I have guided my two daughters—starting at about age nine—through Writing Practice. In both cases, my girls had graduated from chapter books to Harry Potter. Each was at the time steeped in weekly exercises for spelling, capitalization, punctuation. Each was heading into the season of independent school admissions, which would include a writing test. And each daughter wanted to spend time with me.
So I pulled them into something that was precious in my life. We whipped out our notebooks and fast-writing pens, grabbed a topic from thin air, set the timer, and wrote. And when the timer went off, we read our writing out loud.
I learned a lot about the mechanics of writing in elementary and secondary school. Mrs. Salisbury got me hooked on spelling bees. Mrs. Fiske, who wore her ginger-colored hair in a tight flip, walked us through the ins and outs of the paragraph. Mrs. Rhodes cried in class—overcome by the beauty of imagination—while reading The Hobbit out loud to us. But somehow I managed to get through twelve years without knowing how to simply compose.
And so it only seemed right that what took me until my late 30s/early 40s to figure out, thanks to the help of Natalie Goldberg and Writing Down the Bones, should become an early and natural skill for my girls. Like riding a bike or swimming.
How it works
- Start with three of the basic rules of Writing Practice–Keep your hand moving; Don’t cross out; Don’t worry about spelling, punctuation, or grammar. These three are tangible. Any kid can understand them. In fact, they will be music to a child’s ear. I don’t cover the other three rules of Writing Practice, which are: Lose control; Don’t think; Go for the jugular. These ones are, in my opinion, meant for us adults, who try to be in control at all times, analyze our way through most everything, and are inhibited. Kids don’t need to be told to lose control. (By the way, I also have never had to say, “You’re free to write the worst shit in America,” as Natalie does. Children don’t seem to worry about lousy writing at this age, even though they already tend to denigrate their art ability. My theory is that they never write in school; thus, they have no basis of comparison. Not so with art.)
- Pick a topic that is easy to understand. It should be tangible, something like “Pickles” or “Socks.” The other day, I figured my youngest and I could use a recent topic from this blog, so I threw it out for consideration: I write because… “What does that mean?” my daughter asked. After trying a few times to explain how each of us might choose to write for different reasons, I went with something simpler. Apparently, she’s not in a place of needing to understand why she writes; she writes for the sake of writing.
- Start with five minutes and work your way up. This was a precaution I took thinking that my daughters might get bored after five minutes, plus it was a gentle start to a new concept. However, we quickly worked our way to ten-minute stints.
- When it comes time to read out loud, remind your child that we’re going to each listen to one another with full attention, otherwise you might find her scanning her page. Also, the first time we read, I took the lead. Again, that was probably an unnecessary precaution, as neither daughter hesitated to jump in when after subsequent topics I asked if they wanted to read first.
- Do Writing Practice with one kid at a time, at least to start. This is one-on-one time. Having someone else there—even a sibling—might change the dynamic. There will be no trying to impress, no worrying about someone being better. Moms are safe. Plus, it’s an easy way to bond.
- When your kid questions the part about Spelling—and, believe me, she will—tell her that she’ll continue to learn how to spell in school and by reading books, but that this practice is mainly for learning how to write, write, write. Spelling is important, but spelling will come in its own time.
- Be aware that your own writing might go in almost any direction if you, too, are following the rules of Writing Practice. I try not to temper my writing, and consequently I have written my politics and at times my petty minutiae. You can always pass on reading, but doing so might send the message that not reading is an easy out.
- Get your kid her own notebook and fast-writing pen, and encourage her to write on her own in this same way whenever she feels like it. Kids this age know what it means to practice, perhaps for sports or music, so instill the idea while it makes sense. And when she comes ’round and suggests, “Mom, can we do Writing Practice now?” be ready to pull out your notebook and see Beginner’s Mind in action.
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Here are the Writing Practices (spelling errors corrected) that my youngest daughter and I did two weekends ago. Our topic was “Fall,” and we wrote for ten minutes.
Hers
Fall is when the leaves all fall to the ground. I like to jump into big piles of leaves. When the leaves start falling they change colors and they also crunch under your feet. Why is fall called fall? Maybe because leaves are falling. Another word for fall is autumn so I’m not sure why it’s called fall or autumn. The names have nothing in common. I also like sitting and watching the leaves fall off the trees. Sometimes all the leaves are a pain when you need to clean them up out of the pond and off the porch. Sonia likes fall I think because she has an excuse to stay inside. Otis and Rafie like to be inside too so they are happy when fall and winter come around. We have a lot of leaves to rake up so I’m happy because I want to jump in a big pile.
