No two people are alike. For that matter, no two animals are alike either! One mark of a great story is believable characters, each with his or her own distinct personality and habits. Author Kaley Birchfield is only eleven years old. Her story, “A Home for Barney” (the featured story from our March/April 2014 issue), is only six pages long. Somehow, in those six short pages, Kaley manages to bring to life a whole host of human and animal characters. How does she do it? There’s the narrator, Christy, a young woman who works at a goat farm. From the first sentence, we see that Christy loves nature. As the story goes on, we learn that she is emotional, loving, and a bit of a worrier. Christy’s co-worker, Marla, seems kind of slow at first. Little by little, we see that, while Marla may not say much, she is wise, and she feels things deeply. Their boss, Jenny, is a take charge kind of person, full of confidence. But she has a soft side and feels sad, like Christy does, when Barney the goat has to leave. Then there’s Barney and another goat, Mocha. They couldn’t be more different from each other. Barney is gentle, calm, and affectionate. Mocha is unfriendly and moody. Even the family that arrives at the end of the story has well-drawn characters, especially the bubbly, impulsive youngest sister, Autumn. It would be boring if Kaley simply listed each character’s distinguishing qualities. Instead, she shows us what each character is like through their words, actions, gestures, and speech. Marla seems unemotional, but the goodbye hug she gives Christy speaks volumes. Christy’s emotions are up and down as she and Barney are separated and reunited more than once. At different times Christy’s shoulders sag, she can’t sleep, she has a lump in her throat. She is overjoyed when Barney runs up to her after their separations. When Autumn realizes how sad Christy is to lose Barney, she blurts out her family’s address and tells Christy to come visit. Why do we write stories? Why do we read them? You can probably think of many answers to these questions. Maybe we like to leave our own lives for a little while and lose ourselves in the lives of others. Maybe we have feelings of sadness that we can’t express, and a sad story helps us tap into our own feelings and get them out. And no matter how young or how old we are, we can always learn. We can learn how to be better people, more loving toward each other and our pets, more understanding, better able to cope with loss and change. But before we can get all these benefits from a story, we must believe in it. We must believe that the characters are real.
teaching writing
Art Inspired Writing
“But I can’t think of anything to write about,” my kids cry as an excuse for daydreaming out the window. Then in an attempt to divert their attention from the window or to prevent a breakdown, I end up struggling along with them in the quest for a great idea. I’ve heard that the best ideas are often right in front of you, but it wasn’t until after I had fenced far too many complaints of writer’s block that I realized I had the answer to this problem all along. Over the years, I’ve used art to inspire my writing, creating an ekphrasis based on a Remedios Varo painting, or a haiku inspired by a photo of my grandpa as a boy; however, I had never thought to incorporate art right in my own home, in my children’s writing lessons. Who knows if that light bulb would have gone on had I not stumbled upon the article, Ten Ideas That Get Kids Writing, which relates the story of a Chicago-based teacher who used sculpture to inspire her students’ writing. “Of course, why didn’t I think of using art before?” Painting, sculpture, music, photography, dance, the arts are a wonderful way to get a child’s creative juices flowing. Where is this boy going? Now when ideas are slow to come, I have a supply of photos on hand that often help solve the problem. The photos include shots of family, friends, previous vacations, and nature; pictures of paintings and sculptures from galleries or the Internet; as well as clips from children’s magazines. I give them three or four photos to choose from so as not to overwhelm them; after they choose a photo, we talk about what’s happening in it, how it makes us feel, and what it makes us think of. Many times this process alone sparks an idea, but if not, I’ll provide an additional prompting question based on the photo, like “Where is this person going?” “Why is she happy/sad?” “Why did the artist use… (Fill in the blank)?” These questions may lead them in various directions from making up a story about someone in the photo to writing about the artist or creating something seemingly unrelated to the photo altogether. Not so long ago, my daughter struggled to come up with a poem using a repeating pattern. After looking through some photos, she chose one of our cats, and here’s what she came up with: My Calm and Gentle Cat As I wander around the house, I see my cat lying on the bed. As I gently pick him up, I feel as if I’m holding a cloud. As I rock him side to side in my arms, love rushes through my heart. As I see him close his eyes and fall asleep, I gently lay him down, and his soft purring fills me with peace. Art doesn’t have to be saved as a last resort. When you have more time to plan, why not develop a lesson around a trip to the local art gallery, symphony hall, or dance performance? These are great opportunities not only to help children appreciate other art forms but also to inspire their writing. What emotion do you feel when listening to the violinist? Write a lyrical poem about it. What story are the dancers telling? Write a fairy tale about the lead dancer. Whether it’s pre-planned or off-the-cuff, art in various forms not only inspires ideas but it can also help you teach genre, such as poetry and short story, as well as specific writing techniques. If you’re not sure how to start, Literacyhead is a helpful site that offers numerous writing lesson plans using images. So let the arts move you.
Book Review: “Models for Teaching Writing-craft Target Skills” by Freeman and Koehler
No doubt about it, reading positively affects writing; however, educators often struggle with how to integrate the former into writing instruction. Freeman and Koehler seek to meet that need with Models for Teaching Writing-craft Target Skills, a teacher’s guide for utilizing “the strong connection between reading and writing.” Using “literature models,” the authors present their method for teaching the craft of writing to children in kindergarten through eighth grade. The approach of using literature models, more commonly referred to as mentor texts, relies on well-written fiction, nonfiction, and poetry as representations of specific techniques that children will learn. Models for Teaching provides a thorough overview of why and how to use this approach to teach writing, but the core of this book is its presentation of specific writing craft techniques, which they call Target Skills®. These skills are categorized into three groups: organizational skills address writing introductions and conclusions and using the writing process; composing skills include but are not limited to descriptive writing and using literary devices while skills in conventions deal with punctuation, spelling and grammar. Each individual technique is provided its own page that not only describes the device and its function but also provides an example and the titles of five age appropriate and easily accessible texts that represent its use. As experienced teachers and curriculum developers, Freeman and Koehler anticipate the teacher’s apprehension about lesson presentation, so they provide a sample step-by-step instructional outline and script, making this text a teacher’s “go-to guide for writing-craft instruction.” Although Models for Teaching is written with public school teachers in mind, it proves to be an invaluable addition to the homeschoolers reference library. Logically organized and void of excessive academic verbiage, this instructional text is understandable and easy to adapt to the homeschool classroom. Because the authors have completed the tedious and time-consuming task of finding exemplary texts as well as provided lesson planning guidance, Models for Teaching Writing-craft Target Skills makes it painless for parents to incorporate this effective literature-based method into their children’s writing curriculum.
