Helping Your Child Learn to Write

Writing will always be important in your child's life.  Writing is:

·   Practical--make lists, jot down reminders, and write notes.

·   Job-related--writing memos, preparing reports, proposals, letters, research.

·   Stimulating--writing helps provoke thoughts and to organize them.

·   Social--writing thank you notes and letters to friends and family.

·   Therapeutic--it can be helpful to express feelings in writing that can't be expressed so easily by speaking.

Writing well requires:

·   Clear thinking

·   Sufficient time

·   Reading

·   A Meaningful Task

·   Interest

·   Practice

·   Revising

Pointers for Parents:

·   Your goal should be to make writing easier and more enjoyable for your child.

·   Provide a comfortable place for your child to write.

·   Provide plenty of writing materials.

·   Allow time for your child to think.

·   Respond to your child's writing.  Focus on the "what the child has written, not "how" it was written.  Ignore minor errors.

·   Don't write a paper for your child, or rewrite his work.  Taking responsibility and feeling ownership of it are important parts of writing well.

·   Praise your child's writing efforts. 

Things to Do:

·   Make it real.  Encourage your child to write to relatives and friends.

·   Suggest note taking.  Encourage your child to take notes on trips or outings and to describe what he saw. 

·   Brainstorm.  Encourage your child to describe people and events to you.

·   Encourage keeping a journal. This is excellent writing practice as well as a good outlet for venting feelings. 

·   Write together.  Have your child help you with writing letters, making a grocery list, etc.  This helps your child see firsthand that writing is important to adults and truly useful.

·   Use games.  Word games and crossword puzzles help a child to increase vocabulary and make the child more fluent in speaking and writing.  Building a vocabulary builds confidence.

·   Suggest making lists.  This is good practice and helps a child to become more organized.  Suggestions:  make lists of their toys, baseball cards, books they enjoy, things to do, school work, social events, etc.

·   Encourage copying.  A child might copy a favorite poem, quotation from a book, song lyrics, etc.

Source:

www.ed.gov/pubs/parents/Writing/index.html