Sharing your thoughts!
Writing Themes by Quarter
Quarter 1
Descriptive Paragraph
Quarter 2
Personal Narrative / Memoir
Quarter 3
Personal Essay
Quarter 4
Research
Does your child struggle with Writing? What Can You Do?
What Can You Ask Your Child to Do?
Quarter 1
Descriptive Paragraph
Quarter 2
Personal Narrative / Memoir
Quarter 3
Personal Essay
Quarter 4
Research
Does your child struggle with Writing? What Can You Do?
- Have paper, pencils, chalk, and markers available.
- Let your child see you reading and writing: shopping lists; letters and e-mails to teachers, family, and friends; telephone messages; reminder notes; and diary or journal entries. Children learn to value reading and writing from your example.
- Send your child messages. Tuck a note into your child's lunchbox. Stick a note with a question onto his or her pillow or bedroom door. Ask for a written reply.
- Look at magazine pictures together. Improve your child's vocabulary and sharpen his or her observation skills by describing what each of you see.
What Can You Ask Your Child to Do?
- Plan his or her birthday party, including writing invitations, listing party activities, and making up a menu.
- Write a letter to a story character or between two story characters, such as the Big Bad Wolf apologizing to the Three Little Pigs.
- Put family photographs in an album and write captions and dates under them.
- On a snowy or rainy day, hide some "treasure" in several places inside and draw a treasure map with pictures and captions for a younger sister or brother to follow.
- Start a diary or a journal. Either might be just sheets of paper kept in a shoebox. Ask your child to describe a day's events, thoughts, or personal feelings. Suggest that your child also use it to record descriptions of interesting, beautiful, or unusual places.
- Write an e-mail letter to a distant friend or a favorite relative.