Raising a Writer: Fabulous Ways to Nurture Young Writers (continued)

-Encourage your child to play with words—literally. Whip up a batch of homemade playdough or purchase some modeling clay so that your child can have fun making letters and spelling words. Note: If you want your child to be able to keep the results of his labors, go with a recipe for salt dough ornaments instead. Simply paint the ornaments with acrylic paints and then spray them with some spray shellac.

-Smear a thin layer of shaving cream on the bottom of a non-stick cookie sheet and show your child how to write words in the shaving cream using his finger. Note: You can add a few drops of food colouring to the shaving cream for an extra-colourful effect.

-Give your child “the write stuff”—an assortment of brightly coloured pens that positively glide across the page plus some colourful lined paper. With any luck, having some extra-nifty writing supplies will encourage your child to put pen to paper.

-Tap into the power of penpals. Hook your child up with a penpal—perhaps a long-distance cousin or a friend who recently moved to another community. It doesn’t matter whether the letters end up zooming back and forth via e-mail or snail mail. What matters is that your child has a compelling reason to sit down at the keyboard and write.