One question I see often online is “how to encourage a child to write”. As you may know, we raised our son to be bilingual and bicultural. I often get comments about how lucky we are, and I agree, but I also think that raising a bilingual & bicultural child is also a lot of work, or should I say a lot of extra work, as you know, raising kids is no walk in the park. Luck doesn’t come into it.

We are lucky that my son has always had a love for books. He started reading at a three and was on chapter books at four. I had to continue to supply him with books on all kinds of topics, anything that captured his imagination. Thank goodness for the Book Depository back then and their free shipping or I would be a very poor woman by now!

When Ebi-kun was seven he had a reading age of about 12, his writing, on the other hand, was not so hot. This creates the dilemma that many parents have:

A boy lying on the floor writing a story in an exercises book

How do I help my child’s weak areas without turning into a pushy “education mama”?

For me, this meant finding a way to make it fun. When I looked for books, I tried to find those that are well written and illustrated plus have an element of fun. I can tell you that history would have been a lot more interesting if they had the Horrible Histories books when I was a kid!

Although Ebi-kun enjoyed doing puzzles and quizzes, sitting him down every night to do 2 or 3 pages from a workbook isn’t my idea of fun and I am sure that after a few days he would start to rebel. I keep this in mind when I’m designing the 193 Little Adventures packs. They all have some element of writing, from simple labelling to writing a journalist report. No matter where your child fits on the writing scale, they can find the right level or activity for them. You can find out more about the 193 Little Adventures Club here.

using a mini books to encourage a child to write. a handmade book with a monster and a list of superpowers

How to encourage a child to write with mini storybooks

I made up a pile of these little books. Each book is made from 3 pages of A4 paper, printed with lines and a box for a picture. I think it helps with writing when there are lines. And it is more fun to illustrate your writing. The one above was a beast book, with simple prompts that only needed a couple of words to answer. He was really into the Beast Quest books at the time and was excited to make up his own monsters.

To make your own mini books for writing practice

Fold the pages in half and then fold a piece of A4 card stock to be the cover (or recycle some artwork) and staple them through the middle. I made a few at a time when we get down to the last one I will make a pile more. Took about 10 minutes to do. Of course, you can get the kids helping to make them too.

I regularly made little books for Ebi-kun to use, with no instruction of what to do them. He often turned them into things like ‘How to be a Ninja Manual’ or ‘A Dragon Encyclopedia’ but sometimes I’d want more of a focus and a challenge to go with the books, writing with purpose.

 Another idea: writing prompt cards and pictures

Between us, we came up with a selection of cards, some to be fact and some fiction. We did this together as I feel it is important to include the child in the process, he does have to do the work after all. Giving a child a black book and no direction can set up a barrier before you even start. Imagine if I gave you a lined exercise book and said. OK, you have a week to write a story. A budding writer might cope with the situation and go off with their pen and book, a person who struggles with writing will sit there looking at the blank pages.

Here are some of the writing topic card ideas we came up with:

  • The Tower Of London
  • The Dragon and the Magic Crown
  • The New Teapot
  • How Gears Work
  • Itchy pants

An alternative idea to this is picture prompts. For the work below I used Photoshop and and put photos of my son in strange situations and then he wrote a short story about the picture, imagining how the photo would have been taken. This made it more personal.

How to encourage a child to write - using photoshopped images as writing prompts. Pages with photos of a boy swinging through the jungle, another at a volcano eruption and a third as a chef licking his fingers

Encourage a child to write using guidelines

What this looked like for us: On a Monday he picked out a card and a one of the premade books. He kept them in his homework folder so that when he did his homework for school he can do some of his book work too. He could choose when to work on the book but keeping it in the homework folder meant it will be a fresh reminder each day, (meaning it won’t get lost under the pile of papers on his desk, as he had to check the homework folder daily).

Sunday morning he presented his book to the family at breakfast. That way his dad was involved too. Quick note here, as we used the Montessori method, there is a special way that you go about praising kids for their efforts. If you want to learn how and why this works, I have a post about it here.

After time the book writing became a habit and as his writing improved we can tackle more difficult ideas and subjects. There is always a strong emphasis on creative writing but I feel factual and technical writing are important skills too. An as it turned out, that was the type of writing he preferred. He wrote many “manuals” on how to do things and his findings from researching something new.

Of course, every child is different, and I was sure my sons writing skills in English would be fine, IF he was being schooled in English. As it stood, his official schooling was in Japanese so it is my job to help him with his English. We didn’t take the usual school route, you can read our story here.

How to encourage a child to write - making a monster manual. a picture of a monster and a description of what he likes and doesn't like

If your child is struggling with writing then here are a few ideas to try:

  • If they find holding the pencil difficult, try investing in some specially designed pencils which will make it easier for them to grip. Also, work on some pincer muscle exercises to strengthen the muscles.
  • Suggest writing a family newsletter to send out to the grandparents, each member of the family could write an article, do it monthly.
  • Find a penpal, old school but still fun.
  • Join Postcrossing and send postcards around the world (and receive them)
  • Make sure there is a good supply of writing materials – nice pencils/pens, notebooks and paper.
  • Keep a diary – we found this Q&A a Day for Kids: A Three-Year Journal was fun, especially the second and third years when we could read what was written the year before.
  • Encourage them to write to-do and shopping lists.
  • Write invitations for playdates instead of calling.
  • Enter a writing contest.
  • Make a cookbook with the family favourite recipes.
  • Make a technical manual explaining how to use something in the house.

As always, follow the child as that will get you better results. If your kid is mad into ponies, have them write about their upkeep, types of saddles, their favourite pony or anything else pony related. If dinosaurs are their thing, do the same but dino related.

Final thoughts on How to encourage a child to write

It is easy to get caught up in how beautiful the handwriting should be and how perfect the spelling is but if you have a child that struggles with writing then take a step back.

Instead of expecting beautiful writing, be happy with legible writing and again with spelling, if you pick out every word that is wrong then you will end up doing more damage than good.

Instead, make a note of the words or grammar rules that they consistently get wrong, you may discover that its because they are unaware of a spelling/grammar rule. If this is the case teach them the rule separately.

If spelling, in general, is difficult, then play some spelling games and you will have no end of ideas to try out. Most of all, remember to make it FUN. The ultimate goal isn’t to have a miniWordsworth or Bronte on your hands but to have a child loves learning.

FAQ’s about encouraging your child to write

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