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SeaStar
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OK- give it to me straight.... what is the reality of encouraging a boy to write? Is there any boy alive between 7 and 15 who voluntarily writes anything school-related? 
My ds will be ten in November. He is... ahem... most unenthusiastic about writing anything along school lines.
He has been narrating since he was six. He is an auditory learner and is an excellent narrator. No problem there.
Writing is another story. Now, I know he can do it. This summer , on his own, he wrote a few very nice letters to relatives, and he wrote me a magnificent letter of protest when I announced that ice cream was not a food group for daily consumption at our house. He also writes captions for drawings he does.
He is still learning to spell and is self-concious about that. I have The Writers Jungle, and I did read that the author usually doesn't require much writing until age 12. But, somehow... I don't think he'll be loving writing at 12, either. And in her book she does include lots of paragraphs written
by ten year olds.
I don't want him to hate writing... and it would be a huge power struggle to get him to write a report about Maine or a book he's read or anything on a regular basis. Yet, I don't want to feel like I'm short changing him with his education, either.
I know that a lot of you have been here before with your own boys.
Advice? Thoughts? Chocolate?
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You're right in that boys are sometimes slow to writing. And it's about this point that I start to feel a little nervous because everyone around us has to turn in 18 book reports a term...and my 11yo is really only just beginning to write. But honestly, I felt the same way with my now 11th grader. And writing did develop, quite naturally.
I read somewhere, and it may have actually been Julie Bogart in The Writers Jungle that said it, that natural writers are loathe to write for someone...in other words, they like writing in their preferred genre and they don't like it when people (you) ask them to write something. My high schooler is like that. She likes writing fiction, so if I ask her to write a biography it's like pulling teeth!!! And she's a very natural writer on her own, but ask her to write a non-fiction essay, and it was like she forgot how to form the letter 'A', much less organize her thoughts in the written form. Whereas, if I gave her an afternoon free, she'd likely churn out two chapters of the novel she was writing.  Anyway, all that was to offer you that perspective because it sounds as if your son might be a natural writer, as eloquent as he is with his letters of protest on the topic of ice cream deprivation. As my natural writer matured and became more and more familiar and practiced in written narrations, she was able to write more and more non-fiction, and write well...even though she never completed ONE.SINGLE.BOOK.REPORT!! Not one!
I have noticed a few things that have helped us:
** I TOTALLY agree with Julie Bogart - children write on their own timeline, just as they read on their own timeline. I don't push formal writing, and I have noticed that it does develop over time. By high school, my students are ready for more formal instruction in writing. Before high school, it's written narrations and creative essay projects.
** While I don't push academic writing, I have seen that a simple change of perspective really helps inspire a boy in writing. Example: Write a one page biography of Captain Meriwether Lewis ...is met with eye rolls and wailing and gnashing of teeth. BUT...something that changes the perspective and appeals to the naturally adventurous and active spirit of a boy really works. So for example: Pretend that you are Seamus' caretaker on the Lewis and Clark expedition (Seamus was the dog that accompanied Lewis and Clark on their expedition). Write a little about the expedition. Map out your favorite kibble locations along the route. ** My son really enjoys finishing stories from Andreola's Story Starters.
** I like to provide avenues of writing that a boy naturally enjoys:** A private blog for recording favorite observations about WWII
** A special notebook for journaling about lego inventions. Build on his interests and passions, and chances are he will naturally write a little about it.
** Keep narrating...and begin written narrations around 10/11 yo. I began written narrations for my oldest son a full year later than I did with my dd. I just knew he wasn't ready. And written narrations begin very, very shaky. It's just like having a beginning narrator all over again. But it works because it's slow-and-consistent-pen-to-paper-writing-what-you-know, and they're learning to organize their thoughts into the written word. I really see my son's written narrations just starting to improve, but it's taken a long time to see improvement. Great patience is called for in beginning narrations - whether it is oral or written. And both benefit from good modeling. I've been reading the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin and it's extraordinary what an influence good modeled writing was for him. He sought it out and then set out to emulate it and write it better. I've found that our best writing work comes from exactly those kind of exercises...like our high school essay course based on Chesterton's essays, Tremendous Trifles.
