My Published Writing - Parenting

Playing with Words:
Encouraging the Young Writer in Your House

Published February 2000 in Parents Express, Philadelphia

        Some kids live to get home from school to watch TV to find out if Ash has caught all 151 Pokemon yet and achieved master status. Others can hardly wait to run outside to shoot a few hoops or play street hockey. There are those whose favorite past time is pioneered in their own imaginations where they exercise creativity while playing with words, sentences and metaphors. Most parents know how to nourish the passion of the young sports enthusiast by signing them up for soccer, basketball, and baseball. We take them to pro games and encourage lots of athletic activity. What about the budding young writer? Their talent needs to be maximized, too, but the initial task is to recognize it.

"For a child of all ages, the first thing you look for is if they like to play with words," says Dr. Andrea Fishman, Director of the Pennsylvania Writing and Literature Project, based at West Chester University. Children who play with sounds, words and rhyming are developing the basics for an interest in writing and language.

Kids who like to listen to stories and also tell them are, as she says, "internalizing a model for communication," since storytelling is what you do when you write.

Just about any child has the potential to be a writer, but so often either the skills aren’t developed or a fear of writing is created by well-meaning parents and teachers, Fishman says. If you’ve ever had to write a "Why I should behave on the playground" essay, you end up thinking that writing is
penalty, not a recreation of the mind.

The best way for a writer to develop skills is to write, no matter what age you are. Parents should encourage their children by supplying them with the necessary tools - pencils, pens, pads of paper, or a computer with a word processing program, if you can manage it. And kids need space and time to write.

"Fluency with words, comes from using words," says Fishman, "whether it is writing letters, stories or poems. The more somebody writes, the better they are."

The Young Writers/Young Readers summer program of the Pennsylvania Writing and Literature Project offers kids, grades 1 - 12, a creative environment where they explore their talents three hours a day over a two week period by writing, frequently on topics they choose themselves.

"We make a literary community of writers and a community of readers," says Fishman. "Being part of that community is such a supportive experience, a warm experience. It makes the kids feel encouraged."

Sharing their writing and getting feedback from peers and the teacher helps the participants understand how others interpret their work and how they can improve it. They’re also encouraged to carry journals and each writer has a page in a published class anthology.

Being published validates a writer of any age. Jess Limbacher, 13, of Ambler will tell you that it’s not really that hard. She had her first story published when she was in 4th grade after being encouraged by her teacher who thought the story was worthy of a wider audience. Since then she has had a total of 13 stories and poems in 6 different publications: Stone Soup, The Children’s Magazine, New Moon, Acorn, Word Dance and Young Voices. Her scary tale "The Ghost of Pebble Beach," is currently posted in the sample issue of Stone Soup at their web site.

Most of the stories she submits have been assignments that have been revised several times as part of her required school work. Since she’s an avid reader of books and magazines, she’s developing marketing skills necessary for publishing.

"Once you get published in them [magazines] a lot, and I read Stone Soup all the time, you start to know what the editors are looking for," says Jess. "[At Stone Soup] They like descriptions and feelings, and I think they like stories that are true to life stories about kids and school."

Jess is obviously on target as she’s had 6 stories published in Stone Soup, a publication which receives 10,000 submissions annually and only publishes 50.

"We look for stories in which the writer has something to say, "says Stone Soup editor, Gerry Mandel. "We look for a good beginning, middle, and end, realistic dialogue, good descriptions of people, places, and things, and an engaging plot." Those are good guidelines for any story.

Jess has the following advice to kids interested in publishing their work: Check out the writer’s guidelines first since kids’ publications have a variety of requirements. Some ask for submission fees or a prior subscription to the magazine. Others have rules for manuscript preparation and require that a self addressed stamped envelope [SASE] accompany the manuscript for a speedy reply from the editors. Don’t take rejection letters personally. It’s just part of the writing process since sometimes magazines have too many manuscripts in their files at the time you submit. If you’re interested in seeing your words in print, don’t give up. Parents can help out by reading over manuscripts to check for errors and by reviewing the submission guidelines.

" I like to read kids’ stories," says Jess. I actually find that a lot of the stories that the kids write are sort of more realistic. I guess most of them are experiencing what they are writing about now, so they know it better than adults."

Jess isn’t the only writer in her family. Her brother Scott, 10, has 3 published pieces under his belt. Both kids were interested in writing from a very young age and even before he could write, Scott would dictate stories to his mother for her to write down. They even formed their own family writer’s group.

"We used to sit around, Jess and Scott and I, and just write," says mom, Franca Limbacher. "And then we would share what we had written with each other. Then Jess would comment, ‘Maybe you need a simile here,’ or ‘I don’t quite get that part."

Early on, writing at the Limbacher house became an exercise in fun, tossing words around the way you’d toss a ball. That’s the way it should be.

So next time the kids want to veg out watching TV, why not suggest they make up their own story about their favorite characters? Or better yet, they can make up their own characters. Maybe they’ll flex their vocabulary and come up with something entertaining. Who knows, you could be encouraging a budding scriptwriter. At the very least, maybe they won’t complain as much when they get their next writing assignment from school once they know they can submit it to a magazine and actually get paid for doing their homework!

Copyright 2000 Susan M. Lang

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