Guest Author - Terrie Bittner
Article by Terrie Bittner
http://www.terriebittner.com
Maybe itīs because Iīm a writer myself, but I love teaching writing. Itīs such a part of our lives that I seldom even let the kids do it during normal school hours. Fun stuff has to be homework.
If it isnīt naturally fun for your kids, though, itīs time to change their thinking. While not every child will want to be a writer, being able to write fiction is an important skill. For one thing, good writers are better readers. You have to understand the structure of a story, the art of characterization, plotting and other literary skills to be able to write a story. When youīve struggled with those in your own stories, you will appreciate them in others. Writers understand what makes a good story. At the very least, children need outlets for their vivid imaginations. When they are tempted to make up wild stories and pass them off as truth, (beyond the normal age) you can encourage them to write them as stories.
Story writing should start as soon as the child can talk in complete sentences. (There is more on this in my report writing section.) Let them tell you the story into a tape recorder, and later let them dictate stories to you. Donīt worry about fact or fiction, just write what they say. Let them start by telling you about their day, or their vacation. If they have an imaginary friend, youīll have a head start on story writing. After all, an imaginary friend is a character made up by your child. Be proud-making up characters is hard! Let your child tell you all about her friend, and her friendīs adventures. Donīt worry about originality yet. Lots of these first stories are "borrowed" from their favorite books or television programs. As they get older, you can talk about not borrowing from others.
When they start learning to write, they can write a few stories alone, but writing is still too slow a process and writing a long, complex story is frustrating when you write slowly. For quite a long time, youīll want to continue taking dictation for them. Each time they settle down to write, ask them whether theyīd rather dictate to you or into a tape recorder, or if theyīd like to write or word process for themselves. Eventually, most children will like the freedom to write for themselves.
The computer is a wonderful tool for writing, since kids naturally take to electronic tools. Start teaching them to type at an early age. Most school age children can start learning to use Word or WordPerfect, although there are childrenīs writing programs if youīd rather use them. I prefer to give the kids my own programs, so they wonīt have to learn to use a new system later. Just let them type without formatting at first. When itīs time to edit, show them how to capitalize, center, and so on, but they probably wonīt remember to use them for a while. You can also show them how to add their own graphics to the story, which makes the whole process seem more exciting. Be sure to teach them how to grammar check, too, but make sure they understand that a computer is a machine, and doesnīt really understand what they are saying. They still need to know enough about writing and spelling to decide whether or not to take the programīs advice.
The First Step: Ideas
Once theyīre seriously writing, youīll want to start teaching them how to work more professionally. Getting ideas is a challenge for many writers. To help with this, start a family idea box. Use a small file box-like the kind you keep recipes in-and fill it with file cards. Mark one section for ideas. Let everyone in the family brainstorm for ideas, and write all the ideas on individual cards. Each writer might want his own box as well, for ideas he doesnīt want to share. The best way to create ideas is to start with what-if questions. What would happen if....we got a pet giraffe and it had to live in my bedroom....if I were invisible for one day...if I could travel back in time. Once you get them started, most kids can think of hundreds of fantasies or problems. Try reducing your favorite books to what if questions: what if a girlīs house got carried away by a tornado and she woke up in a strange land and didnīt know how to get home? Once your children know how to do this well, theyīll have a better idea of what constitutes an idea.
Step 2: Characters
Every story needs a character. Some kids will make themselves the star of every story, and thatīs okay at first, or once in a while, but eventually they need to learn how to make up characters. Teach older children that authors use elements of real people in their stories, but they practically never use all of a real person in their stories. For one thing, they would get sued. For another, no real person is right for a story, because story people have to be more believable then real people. Look through your books and write short summaries of the characters you encounter. (Obviously, I mean for you to do these with your children, although doing it yourself could prove educational.)
Have your children notice how the author tells you what the character looks like. Stick to more recent books, so they donīt learn outdated methods. Authors today donīt have someone admire themselves in the mirror as they describe themselves. (Susan couldnīt help but admire her pale blond hair, but she did wish it would curl. Still, her sea-blue eyes gazed out of the mirror with a clearness that made people see her as honest....) They can scatter little pieces of information throughout the story. Notice that a book will tell more about a characterīs looks than a short story will. The more time you spend with a character, the more you need to know about them.
What kind of people are in the story? How can you tell? Notice that the author probably doesnīt say that Susan is shy. Instead, she might show the girl stumbling over her words, or stepping back and letting her friend do all the talking. Have your children make a list of ways authors can show what people are like. Then help them create characters of their own. They can add examples of these people to the idea box. Talk with older children about stereotypes. No one is all good or all bad. Let them give examples of stereotypes (smart girls with thick glasses, ugly bad people, dumb athletes...) and then help them think of new ways to portray these stereotyped people. What kinds of people are smart? Are all smart people ugly, or uncoordinated? Do they all wear glasses? See if they can create characters who are not stereotypes. You might want to try creating characters as a group before letting them try their own. Remember to give people a mixture of good and bad traits: the thief might rescue kittens from the pound, and the girl who tutors underprivileged children might taunt her own brothers and sisters when they do poorly in school.
