Encourage your child to talk to you about their writing lessons and homework.  Ask questions to spark their creative thinking and listen as they share wonderful, fun, and inspiring ideas.

Decorating Notebooks and Collecting Ideas for Tomorrow's Writing

Tonight, decorate the cover of your writer's notebook.  Some students use laminated photos, dried flowers, pictures from magazines, or their own designs and drawings.  One way or another, you will need to personalize your notebook to make it special, because it will hold your writing, it will hold your stories - which means it will hold precious pieces of your life.

As you decorate your notebook, keep in mind that tomorrow you will another chance to write in it.  So, when you are at home with your family, be on the lookout for stories. Listen for stories. When things happen at home, let them jog your mind so memories surface. When you feed your cat, maybe you'll remember the day you picked her out from a litter of kittens. When you take out the garbage, maybe you'll remember the time you saw a big raccoon on top of the garbage can. Tomorrow, come to the writing workshop already remembering some stories you could write.

Noticing Stories Like Writers Do

Tonight when you are at home, pay attention tot he stories that hide in places of your life. Think about the places in your life that hold stories, and come to school ready to talk about lots and lots of ideas you have for Small Moment stories you can write during writing workshop. You should live differently because you write. Be like a magnet, pulling story ideas to you.

Living Like Writers, Noticing Details

Tonight, instead of writing with details, live with details.  Watch your dog slide between you and the newspaper you're trying to read, as if she's saying, "Read to me!" Notice that the tower of books beside your bed shows how your reading tastes have changed over the last few weeks or months.  Pay attention to the fact that in your household, there is only one person who can find the heads to Lego-people Does your little sister have stash of heads hidden away so that she can save the day? Most people wouldn't wonder about this. Most people walk right past details.  But writers are people who pause and say, "Hmmm....this is interesting!" The poet Naomi Nye says it this way: "Truly, I feel irresponsible when I don't notice things well enough, when I slide or slip through a day...I want to hear the cat down the street during the block."

The Writer's Job in a Conference

Today, you learned about your job in a writing conference.  For homework, you'll rehearse for that job.  Imagine that a teacher pulls up a chair next to you.  Think about your writing so you'll be ready to talk about it with the teacher.  Remember, teachers tend to ask questions like the ones below in conferences, so be ready to answer them: