#4 of 15 Ways to Teach Your Child to Write Using Books - Read for Fun!

This means you!


If you only read aloud -- what we call "reading around" -- taking turns -- for educational reading alone, then reading will not be considered of value by your children. Writing isn't fun because reading isn't fun -- it's a chore; it's school. How about its being cuddle time in front of the fire or on the front porch on a sunny morning? We do it with our preschoolers; why not with our teens?

But, before reading can be fun with your kids, it has to be fun for you. Do your children see you spending time reading? Maybe it's your favorite gardening magazine, maybe it's Danielle Steel, but if you make reading a priority -- not because someone is making you -- they will wonder what the big deal is and try it out for themselves. My mother spent most of my childhood in the corner of the sofa knitting, playing solitaire and, above all, reading. She tells us that as toddlers, we would crawl up under her book to see what was so absorbing.

I have many friends who insist they are not readers, others who have hardly a book in the house, who have not been to the library since their 3rd grade field trip. People don't all have to be readers. But, if you want your children to be moderately eloquent writers, you have to be a reader. Read cookbooks, manga books, magazines, atlases, "as told to" autobiographies, even your own kids' stories. Then, when you've gotten a taste of the enjoyment of reading, read with your kids for fun. Let them pick the book and enjoy the time with them.

#3 of 15 Ways to Teach Your Child to Write Using Books - Read Together

Reading aloud together is probably the most valuable educational tool you will ever have. I consider this to be of such importance that I am going to dismantle the subject and detail it further in later posts. But, why is this so important?

Well, quite apart from teaching your children to write, you are teaching your children that they are loved. You are teaching them that reading with them is something you are willing to take the time to do with them. When they pick the book, you are valuing their opinions. When you pick the book, you are showing respect for them, that you consider them worthy companions and intelligent enough to share your interests with.

Educationally, what does reading offer, particularly to the subject of writing? It exposes children to a greater vocabulary and to more difficult concepts than they have the capacity for on their own since they usually have a greater auditory understanding than visual understanding of language. It gives you all a chance to ask questions and pull apart meaning that can be applied in later experiences. My children love Shakespeare because I never have them read it. We watch it on DVD. Since the oldest were in their early teens, I would periodically stop the show and ask,"OK, do you know what's going on?" At which, they usually said, "No," and I would explain. That allowed them to "get" the story and really enjoy it.

Lastly, reading aloud gives your children a chance to use you as a sound board for digesting what they have read and applying it to their lives. And, that is the foundation of good writing.

#2 of 15 Ways to Teach Your Child to Write Using Books - Uninterrupted Silent Reading

Our family always had this informally because my brother broke the TV when he was 7 and, in a  house full of introverts, books were our entertainment. But, when I was 11, our Ogden Elementary School instituted Uninterrupted Silent Reading. From 1:05-1:25 everyone in the school, including the janitor and school secretary, read. There were 20 minutes of profound blessed peace. The only rule was that the book had to have words. There was some discussion at first but comic books were finally allowed. You could read anything you want except "Spy Vs. Spy" (a wordless comic strip.) You could read Hardy Boys, Little House on the Prairie (very popular among pre-teen girls at the time), or Judy Blume  (though there were some questions about the immorality of some of her books.) Personally, I went to the English teacher's glass-fronted shelves and, in 20 minutes a day, over a 9-month period I read Dickens's Oliver Twist and Jules Verne's From the Earth to the Moon.

What did USR accomplish? It developed the habit of reading. The students saw that reading was valuable, not busy work, because even grown-ups did it. They were given the opportunity to start making their own choices in books. It brought a moment of rest to an inherently busy and chaotic institution. Students learned that they could accomplish something -- actually finish a book! -- in 20 minutes a day. They began to develop a fund of stories that gave them something to write about. Let's face it, no matter what the art -- fishing,computers, chess, figure skating or music -- you don't develop the desire to do it yourself until you see someone else do it, and that includes using words.

#1 of 15 Ways to Teach Your Child to Write Using Books: Talk About Stories

My adult son, Ben, is my writing club. Almost all of my kids have spent time writing but he is a natural. We still have his first story. At age 6, he wrote descriptions of the evil lord's castle with ugly dogs fighting over the bones and the happy castle with puppies in the corner. He studies writing and challenges me, partly by quoting me back to to myself. But what we do most is talk about stories, both in film and on paper.

My mother and I did this. We read hours together and always stopped to go on a bunny trail sprung from the reading. My husband did this, stopping a movie to ask the kids, "Okay, what's happening here?" When we read stories with the children, we ask them what they see in the picture that gives them a fuller picture of the story. Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland was the first place this was done, even to the placement of the pictures and text on the page, and Little Critter books are nothing special at all if you don't look at the humor (where Little Critter is really coming from) in the pictures.

When my children want to talk about stories, I always listen, whether it is something they have written or read or even an online anime program they are following. I once listened to my 15 year old daughter, Becki, go through the complicated storyline of every single Eragon book over pancakes at IHOP.

We all learn from stories and talking about them helps us to process them and apply them to our lives. If we are interested in stories, our children will want to produce them. They will become writers.