** I don't worry too much about spelling - I ask for best effort in writing, and that includes spelling. I do let my son write using the computer and that has a spell check on it. If we walk a piece of writing through the editing process (and he and I have not done that yet, but we will soon for a short essay he has to write for his Confirmation class) then I do point out spelling errors...and I usually make sure that those words make it to a dictation lesson sometime soon. He was very concerned about his spelling last year, too, but with consistent dictations his spelling has made leaps ahead in progress so that I rarely hear him say anything about it. Not that his spelling doesn't still need improvement, just that it is improving and he can see it and it builds his confidence so that it's one less road block to his writing.
Not sure if anything here is helpful, Melinda. Looking forward to hearing observations from others!
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Jen Mackintosh
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MarilynW
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My observation - my boys seem to prefer non-fiction writing with definite instructions. They have no problems with oral narration or with written narrations in history or science. But creative writing has never been easy for them.
This year I have bought Story Starters and Rory's Story Cubes to encourage their creative writing.
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SallyT
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My just-turned-10-year-old, like his brother before him, is not a very willing writer at this stage. He did go through a phase of keeping a spy journal, which I happened to pick up and glance at not long ago. I was totally amazed that he had voluntarily written entries of . . . 2 sentences? 3? . . . in reasonably decent, basic prose, reasonably correctly spelled.
He'll be a 4th grader this year, and I am asking for written narrations for the first time. And I'm honestly not expecting much -- so far my experience with boys at this age has been that they do not cough up assigned writing very easily, though behind my back they may be writing away at things they're personally invested in. My older son at this age, who's now quite a proficient essay-writer, could barely squeeze out three sentences if I asked him to write, but then would turn around and write Redwall fan fiction. In fact, once I caught on to the fact that he was doing this, I largely just let it be his "composition curriculum."
The only thing about this is, of course, what if your child doesn't want to write ANYTHING? My basic approach has been to offer the tools: reading, copywork (my kids so far have transitioned pretty readily from a steady diet of copywork to independent writing), "book talk," ie narration, and the model of me writing. *So far,* when a given child has felt the need to write something, he (or she) has done it. So I see the "school" part as the offering of the tools for writing, but a lot of writing taking place in real life -- lists of things they want for their birthdays, grocery lists, expanding from lists to writing things like thank-you notes, keeping little travel (or spy) diaries, fan fiction . . . In short, anything that makes writing seem not like schoolwork, but like part of life. In general, all three of my children who have passed through this stage so far (girl 18, boy 14, boy 10) have been very, very quick to smell out "fakey assigned gimmicky writing that I don't want to do," and I have to admit that I don't blame them much, though Son1 did enjoy assignments in which he played the role of a newspaper reporter at various historical events, especially when I told him he could make his reports funny. Humor goes a long way as a motivator in my house.
I did see a real takeoff in my older son's writing when he was about 12, and I don't ask for *much* before that. Mostly I just assign longer and longer copywork passages, to acclimate the writer to the physical task of writing, say, a whole extended paragraph. And this year I will be asking for brief written narrations -- a sentence, say. If he wants to write more, that would be great, of course, but I'd be very happy with one sentence.
I also have found that my boys prefer to write on the computer, though I haven't been as ready to let my younger son do that (his handwriting has no margin for deterioration, let's just put it that way).
Hope this is helpful!
Sally
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SallyT
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OK, rereading your initial post this morning, Melinda -- he IS writing! What you're describing is fantastic! If he's writing letters of protest, he's writing paragraphs. He's starting to put arguments together. That's amazing! (so: as a pedagogical maneuver, make him mad a lot . . .  ).
I'm with Jen in not worrying about spelling a whole lot, except when walking through the editing process (I do agree about the helpfulness of spellcheck, which really did help my rather spelling-impaired oldest daughter to write more fluently without worrying about every word).
I also thought about a private blog. My older son started keeping one at 9 or 10, and though the project didn't last that long, it was a motivator.
