Writing Your Own Books

Posted by Montserrat | 0 comments

This past week as we cleaned out our school closet I came upon some treasures. Books written by my two oldest!

Several years ago when we were struggling with language arts I stepped away from our regular curriculum for a while and encouraged my daughters to write books instead. It was a memorable experience.

My oldest, who was 11 at the time, decided to write a book about our family. Each one of us had our own chapter. It was very fun to read her views on our personalities, likes, dislikes, attributes, etc. She was extremely observant!

My second oldest, who was 10, decided to write about her grandmothers and great-grandmothers. She wrote a chapter on each one telling stories that occurred to them throughout their lives but particularly when they were little like her. She called her grandmas asking them for stories and giggled so much she got the hiccups! It was a wonderful bonding experience for all of them.

Here’s a run down of what my children did when writing their books.

1. Chose their topic.

2. Did their research.

3. Wrote, wrote, wrote! I had them hand write their drafts but reluctant writers may enjoy using the computer instead.

4. Corrected grammatical, spelling, and punctuation errors.

5. Took lessons on using the thesaurus. Five neats in one paragraph are a little much, don’t you think?

6. Typed the final draft on the computer.

7. Published a few copies by printing them off and having them bound at a copy center.

We gave their books as gifts for Christmas that year. They were a huge hit! As I prepare for school to start again in a few short weeks I’ll be adding in “writing books” as part of our schedule. It’ll be a great process for my children to apply what they have been learning. And it will create more treasured keepsakes too!

Montserrat Wadsworth is completely devoted to her wonderful husband, Joseph, and their eight children (seven girls and one boy!). They live on a 4,000 acre alfalfa farm nestled in a small Northern Nevada valley. They’ve been homeschooling for 11+ years. Montserrat enjoys, photography, cooking, crafting, chocolate, and sloppy goodnight kisses. She strives to live each day as God would have her do following Mary’s biblical supplication, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.” (Luke 1:38) You can find her at her blog Chocolate On My Cranium.