Recreating the Wheel Contest

I am not a Homeschooler, but very often I found myself having to encourage my children to continue their writing during the summer months. Here are a couple of ideas that worked well for both my son and daughter (2 years apart in age).


1. Picture Story

Take a composition notebook and a few old magazines.
Have the child cut out interesting pictures (but don't tell them why yet),
Then have the child glue one of the pictures to the top of the page.
(Keep the rest in an envelope)
Then instruct the child to write a story about the picture!

2. Complete the idea

There are several website that have writing prompts for everyday of the year, but normally they are to advanced for children. So one day I had my children brainstorm "What if's", and then jotted them down on strips of colored paper. I then put them in a jar and had them pull from the jar on days that they were "bored". They always got a giggle when they read them, and then I had them write their stories on fun colored paper to add to the excitement.