Teaching children to write can be a long and painful process. If you can add some enjoyment along the way, it makes it more palatable.  When my children were a bit younger, we did quite a few creative writing projects, which made writing fun.  The main thing that we did was to publish short stories once every year.  Our bookshelf is full of home published books.  Over the next few months I would like to post some of my children’s stories to this site for inspiration to other budding authors.

A few years ago, I hosted an author’s co-op in which several families joined together to learn about how stories are put together.  Each of the children also wrote and published their own story over a period of a few months.  I have updated the instructions that were given to these children, and published them as a book entitled In Print: A Beginner’s Guide to Writing and Publishing Short Stories at Home.  This book is available to purchase as a printed copy or digital download.

Another activity that we have done to encourage writing is to make historical newspapers.  We invited several other families to join us.  I acted as the editor of our newspaper, and “hired” the children to write for me.  Pay was in a currency that we made up ourselves – Giggles, Laughs and Smilies. At the end of the project, students each took a portion of the paper, and digitally arranged the appropriate articles in it.  Not only did they gain writing experience, but also helpful computer skills.  Ancient Times and How to Write About Them is available for free for a limited time.