Mine
The trees outside the window make sure I know it is fall. They reach out over the window, and the sun shines behind them, shining through them, like light in a stained glass window. The colors are luminous, yellow shades and fading green shades. Even the dead tan leaves are beautiful, dangling in sparkling sunlight before letting go.
This morning I dress in a teal turtleneck sweater that I’ve had for ages, it seems. It’s too short from too many dryings, and it doesn’t keep my belly warm. Still, I head out to the corral with purpose, first holding my arms tight to try to keep the cold from hitting my core. But then I open up, drop my arms and swing them by my sides, in a sort of angry woman march. Except I’m not angry. I’m exuberant. It is cool but not cold. It’s early and the fall air feels new and fresh and good for me.
Dooley is waiting for me at the back gate. It’s a long walk down the service road, and the path is covered with leaves that have fallen from the trees that stretch like canopy over the path. Dooley is hungry for apples and grass and liberation. He will give a neigh and kick and run in a controlled run of his when I let him out.
I think all creatures must love fall. It is the best of times. The sun rises early now that we’ve set back the clocks, and even though it sets early, too, that feels right. Like it’s only natural that we would settle into our cozy homes, stews bubbling on the stove or a chicken roasting in the oven, and wait until it’s time to go to sleep.
Fall is also a time to prepare for the cold of winter. It’s a time to become more productive, less distracted by the never-ending light of summer. Yesterday I worked on my paintings for hours. I am finally becoming satisfied with Bush. He looks more real, red face and all, than he’d looked before. His eyes are scary, as you’d expect the eyes of someone like him to be. And his face has those plains to it that they have, a sharp face, pointy nose, pointy ears, straight lines for a mouth. He is an ugly man, as is Cheney and now Rove. Why is it that our lives get placed in the hands of such ugly men?
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Postscript: It is natural that parents want to guide our children, and usually in a more heavy-handed way than we might guide our friends or adult family members. When doing Writing Practice with your child, refrain from critiquing what she writes. Writing Practice is raw; it is not a final product. There is no good, no bad. It is what it is.
If you’d like to give your child feedback, use recall to do so. After she reads, recall a phrase or section of her writing, letting her know that those parts stood out to you. Try to do so without assigning value, such as, “I loved the part about …” If you can show your child how to provide input without labeling the input, you’ll also be role modeling how to listen deeply. It’s a wonderful skill to have.
yb, enjoyed reading about you teaching the girls writing practice as a normal, fun activity while they are young. It will help them later when they don’t know what to do with all their emotions and feelings and need to express them in a private place like a notebook. A good practice to have for all those moments in life when you have no one to talk with or don’t want to share your innermost wanderings with other people.
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Great article! I look forward to trying these out to Sohom my five year old son.
regards
Aurita
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I really enjoyed this, Ybonesy. What a wonderful way to share and teach what you love.
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Thanks, Robin, Shubhra, Bob. I started doing this with my older daughter a few years back, and man, can she write! Her pen flies, and when she reads it to me (and this is not in Practice sessions but rather, she’ll just read me what she wrote on her own) I’m amazed.
I’m glad she got this when she did, because now she is getting deep into mechanics. Which is good. So she already knows how to compose, how to let the writer go wild, and now the editor is being honed.
People my age (and I don’t know that much has changed even for my daughters’ generations) only honed their editors. Hence, the writers never developed, or rather, developed later in life.
My observation in general around education is that there are many methodologies for teaching Math. You have the trees and the fives/tens and a host of others whose names I don’t know and whose approaches I don’t know. But writing is still all about mechanics and reading. And mind you, mechanics and reading are both important. Boy howdy. But I don’t see any evolution in how writing is taught, the way I see an evolution in how math is taught.
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ybonesy, I really enjoyed this post. And how you demonstrated that the rules of Writing Practice have no age barriers. Anyone can do it.
Loved reading your practices, too. I’m not around children very much, spend most of my time with adults. So I’m always amazed when I go home to Pennsylvania and Georgia and am around my nieces, nephews, cousins, kids and grandkids of my mom and siblings. It opens my eyes when I see the way different ages look at the world.
