My 8 yr old is the same way, so I'd love to hear what others have to say!
yes rs very normal!!
since he likes art have him draw a picture or put a picture together and have him write a sentence about it or a few sentences
give him an idea of what to draw , example: draw a picture of an island you would live on, then have him write down the chacacters in on the island, then have him write a bit about each character, then have him discribe the island, etc and then have him write a story about the island in short paragraphs, also drawing more pictures as he goes, draw the people, animals, vegetation, etc
make it fun, more than a chore, at first it might be but you also do it with him (your own island)
when done make it into a book
you could also have him keep a journal- write a couple sentences each day about something( you can give him a topic)
you can have him use the comp. to write stories
you can both read a book together but dont read the ending and both of you write an ending(theres also books without ending and the child gives the ending)
Yep! Very normal indeed. You should see what my older kids sometimes try to do! lol
Does your son like comic books? Or maybe he has a favorite movie or tv series, cartoon? What about his favorite animal?
I had to help write some sentences a few times just so my kids could get an idea of how it works and how to think up sentences.
It's not so easy for a kid to do when it's not something you do a lot of and especially when you do not even like to write. Thinking in sentence form can be boring and un interesting to say the least.
Yes, that is VERY normal for an 8yo. What you are describing is called oral narration. It is hard! Try it some time. Read a 2-3 pages from a history book (something dry and boring) and try to tell it back with lots of details.
You are right in thinking that telling the story back is the first step in being able to do creative writing. If they can't tell a story already written back, how can they tell an original story? The answer is that they probably can't.
Oral narration takes practice. There are strategies for teaching it. Look here for some ideas.
It helps her see that her ideas are good, she easily sees the steps she missed, and just shows her how to organize her thoughts.
Another thing we do--for fun-- is I give her three random words and she has to think of a story, draw the picture & tell me about the story. I handwrite it on the back of her picture, date it. Write "illustrated by" and put it in her "creations folder". She's vey proud of it. My 4yo got in on it, with his own folder, and he even wrote the story himself on the back of the picture. (there were no spaces, a bunch of misspelling, and it was (always) about angry birds, but still...)
My eldest was exactly the same...then we started story boarding. Suddly e became obsessed with writing. Also, his handwriting and grammar improved when I allowed him to begin learning computer programming.
Story Boarding if basically a visual representation of a story, idea, concept, etc. it originated w/ the movie business. When planning filming/story lines, the writer & director make 1 picture to represent each scene. So, with homeschooling. While reading a book, before doing a book report lets say, my son will read a chapter then draw a picture of what happened durin this chapter. When he goes to plot a story, or write a book report, he puts his ideas into a series of pictures - like an anima version of his story. Basically 1 picture for each paragraph. That way, his words are just descriptions of each picture in order. Then we just tidy up the concepts with editing. My son saw it as making his own cartoon everytime he had a creative writing project.
http://digitalstorytelling.coe.uh.edu/storyboarding.html
http://www.ibiblio.org/ism/articles/huffcorzine.html
Quoting paris2lmp:what is "story boarding" I've never heard that term before?
Quoting KickButtMama:
My eldest was exactly the same...then we started story boarding. Suddly e became obsessed with writing. Also, his handwriting and grammar improved when I allowed him to begin learning computer programming.
wow...thats kinda cool! lol! Thanks :)
Quoting KickButtMama:
Story Boarding if basically a visual representation of a story, idea, concept, etc. it originated w/ the movie business. When planning filming/story lines, the writer & director make 1 picture to represent each scene. So, with homeschooling. While reading a book, before doing a book report lets say, my son will read a chapter then draw a picture of what happened durin this chapter. When he goes to plot a story, or write a book report, he puts his ideas into a series of pictures - like an anima version of his story. Basically 1 picture for each paragraph. That way, his words are just descriptions of each picture in order. Then we just tidy up the concepts with editing. My son saw it as making his own cartoon everytime he had a creative writing project.
http://digitalstorytelling.coe.uh.edu/storyboarding.html
http://www.ibiblio.org/ism/articles/huffcorzine.html
Quoting paris2lmp:
what is "story boarding" I've never heard that term before?
Quoting KickButtMama:
My eldest was exactly the same...then we started story boarding. Suddly e became obsessed with writing. Also, his handwriting and grammar improved when I allowed him to begin learning computer programming.
Exiting public school
What is your highest level of education?
- rsrangel
on Jan. 14, 2013 at 4:54 PM