.