And I do really agree with Jen that, while I don't ask for a lot of academic writing at this age, how an assignment is phrased can make all the difference (her example is perfect!). I'd also add that boys tend not to want to write "how would you feel in X's shoes" kinds of things -- they don't do emotional/empathetic. The example of this that comes to mind is from Leonard Sax's book Boys Adrift: a middle school boy is given a writing assignment on Lord of the Flies which asks him to imagine how he would feel if he were Piggy (the boy who's the ultimate victim in the novel). It's supposed to be an "empathy" kind of assignment, and the boy refuses to do it, because from his point of view, why would he want to identify with the kid who's the loser? Sax points out that a better version of the assignment, for a boy, would be to ask what he would *do* if he were there and saw the other boys bullying Piggy.
Really, though, at this age, the aim in any writing assignment is to acclimate the student to thinking in writing. School assignments exist (like a lot of things in institutional school) to replicate things that would naturally happen in a reading, writing, conversing, literate home -- which of course is the kind of home too many children don't have, but that's another conversation altogether. If, at home, your child has and takes advantage of naturally-occurring opportunities to write (like letters to relatives, captions for pictures, etc etc), and is encouraged to do things like this and surrounded by other people who are using writing all the time, then he is learning to think in writing. From there, it's not that hard to make the transition to more formal writing in middle/high school, because he's already made writing part of his thinking process -- you just teach him to shape what he already does for particular academic situations.
So while I wouldn't not assign writing, I also wouldn't push too much, and I'd observe and take stock of what he does on his own initiative, count that as learning, and maybe shape what assignments I did give along the lines of what he likes to do.
But again, what you're describing is GREAT!
Sally
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I really agree with Sally's observations on this, and in particular wanted to underline her statement below. (I added the bolded emphasis. )
SallyT wrote:
| If, at home, your child has and takes advantage of naturally-occurring opportunities to write (like letters to relatives, captions for pictures, etc etc), and is encouraged to do things like this and surrounded by other people who are using writing all the time, then he is learning to think in writing. From there, it's not that hard to make the transition to more formal writing in middle/high school, because he's already made writing part of his thinking process -- you just teach him to shape what he already does for particular academic situations. |
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While there are opportunities for worthy writing in the home in upper elementary years, they need not be so contrived, nor do they need to look like those writing assignments we would normally see in a brick and mortar setting or even a school-in-a-box type assignment. It's just that in the earlier years, our "writing instruction" looks so much different than what the neighbors next door are bringing home! Given time and room to develop, more formal writing does happen. And, I'd further agree with Sally that your son is really doing great based on your characterization of his current writing!
I go back to the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin and see so much the profound influence of a literary life, one full of books, discussions, and the goal of emulating good writing - all of which we provide in a literary rich home.
In particular, I really appreciate the way Sally characterizes our role (meaning we, the mom/teacher) in the use of the phrase, "offering the tools for writing". I would agree most wholeheartedly with that idea and characterization! In the earlier years we foster a literary rich home, nurture discussions and narrations around rich, worthy literature, and encourage worthy, meaningful writing (which means that it has to be meaningful to the child...ie - letters of protest, and written narrations about something the child has read and therefore knows about -- not an abstract idea, see Sally's example for that). And in the upper years, we begin to offer more formal tools for writing, which is something that up to that point, has been very natural and enjoyed. Writing up to this point has simply been a natural extension of how the child communicates. In the upper years, we give them those tools, and help them polish the skill of writing, while allowing the child's "writing voice" to continue to develop and mature. It really is a very enjoyable way to nurture writing, and I'd agree with Sally, your son is right on track!
Perhaps each term you can consider a different treat deprivation to prompt a new written work! 
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SeaStar
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Thanks so much for all the feedback. Sally, you are right about being able to sniff out gimmicky assignments... my ds is on to that right away. He has to feel there is a purpose to his writing.
This would be the first year I would consider even asking for written narrations. He loves to narrate when he is *read to*, but he grumbles still about having to read something on his own and then narrate it to me.
Maybe, like Jen said, I should put off asking for written narration until he turns ten- perhaps start after Christmas. In the meantime I could ask him for more independent reading narrations.
