Creative Writing Prompts

Sometimes creative writing can be a crisis when you are all out of ideas.  Until recently that is the slump we had found ourselves in.   Being a blog writer however; I am also a blog reader.  One particular blog has caught my attention is past weeks, not only for its written content but because of the excellent photography.  

On a particular day several of the photos caught my whimsy.  I loved them and I made one my desktop wallpaper.  After several days of staring at this particular picture I couldn’t help but make up imaginary stories in my mind. The geese in the picture kept coming to life and I found that my children where just as captivated by the photo as I was. 

That was when it hit me!  Here was our writing prompt we had been waiting for. Delighted with the prospect of being able to find inspiration anywhere on the web during the dreary winter weather I have begun collecting pictures for dull days.  My seven year old tells his story orally to all of us; while my older children write in their notebooks.  Here we have covered language for the day in one session for all age groups.  

Our Mother Tongue: A Review

Grammar workbooks are my bane.  Somewhere out there I am sure exists a grammar book that isn’t going to bring  frustration and a bunch of  busywork that leaves teachers wondering what sadistic person thought to put 50 sentences to diagram on each page and then have you spend valuable time grading those same sentences.  I’ve never like diagraming sentences and I’ve NEVER liked grammar workbooks. 

Easy Grammar – tried it, started to like it, hated it.  

A Beka Grammar – well laid out year after year after year the same old, same old thing.  Do you get the idea that it is repetitively redundant???

Winston Grammar – Scared of it simply by the looks.

Jensen’s Grammar – Teacher sleeps through book.

Bob Jones Grammar – Easier version of  A Beka.

But finally I think I have found something that makes grammar an interesting subject to pursue.  Our Mother Tongue by Nancy Wilson is a brilliantly simple approach to understanding grammar “without bringing your soul down to Sheol.”  I have thoroughly looked it over and found simple explanations for higher grammar that even my fifth grader can handle while being able to catch myself up on things I must have *hmhmmm” missed in public school.

Writing An Autobiography

Here is an excellent resource for brainstorming about what to put in an autobiography.  My children really enjoyed this exercise and I was delighted to find all the work done for me as it simplified explaining what I wanted them to do regarding writing an autobiography.  

Where do I log hours for Reading or Language in my daily log?

One of the things that confused me when I began homeschooling was understanding the difference between Reading and Language Arts.  Some places seperate the two and some teach reading as part of Language Arts.  Unless you are ordering all your curriculum straight from a place like www.abeka.com or www.bjupress.com than you may have difficulty understanding where to log the hours for these two subjects. 

Language Arts includes:

• parts of speech
• sentence structure
• word usage
• punctutation usage
• writing
• reference skills
• using reference materials

Reading

• phonics
• word recognition
• vocabulary
• oral & silent reading
• reading comprehension
• literature
• composition

You can find more detailed information in the following link.  It is the scope and sequence from Bob Jones University Press.  http://www.bjupress.com/catalog_pdfs/scope_sequence08.pdf