I have one question. How does it flow when you read a finished piece from one of your daughters and they want feedback? Or do they ever ask you to help them edit a finished piece that might have started from a Writing Practice?
I’m glad you mentioned the part at the end about not giving feedback on Writing Practice. It’s totally raw, not meant for critique. Then I started to wonder how you work with finished pieces with your girls. Curious.
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Oh, I thought of one other thing I wanted to say. When I turned 50, I went to an astrologer recommended by two good friends of mine. (As a sidenote, the reading was amazing and nearly everything she talked about came to pass.) But what I wanted to say about it related to this post was that she said she remembered back when Natalie Goldberg taught Writing Practice to children in a couple of Twin Cities schools.
This was way, way back when Natalie lived in Minnesota. She said it was some of the best writing those kids ever produced. And that they loved Natalie as a teacher. Writing Practice is for all ages, across all times. It’s only one way of writing. But for those who have embraced it, the practice has really taken them places.
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Thanks, QM. I’ve only recently started reading some of Dee’s essays for her English class; the teacher put into place a feedback process that includes peer and parent feedback and actual editing. The most recent essay had to do with themes of marginalization in the book Of Mice and Men.
The emphasis right now is on tools and components of writing—the outline, the paragraph, the lead sentence of the paragraph, the thesis or main point, etc. For example, the finished essay was built from an outline that had been a working document; Dee didn’t use Writing Practice to get a first draft and then go back in and work the mechanics.
My sense was that Dee was focused on getting the mechanics right, and when you use those tools to build an essay, you get a different outcome versus using Writing Practice and then going in to edit. So in editing the essay, we talked about how to go back and bring some natural flow to the piece. It was almost the opposite of how I write.
Which is why I’m glad that we have done Writing Practice together. Because now I can reinforce an understanding about tools and components, breaking down Writing into technical aspects, without feeling like we’re losing the composing piece.
I do think a young person needs to grasp the two—editor and writer—separately and fully before merging them in a natural way.
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QM, I would love to hear more about your astrology reading and the events or predictions that came to pass. I should go back and revisit my last astrology reading. I have it on tape.
I did want to say that I did some basic research for this post, because I wanted to include links that might be about teaching children to write. I wasn’t impressed by what I found. The best items on the web that I found had to do with reading, which is, of course, critical for any of us to learn how to write. You gotta read. One piece talked about kids seeing their parents read and write. One item I found talked about encouraging writing for toddlers, allowing kids to express themselves with their budding knowledge of the alphabet and through pictures they draw.
After about a dozen clicks, I decided not to pursue it further.
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Wonderful piece! Made me hungry to write with Alex, although he is not interested in writing as he has dyslexia. But he tells great stories and sometimes I write them for him which is like the free flow of writing practice because they can go anywhere. Sometimes we type them on the computer and work together to edit. Isn’t it great to be creative together?
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I taught my classes to do writing practice. Even my third graders got into it and enjoyed it. If for some reason we didn’t do writing practice, they complained!
We did it first thing in the morning. When they came in there was a word or phrase on the board and they knew what to do. They wrote while I took roll and collected absence notes, etc. Then I wrote for a few minutes then stopped everyone. We had kids volunteer to read their writing although we only had time for three or four each day.
Once a week we would take one of our writing practice pieces and work on them. They picked the one they wanted and learned about editing (which included spelling).
If they learned nothing else in my class, my students learned not to be afraid of writing.
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Corina, I didn’t realize that you taught, and that you taught Writing Practice. Cool! Oh, how great and hopeful to hear that you did this and to learn a bit about the word or phrase on the board, the volunteer readers, and then how you took the WPs and finished some of them. It’s so simple. I bet other teachers do it as well but perhaps they don’t talk about it so much. My oldest daughter’s third grade teacher once told me that she had learned to write in college via a Writing Practice approach, and that she also thought it worked, but I don’t know that she did it with the students. Although she was the teacher that first saw how much my oldest loved reading and encouraged it.
Third grade has been a milestone grade level in terms of reading. Perhaps the writing goes hand in hand with that. Thanks again for sharing your experience.
Lisa, sounds like you’ve found a great way to encourage Alex to keep on with his storytelling. The interest you show by typing his stories must make him feel good. I’m struck by how much my girls appreciate the opportunity to show us adults what they can do and have us respond to it in a positive way.
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Thanks for sharing. My kids walk around with journals now. They are always writing something.
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That’s cool, Carolyn.
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