I have to say that the thought of son+written narration makes me sweat in this case. He is slow to adapt to change, and he will see this as a huge change and something done just to make his life harder. Well- what else can you expect from The Meanest Mom in the World? Putting the brakes on ice cream wasn't enough, so I will have to find a new way to torture him
Ironically, when I was in fifth grade, we read some of Ben Franklin's autobiography, and I still remember how he would read something famous, then write his own version, then go back and rewrite from his version to the original. I would love to know what motivated him initially to do this... how he came up with the idea. Of course, being brilliant probably helps.
Anyway, ds always keeps me on my toes. The other day he actually typed out a notice that said, " No daily mass Friaday" on paper the same color as the bulletin. He cut it out and brought it to me, asking me if I had seen this notice in the bulletin .
Then he realized his spelling error gave him away... I didn't know whether to laugh or be appalled. He is discovering the power of the written word... while turning my hair gray.
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SeaStar wrote:
| Maybe, like Jen said, I should put off asking for written narration until he turns ten- perhaps start after Christmas. |
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I think ten is a good age for beginning to ease into written narrations, Melinda. And your idea to start after Christmas is a good one! I have an idea for you, that has really been effective here, to help him transition to written narrations.
If he really resists change, a very good way to gently walk a child into written narrations is to allow them to orally narrate to you while you type their narration. Have him stand or sit next to you, and you type as he talks. Try to capture his narration exactly as he narrates it! Print it out for him to read.
It is always surprising and reassuring when we do this because we both see the adjectives, the different phrasing, the clauses, the observations that the child is using in their speaking and thus, their writing. It REALLY helps my kids to SEE their oral narration IN the written word.
Only do this once a week and try to stick with a good book. Halliburton's books are really good for this! (The Royal Road to Romance {not about romance at all!!! }, The Occident, The Orient) But any really exciting, adventurous book with shortish chapters would work well here!
Print them and keep them in a notebook, or perhaps include a few in his Book of Centuries. It's a way of indicating that you're making a turn in his narrations. He's still narrating, but the way he communicates them is changing and expanding a little, but it's slow and gentle.
SeaStar wrote:
Anyway, ds always keeps me on my toes. The other day he actually typed out a notice that said, " No daily mass Friaday" on paper the same color as the bulletin. He cut it out and brought it to me, asking me if I had seen this notice in the bulletin .
Then he realized his spelling error gave him away... I didn't know whether to laugh or be appalled. He is discovering the power of the written word... while turning my hair gray. |
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Jen Mackintosh
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SeaStar wrote:
| He loves to narrate when he is *read to*, but he grumbles still about having to read something on his own and then narrate it to me. |
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...and I would REALLY work on building this habit of narrating after independent reading.
Again, start very, very slowly, with really short independent reading and narrating. If it helps, only ask for one narration from an independently read book every 2 days just so it isn't overwhelming to him at first, but keep it on your radar and watch for him to gently improve and keep stretching that to more narrations from his independent reading and less from read alouds. Otherwise, you're going to get to 8th grade with a student that will still balk at narrating unless you read it aloud. 
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Jen Mackintosh
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SeaStar
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Mackfam wrote:
SeaStar wrote:
| He loves to narrate when he is *read to*, but he grumbles still about having to read something on his own and then narrate it to me. |
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...and I would REALLY work on building this habit of narrating after independent reading.
Again, start very, very slowly, with really short independent reading and narrating. If it helps, only ask for one narration from an independently read book every 2 days just so it isn't overwhelming to him at first, but keep it on your radar and watch for him to gently improve and keep stretching that to more narrations from his independent reading and less from read alouds. Otherwise, you're going to get to 8th grade with a student that will still balk at narrating unless you read it aloud. |
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Yes- we just had that discussion today... about how I can't read everything to him, all the time. Sheesh!
I think my plan will be to:
Increase independent reading narration to 2x per week, with a goal of
increasing that to 3x per week by Christmas
After Christmas start written narration with me typing out his narrations once a week and keeping those in a binder. Then gradually asking him to start writing his own... starting out slowly with asking only for 2-3 sentences at a time, once a week, and hopefully building on that so that by the end of grade 4 he will be writing a narration of a few sentences 1-2/week.
