When trying to motivate your young children to learn, it works best when you, as a parent, join in the learning. For example, whenever I give my 7 year old daughter an assignment to write a short story, she would hem and haw and do whatever in her power NOT to do it. However, when I say “come sit with me and we will take turns writing out a story”, she will willingly comply. So, here is a story we wrote the other day. I wrote the first line, she wrote the next and we continued taking turns until the story ended. Her contribution are the ones in italic, recorded here as it is without corrections on my part.

Kiki is a black dog.
She is dog that is kind.
One day she met Scarface Claw the meanest cat in town.
She was frighten of the meanest cat in town.
She was so frighten, she hid under a bush.
Then he look for her.
Oh no! He found her.
She run and cried woof!
Then she thought that instead of running away, she should do something nice for Scarface Claw.
Then she think and think.
The next morning, she went to see Scarface Claw.
She did give him flower and kiss him.
Scarface Claw was so shocked.
Then they became friends. The End.

Sometimes we think that children are full of imagination and therefore should have no problem concocting up stories. But the fact is children need to be taught and guided through the writing process. Their ability to create fantastic stories during play does not translate to efficiency in writing stories. When you throw them a writing assignment without first explaining to how to build the story, they get overwhelmed. It’s like asking them to climb a mountain without proper tools and equipment.

When you write together, you can guide their writing and teach concepts indirectly. For example, start off the story by introducing a character, describe the character, mention where the story is taking place and when, what is the problem, what is the solution and how does it end. To clarify further, break the story into 3 parts: introduction (beginning), body (middle), and conclusion (end). Writing together also gives you the opportunity to teach them how to use punctuations properly. They are able to learn writing by watching how you write.

By writing stories together, the task seems less threatening. Furthermore, you could inject humour or familiar phrases into the story, making the writing process enjoyable. For example, in the story above, I used the character Scarface Claw from the famous story “Hairy Maclary”. In another story that we wrote, I used the phrase “it’s wherever you left it” from the book “Let’s Go, Froggy!” that we’ve read many times.

From these initial writings together, hopefully it will help build their love for writing. It’s okay to take their hand and lead them in the beginning. Don’t make the mistake of throwing them into the deep end before they are able to swim (so to speak).