Encourage Your Children With Their Writing

This post is part of the series 10 Ways to Inspire Your Budding Writer

While helping my eight-year-old daughter write her own version of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, I took a turn to write as she dictated. “Then Goldilocks went up the stairs.” 

“Hmmm. ‘Went’ is a rather ordinary word. Can you think of a more interesting word to tell how she went up the stairs?” 

She couldn’t. I hinted, “I can think of one that starts with ‘c’” 

Puzzled, she gazed into space. Suddenly her face lit up. “Clambered!” 

Then my face lit up. “Wow! That’s fantastic! I love that word. Great choice! I was thinking of ‘climbed’ but clambered is much better. It paints a clear picture of how Goldilocks went up the stairs. Well done!” I cheered her on and bragged to her dad later on within her hearing.

I didn’t realise that my exuberant praise had made an impact. Yet at the family dinner to celebrate the completion of my 25 years of homeschooling, my daughter recounted that experience as a memorable moment.

Encouragement is powerful

As a parent charged with teaching writing to our children, we can easily feel the weight of that responsibility. When their beginning attempts are full of spelling and grammar mistakes, it is easy to feel that we must correct each one or they will forever be embedded in our child’s minds. However, just as when our children lisp their first attempts at speaking, we need to reassure ourselves that these mistakes are part of the process. We can relax in the knowledge that they have years of practice ahead of them and trust that improvement will come with regular effort combined with gentle guidance.

We all need encouragement, and this is especially true for our children when they engage in the hard work of learning to write. They thrive when we give them lots of specific feedback and praise. Success breeds success. People generally want to do more of the things they do well. Let your children know what they are doing right. 

Early writing experiences carry weight

Well-known author and writing coach, Allison Fallon, shares that how people feel about themselves as writers is often tied to their early experiences of writing. She finds that for many people, those early experiences were negative. A teacher may have returned a paper where the writing was all crossed out and marked in red. Their ideas may have been overlooked because of the grammar or spelling. Allison’s view is that grammar can be learned or an editor hired, but it is the deep, brilliant ideas that are more important. 

While it’s easy to focus on spelling mistakes and glaring grammar errors, we can choose to focus first on the message. If you received a note from your young child that said, “I luv u frevr”, I imagine you would treasure it rather than correct it. Yet somehow when our children write as part of their ‘school work’, we sometimes feel compelled to mark it up and get them to fix everything. Then we wonder why they don’t like writing. While it’s important to help our children grow towards accuracy in their spelling and grammar, we can find ways to do this that are less discouraging and more motivating. 

In our homes, we can ensure that the ideas our children put forward are validated and that their early writing experiences are positive. And if they’ve already had negative experiences from our mistakes or from someone else’s, we can intervene to turn that around. We can seek to create enjoyable experiences that encourage them to have a positive view of writing.

Positive Experiences Are Powerful

One day when I was about eight years old, I remember the dread I felt when I heard my name called over the P.A. system at school, requesting me to go to the principal’s office. Heart pounding, hands sweating, I trudged down the long hallway, wondering what misdemeanor might have landed me in this predicament.

Finally arriving at the principal’s office, I relaxed a bit when he peered at me kindly over his desk. When he explained that I was there to receive the weekly principal’s award for a story I had written, I sighed with relief and stood a little taller. I started to see myself as a writer and wanted to write more. While we won’t have the same kind of “principal’s awards” in our homes, we can seek to create positive emotions around writing for our children, celebrating their words and valuing their messages.

Offer specific praise

One way to do that is to offer sincere and specific praise. At school I remember getting assignments back. Often there would just be a letter grade and a vague comment like ‘good’ or ‘well done’. That was nice as far as it went, but what had I done well? What had the teacher liked and how could I repeat that or build on it? I had no idea.

In our homes where we have a much smaller teacher-to-student ratio, we can give more personal and specific comments. It can take some time to learn how to do this well, but we can grow in these skills. Sometimes it is a challenge to look at a piece of writing that may be disorganized, bland, and faltering, and see the bright spots. We can feel that we need to correct every mistake even when we know encouragement is the better way. But we can train ourselves to slow down and realize that each piece is a learning opportunity. Our children have years to hone this skill.  

Valuing the genuineness of their sharing above the mechanics of writing is a good place to begin. Affirm their message. Then look for anything that sparkles. Commend their effort, word choices, sparks of ideas, humor, the way their voice comes through, or the way they organized their thoughts. Show respect for their message and encourage them to elaborate. “You mentioned the party was amazing. Tell me more about ‘amazing’.”

Of course, there are limits as to how far we can get with compliments. As one son got into high school-level writing and asked for feedback, I would start with lots of encouragement. Having a ‘matter of fact’ personality, he would grin and say, “Just tell me what I need to fix.” We would laugh and get on with the work of writing. The foundation of praise built from his early writing experiences enabled him to cope with constructive feedback.

You can grow your feedback skills

Just as our children can develop their writing skills, we can grow in the art of giving feedback, becoming the encouraging writing coaches that our children need. With practice, we can learn to draw out our children’s ideas with good questions. We can write to and with our children, working together to find better words or to add a simile. We can notice and savor beautiful words in stories. Then while writing together, we can try incorporating some of those words. We can be patient with our children and ourselves as we grow in the art of both writing and critiquing. 

Start by looking at a piece of your child’s writing. Ignore any spelling errors and grammar mistakes. Ask yourself:  What’s one thing I can praise in this piece? Identify one specific thing and praise your child enthusiastically. Tell someone else about it in their hearing. Watch your young writer’s face light up. Repeat.

If you would like help regarding how to give encouraging feedback or how to develop spelling and grammar in more motivating ways, attend one of my workshops or contact me for a personalized consultation.