In the meantime, watch out for fake bulletin notices and encourage letter writing; he likes to write letters when he's in the right mood. Also, sometimes I can get him to write lists- for camping, etc... though it's a struggle as he thinks things like soap and clean underwear are optional after marshmallows and nerf swords.
Thanks so much for all the input and guidance!
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Melinda, mom to ds ('02) and dd ('04)
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Sounds like a fantastic and really workable plan, Melinda! 
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Jen Mackintosh
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SeaStar
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One other question:
I usually have both kids read aloud to me every day, just a few pages.
Can I drop that with ds as I have him move more to reading independently and narrating?
We do plenty of read alouds, and he is not shy about asking the meanings of words. I am not too worried about vocabulary building.
But I do think he would balk about reading aloud to me and then also reading on his own and narrating that. I thought I might alternate between having him read to me and having him read on his own and narrate, but not both every day.
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SeaStar wrote:
One other question:
I usually have both kids read aloud to me every day, just a few pages.
Can I drop that with ds as I have him move more to reading independently and narrating? |
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Absolutely. I'd drop his reading aloud to me immediately and limit that to him reading his dictation selection aloud only!
SeaStar wrote:
| But I do think he would balk about reading aloud to me and then also reading on his own and narrating that. I thought I might alternate between having him read to me and having him read on his own and narrate, but not both every day. |
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I wouldn't even alternate having him read aloud to me. That may be just me...but since his reading is going well, and he's coming to you for unknown words, I'd drop him reading aloud to me ENTIRELY at this point unless we're just enjoying a neat family book and he's in the queue to be one of the readers. I'd move him to completely independent reading and narrating to me. Use your time with him in a different way - right now you're listening to him read...shift that to listening to his narrations. It's a better use of your time and a further building up of the habit of narrating for him.
If he'd balk at this instant change, keep one book as a book he reads aloud to you, with the goal to taper that off by Christmas. In other words, see to it the book is finished by Christmas and by then he'll be more in the habit of reading independently and narrating. Just don't put it back on his schedule.
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SallyT
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I have to say that this is a great and timely conversation, because -- despite my apparent overflow of wisdom -- it is where I am with my 10yo, in terms of narrations. "I can't read EVERYTHING out loud" is exactly what I've been thinking! Melinda, your plans look good, and I'm bookmarking this thread.
Sally
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SeaStar
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SallyT wrote:
I have to say that this is a great and timely conversation, because -- despite my apparent overflow of wisdom -- it is where I am with my 10yo, in terms of narrations. "I can't read EVERYTHING out loud" is exactly what I've been thinking! Melinda, your plans look good, and I'm bookmarking this thread.
Sally |
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I had my ds reading independently and narrating one day a week last year, and it was not his favorite thing. At all.
When I talked him through the plan for this year, there was instant melt down and copious crying and protesting  . But at least he didn't howl like a wolf and hyperventilate like he does when he really gets worked up (you can see what I'm up against....).
We settled on independent reading and narrating twice a week until his birthday in November, and then after that three times a week. Today he did his reading alone, narrated and then still wanted to read out loud to me on the couch. I'm not sure if it's the one-on-one time with mom he's after, or he thinks his sister is getting something he's now being denied.
Or maybe it's just the change.
And we try to do as many subjects as we can all together, so that has been one reason why I still read aloud so much during school. My dd would not be able to read some of the books that we use on her own yet, and I sure don't want to do every subject twice with two kids.
So it is all a work in progress. I see that I could read history aloud to both kids and then assign ds extra reading from an additional book just for him. Ah, then I am sure we'd have some good wolf howling... which is so frustrating, and yet just try to listen to a 9 yr old literally howling in protest some days and try not to laugh.
Do you ever think: Where DID this boy come from?
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I'll be reading through this thread in detail, but just the OP brings me some peace. My son is just barely 8 and I do get discouraged about writing... so I'll be reading through all the followups to store away and have reasonable expectations!
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Topic: The reality of writing with boys