Step three: We need a plot!
In the first step, you thought up ideas. Ideas are not the same thing as plot. An idea is wondering what would happen if you adopted a giraffe. A plot is adopting the giraffe and having it grow so tall you have to cut a hole in your roof and then....in other words, the plot is what happens, and one of the biggest problems I see in childrenīs stories is hat they have no plot. Many children write "Susan woke up and had breakfast and then she went to school and took a math test that was too hard and then she went home...." and so on. Who cares? When you plan a story, you have to plan an adventure that people will really care about. The character needs to have a problem people will be interested in following to a solution. Look at the list of ideas youīve created. What problem does each character face? Which one is interesting enough to write a whole story about?
Once the children have chosen an idea, let them choose the main character. (They could also choose a character and then decide what kind of problem that character might have. Many authors work this way. I usually start with the idea, and then figure out what kind of person would face this problem. Then, after I plan out my character, I decide how the personality will affect the plot.) They need to be sure the character could really have this problem. Shy, unpopular girls probably wonīt get three invitations to the same dance, unless you have a really good explanation for her sudden popularity. Stories also need additional characters. What other characters are needed to carry out the story?
Have the children make a plan for the story. For older children just beginning to write, I have used a story planner. Click here to look at the planner, but be sure to come back here for the rest of the article. Remind the children that every story must have a problem to solve and itīs better if the problem doesnīt get solved the first try. In the planner, the child will try to make it take three tries before the character succeeds. After the child has more experience writing, he wonīt need the planner and he can create his own pattern for a story. This is just a tool to help children who have trouble getting started.
These are the essentials for getting a story written: Create interesting and original characters. Make the main character likable. If the main character isnīt especially nice, make people understand why he isnīt, so the readers will like him. Surround your main character with other people, but no more people than you need. Too many people with names are confusing. Give the character an important problem to solve. Donīt let him solve it too easily. Put some obstacles in the way. Let the main character solve his own problem using his own skills. Itīs not fair to let the army, the parents or anyone else fix the problem. In other words, if Katie falls into a deep hole, she canīt sit there and cry until someone rescues her. She needs to find a way to get out of that hole herself. She canīt suddenly develop magic powers or find a ladder. Let her use her brains! Make sure any talents she uses to solve her problems were already there. She canīt suddenly remember that she learned mountain climbing skills at camp last year unless those were mentioned earlier.
Whenever you read together, evaluate the methods the author used to build the story. How did the characterīs personality affect the solution? What obstacles were in the way? Can you outline the story, reducing it to itīs basic elements? Why does it have that title? What did you like best about the story?
Step five: Editing
This is my least favorite part, but for some writers, itīs the best part. No story is complete until it has been edited. Have the child check it for mistakes first. Put it through the spell checker and the grammar check. Read it over and over to see if it sounds right. Professional writers usually put the story away for a day or two, so it will be fresh when they edit. Then they read it aloud to see how it sounds. Does the dialogue sound good? Does the story make sense?
If you have typed the story into your computer, you might want to do the editing on the computer. Let your child sit at the keyboard, while you sit beside him. By doing the editing at the computer, you can edit without making lots of red marks on the paper. You might want to make a copy, in case he changes his mind about the changes. First read over the whole story and compliment him on his work. Tell him what you like about the story. Then start the editing. Go over the story line by line, reading it aloud. Correct obvious mistakes, like spelling and grammar, explaining the changes as you go. Then you can discuss other changes. Now it gets tricky. You donīt want to rewrite the story to your own tastes. You can suggest structure changes: "This sentence is a little long. Can you think of a way to make it shorter?" You can even ask questions to help him think through any problems the story might have. "Jimmy never seems to have much patience. I wonder why he did this time?" "This seems to be a pretty realistic story. I wonder if people will really believe his teacher let him bring a real lion for show and tell?" Remember though, itīs his story, so he gets the final say in these things. You can continue to develop his understanding of story building as you read stories written by others, pointing out, for example, that everything in this story is realistic, or that the characterīs behavior in a certain situation is believable for this reason.
The Last thing: Publishing
Story writing is more fun when someone really reads your work. When my children were smaller, we gathered together selections from everyoneīs creative writing files and made an anthology. Kids love to see their work treated like real books. You can put the story in a school report cover, fully illustrated, of course, and place it on your bookshelves for everyone to read. With desktop publishing, you can make a very professional anthology of your favorite family written stories. Try putting their stories on their personal web pages (see my link on web pages for more on that.) Mail their stories to Grandma and Grandpa. Whatever it takes, get their stories out in public to someone besides you. There are even writing contests for children if they are mature enough to handle the competition.
This has been a very basic introduction to creative writing. Although itīs a homeschool subject, please donīt make it a frustrating experience for your child. Writing is a wonderful hobby, and the fun of it is much more important than the skill or the methods. If you want to learn more about writing, there are many good books on the subject. Books about writing for children can help you teach your children to write. Have fun!
