Most holiday gingerbread creations are lovely houses filled with magical red and white peppermint swirls, candy canes, Necco wafer roofs, and gum drop borders. A harmonious vision of how sweet the world should be. In others, the story is a little less benign. A creaky old woman wearing a scarf and apron (we know who … Continue reading Gingerbread Tales
Category: My Son
Writing, Executive Function, and Deep Breathing
I've written about my son, the reluctant writer, in a few other posts: Writing as Calculus, Open Mic Fright, Celebrate Illustrators! And now that he's in 4th grade, the pressure is on to produce even more. So when he came home with an assignment to write a newspaper article, using the "Who, What, Where, When, Why, and … Continue reading Writing, Executive Function, and Deep Breathing
Labor Making Devices
Well folks, it's time for another trip down bad memory lane. In other words, this is not a writing-related post unless it counts as writing therapy to exorcise persistent devils.We live in an old aircraft tire manufacturing building, otherwise known as a live/work loft in the glorious section of San Francisco called "Dogpatch." You can … Continue reading Labor Making Devices
Celebrate—Illustrators!!
When HeyLookAWriterFellow (Mike Allegra) sent my son a "Celebrate" stamp (see post "Celebrate Cats!"), he didn't know what he was getting himself into---or maybe he did. My son thanked Mike for the stamp by creating a new stamp, "Celebrate Falling!" and a comic book (see post "Alien Invasion - A Graphic Novel" and sending them as … Continue reading Celebrate—Illustrators!!
Alien Invasion – A Graphic Novel
An alien spacecraft appears, sucking up space garbage for fuel. Oh, noooo! Young Zokx's spacecraft gets pulled into a nebula-- that sends him hurtling toward an unknown planet. Zokx's arrival makes breaking news. He abandons his spacecraft before it crashes. Distraught at the loss of his spacecraft and unaware of the dangers of high-tech 4x4s, … Continue reading Alien Invasion – A Graphic Novel
Just Say No!!
So HeyLookaWriterFellow issued a challenge. If I would post how my son feels about books written by celebrities for kids, he would create a one-of-a-kind stamp for my son. Take a look at the Boycott Celebrity Children’s Books Acronym Contest at the above URL. He's got some fantabulous entries!! Tag, Mike. You're it!
Open Mic Fright
And so my eight-year-old son, the voracious reader but painfully reluctant writer, has progressed from writing about building a treehouse in Maine with his dad, to a nonfiction report on the Iguanodon with its fearsome thumb spikes, to creating a fictional story about the adventures of Frog the Kitten and Sid the Skunk. Now the … Continue reading Open Mic Fright
Writing as Calculus
Thinking about writing—and my son. In a recent parent-teacher conference, one of his teachers suggested that my son is a perfectionist, and that’s why he’s so reticent to put words on the page. She told me how she sat down with him one day to brainstorm ideas. As they came up with idea after idea, … Continue reading Writing as Calculus
The Writing Lesson
I confess, I have a son who would rather eat peas than write a solitary paragraph for school. It doesn’t matter whether it’s about his favorite book, what he did over summer break, or some fantabulous story (that he’d love to tell you about, instead). At the beginning of second grade when his class first … Continue reading The Writing Lesson
Jilanne Hoffmann 