Here are some great and easy ways to encourage your child to write and improve his/her writing skills.
Make a Menu
Let your child design and write the menu for a family dinner
while you do the cooking. Write difficult words for them to copy, or
let them look up words in a dictionary. This activity can be done on
art paper with gel pens, or on a word processing program. A related
idea is the Food Critic Restaurant Review from Scholastic.
Write Lists
Let your child write the grocery list as you dictate what you
need from the store. This is a good way to keep her occupied while
waiting to go to the store and to help her develop a sense of
responsibility for household activities. Children can also write lists
to pack for a trip, plan a busy week, and prepare for back-to-school or
holidays.
Write a Letter to Grandparents
Keep a supply of kid notecards and stationery on hand for letter writing.
A letter from a grandchild is always a delight; bad spelling and punctuation is overlooked! Stationery Studio is a great software program for letter writing and to inspire kids with many other writing projects.
Set a Goal
Teach your child the valuable skill of writing personal goals.
Use these Word documents from Education World as worksheets for a
writing activity to set a personal goal and related mini-goals.
Write a Picture Story
Draw a line about 2/3 down on a sheet of art paper. Let the
child draw a picture of anything she wishes at the top. Then, guide her
to write a story about the picture at the bottom. Let her write
unfamiliar words phonetically. Guide her to use the basic story
elements of 'character, setting, and plot'.
Newspaper Reporter Activity
Your child can play reporter and learn the 5 W's of writing with
this activity. Write 'Who, What, Where, When, and Why' down the left
side of a sheet of paper or use this printable from Houghton-Mifflin Education Place. PBS TeacherSource
suggests that you guide him to watch a news story or learn about one
online, and to note on his sheet the 5 W's of the story. Carry it even
further by writing an opening paragraph to the news story and comparing
it to the newspaper article on the story.
Use Writing Prompts and Graphic Organizers
You need some ideas to help your child get started on a creative
home writing activity. Try these sites to find a quick writing prompt.
Your child will be inspired at writing time when you
introduce some graphic organizers to help him develop pre-writing and
writing strategies.
Play with Poetry
Use Laurie Candler's friendship cinquain lesson, but make it a family cinquain. Interview a family member or write the cinquain about the entire family.
Play Scholastic's Newspaper Word Poetry Challenge, which is an inexpensive way to copy the 'poetry magnets' you see in the educational toy stores.
Print these poetry form worksheets from ABC Teach:
Make a Book
Enchanted Learning's Make Your Own Book templates require a $20 annual membership. Not bad for tons of printables for your child.
Picture dictionaries are a must for emergent literacy. Your child and you can make your own picture dictionary with this project from Scholastic.
Sesame Street Workshops gives step-by-step instructions to Make a Homemade Storybook.
Susan Kapuscinski Gaylord gives some creative free samples for making books with children.
(from 'Parenting of K-6 Children')
