We are happy to announce the release of our latest book: Learn to Write, Write!: A DIY Writer’s Companion. This addition to our Handy-Mom Tool series is your guide to discovering and practicing the art of writing.
The title is taken from a chapter in Ruth Beechick’s book You Can Teach Your Child Successfully. In that chapter, Dr. Beechick explains:
Writing is the other side of reading. Reading is receiving language and writing is producing it. While children grow in reading and writing abilities, they carry on a dialogue, like an extended conversation. Children write. Then they read and see the way books do it. Then they write again, influenced by what happened in their minds while reading….
You have seen a similar process in your children when they learned to talk. The dialogue continued for three or four years. They listened and they spoke. They listened and they spoke. And by age five or so they emerged as competent little users of oral language. To do as well in written language, they need years of the same kind of dialogue. They must read, and write; read, and write.
This is the method we used to educate our own children. And they are writers. The book is dedicated to Dr. Beechick.
Learn to Write, Write!
Ready to start writing?
In Q&A format, the book covers the basics, such as finding something to write and overcoming fears. Then it moves on to more advanced topics like revising your work and cultivating your voice and style.
Topics covered include:
- Why Write.
- The Writer.
- Tips for Beginners.
- The Basics of Writing.
- The Mechanics of Writing.
- Improving Writing.
The text gets out of the way as great writers and their writing encourage you to apply their ideas to your own writing.
Throughout the book are challenges that encourage you to put pencil to paper and stretch your abilities as you learn by doing.
Writing is not only key to communicating, but also to learning and thinking.
Many people (writers or not) have questions about writers and writing. Many times young people have questions that sound more like, why do I need to do this? And their question is very astute.
There is an obvious problem with the way writing is taught today. It isn’t caught. There are those who would argue writing cannot even be taught. We teach the grammar and mechanics of writing, but those are the tools of writing not the actual writing itself. So it isn’t surprising that students come away wondering when they will ever need to know what a predicate adjective is, or how being able to identify a participial phrase plays a role in their future.
The bottom line is that writers write. It is in their writing that writers grow and improve their craft. This DIY handy-mom tool will guide you forward, whether you are a beginner or a wordsmith.
Learn to write. Write!
Learn to Write, Write!: A DIY Writer’s Companion
Ready to get started writing? Learn to Write: Write! is your guide to discovering and practicing the art of writing. Cover the basics, such as finding something to write and overcoming fears, to more advanced topics like revising your work and cultivating your voice and style. The book gets out of the way as great writers and their writing encourage you to apply their ideas to your own writing. Put pencil to paper and stretch your abilities as you learn by doing. Learn more.