We had a very on-top-of-it mother call us last week and ask for the dates so they could make arrangements for their summer vacation. Apparently, her daughter had such a great time last summer, she won’t go on her family vacation unless she is sure she is NOT missing writing camp. Very sweet.

We will have registration available beginning February 1st.

Don’t be afraid of the blank page. Get something down. Even if you think it sounds “stupid” you have to have a starting point. Every single time I write something, I think it sounds stupid. But your words are pieces of clay for you to mold, shape, and work. The blank page is only frightening when you leave it blank. Even “stupid” is smarter than nothing at all.

Plus, you often times will surprise yourself. What seemed ridiculous, is actually pretty good the next day. When you get a some feed back, sleep with your words and walk around with them for awhile, they keep getting better and better.

It’s NOT a simple thing. Nothing worthwhile is. Just dive in and let it go.

If you are a writer, you write. And real writers need to write. To “give it up” is only to put it off and be that much farther behind. When you are a writer, you always come back to it. I’ve heard authors call it a “curse,” but it’s a blessed curse–because it means that you have words stirring inside of you that cannot be suppressed.

Most of the students that come to our summer camp have this blessed curse. And Write On! is a joyful week of doing what they know inside they need to be doing all of the time.

Don’t let writing fall by the wayside during the school year! Even if writing isn’t a part of your regular school day, make it a part of your regular life. Without being prompted from camp or from a teacher, be prompted from that voice inside of you that has something to say. It’s part of being true to who you are.

I can’t remember. The only thing I do remember is that we have filled every seat, every year–and last year we literally had to tell the most wonderful kid in the world he couldn’t come because we didn’t have a chair for him.

What is interesting to us about the campers we have coming this year is that most of them are strangers to us. They are coming because their teacher recommended the camp, or they did an internet search, or their friend attended and told them how great it was. We heard that an Open Classroom teacher told her students that every 5th and 6th grade student in their school would benefit from coming to our camp. I love these teachers at the Open Classroom.

Our writing coaches were lucky to work with such talented young authors. You all worked so hard and published amazing pieces in one of our four class magazines.

Every day, one or both of our sessions played host to a published author. This year, our guests included Brandon Mull, author of the Fablehaven series, as well as Julie Wright, author of Hazzardous Universe , Julie’s illustrator Kevin Wasden,  published fifth grader Mackenzie Wagner, and Kate Coursey, winner of the PUSH Novel Contest and former coach for Write On! Workshops.

Thank you all for coming and participating. We wouldn’t be the same if any ONE of you were not there!

WRITE ON!

This is an important question for any reader, any age, even pre-readers. It helps children learn to be more aware of what they are reading and even start to “read like writers.”

It is common for young writers to write stories where there is no problem to be solved. One of the first stories my daughter Elise wrote was titled, “The Best Day.” In this story, it was the little girl’s birthday. She went to the ballet, got her hair done like a princess, chose her favorite gifts . . . and then eventually went to sleep. Though glorious to me because my sweet daughter wrote it, it is a story where nothing happens.

When children start to notice the problems that writers put into stories, they start to read like writers and come up with their own problems for stories.

“What’s the problem in this story?” has recently become a  game I play with my four year old. She’ll often demand me to ask her the question because she likes thinking of the answer. Sometimes it’s hard to narrow down the problem–because many stories have more than one.

But that’s what we like isn’t it? It’s the problem–the “suffering character” author Melissa Kantor called it once at camp–that keeps us reading.

And when we read them like a writer, they can even keep us writing.

But Sarah had her own goals. I mean goal. Finish the report. As soon as possible. Even spell check was taking too long. Any mention of “grabbing lead” or “revision” caused her eyes to grow wide and then weepy.

I found myself doing what any (type A) parent would do in my situation: typing the lead myself:  “Marco Polo was a good explorer.” It’s not a great lead. Not exactly grabbing. But at least it introduces the paper. Better than nothing.

“See?” I said. “That wasn’t too bad was it?”

She shrugged.

“Just remember Mom, this is MY report and not YOURS.”

True.

The problems with this situation are thick and sticky. The heart of it is that Sarah isn’t writing enough at school. If writing were a real part of her daily curriculum, she wouldn’t be afraid of revisions. She would be reading examples of good biography reports as a writer and perhaps have even noticed the kinds of leads she likes. She might even have watched her teacher write a biography report in front of the class and struggle with what kind of a lead to do. That one lesson would have made a big impact on how Sarah approached her own report tonight. A common mistake teachers make is to “cover” writing assignments. Writing, unfortunately, is not something that can be “covered” in one assignment. It is a process that takes time and daily work.

Another piece of the problem is me. As Sarah’s mom, I can’t expect to “cover” grabbing leads and revision in one homework assignment either. The best approach is to encourage and then piggyback on what they are doing right. When children are learning how to read, Mem Fox says you don’t make them suffer if they don’t know a word. You supply it for them and keep them reading. Eventually, they’ll get it on their own.

I think the same is true for writing. Sarah didn’t have a clue what I meant by “grabbing lead.” Tonight I supplied one for her. I didn’t write the whole thing for her, but I gave her a little scaffolding beyond what she could do on her own. I tried to keep it simple and not take over her entire paper. Even though her reaction was a little bothered, the paper remained essentially hers. Maybe next time she’ll think of her own. At least she’ll have something of an idea what I mean by a lead.

It’s so tricky, and humbling, to help a child with their writing. Lucy Calkins says you know you’ve succeeded if the child leaves you wanting to write more. Truthfully, I don’t know if I did that tonight. But I plan to keep her writing. Tonight was a wake-up reminder that I need to do it more.