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Eliminating writer's block
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AP Photo/Denis Poroy
You ask your young child to write a story and he looks at you blankly and proclaims that he doesn’t know what to write about. Or you’re an older student and you’ve been asked by a teacher at school to write a paper on ‘global warming’— or worse a creative writing assignment. Problem: you can’t think of a word to say.
Is this writer’s block? Well, sort of. Writer’s block has to do with not being able to get on paper what is stored in your head, and it occurs even to professional writers. An idea for an article or book might sound good when the writer first thinks of the concept, but upon attempting to actually write, they might find they can’t seem to get started. Often times, this happens because writers think it has to come out perfect the first time. Their internal critic begins to take over and writers get a form of stage fright. Other times, writers realize they don’t have enough information to write about a particular topic and must take a step back and do further research. Or the project may not be interesting enough to excite the author to tackle the assignment in the first place.
For children, writer’s block is different. They simply don’t have a huge store of information, ideas, or words to access when they sit down to write. Their internal critic, unlike the adult’s, which might say “you’re not good enough to write well”, tells them that they don’t know how to approach an assignment, or that they don’t know how to explain what they want to say.
For adults with writer’s block the common advice given is simple:
- Write anything just to get started – don’t worry about it being perfect or writing the best book or article ever.
- Get your body moving – physical exercise sometimes relaxes the mind and allows ideas to flow.
- Spend some time reading about the topic you’re writing about or even watching a movie with some relation to your work.
For children, the same advice applies with some added suggestions. You still want to reassure them that you’re not looking for perfection in their first draft. They shouldn’t be overly concerned with spelling or with writing brilliant sentences during the crafting process. And sometimes it does help to take a small break, though this wouldn’t be my first suggestion for children, unless they’re clearly upset about the assignment.
Mostly, children need to feel confident that they have something to say. The best way to prepare children to write is to do a lot of pre-writing. With proper preparation for a writing assignment, writer’s block goes away. What children need is help thinking through their story or paper before they actually begin writing.
Teachers like to use graphic organizers. The web is popular. The child puts ‘dog’ in the center and lines shoot out where the child writes details about the topic. To me this isn’t much different than telling them to simply write. It might help them organize better, but doesn’t help with knowing what to say. Instead, young writers should spend their pre-writing time doing the following:
- Drawing a scene or doing an art assignment about their story. An example of this was something I did with my own children. Armed with a camera, they had to follow the dog around for a day and photograph him eating, playing, barking, etc. The next day, I explained that they were going to write a mystery. I gave them typical characteristics of a mystery, told them that they were going to start their story by having their pet realize that something was wrong. Their food or pet dish was missing maybe. Using the photographs, they were going to show how the pet feels about the problem, how he finds clues to solve his problem, explain how he gets into trouble during the search, and how he finally solves the crime. My children were dying to use their photographs and write the story. No writer’s block. No crying. No sitting at the table wondering what to write about. This idea came from a book called Kids Write! by Rebecca Olien. This book it is filled with wonderful creative writing activities to make children excited about writing. It is the best book I have found to introduce children to different genres.
- The second suggestion is to involve children in reading. If you want them to write a mystery, have them read two or three mysteries first. Ask them questions about what those mysteries had in common. Discuss what the author might have done differently or how they would do it differently. Then let them re-write part of the story their own way or try their own version of the story.
Preparation is the absolute most important part of writing, especially for children. Asking them to write about dinosaurs or volcanoes or whatever, is not enough and will most likely make them produce an unimaginative, flat paper.
Active, creative, interesting prewriting is the key to beating writer’s block forever. Give it a try.
For more info visit: No More Writer's Block; Scholastic.com; How To Help Kids With Writer's Block; Creative Reinforcement for Writers
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