How to encourage reluctant writer/drawer? Year 1.

[CocktailQueen]

My ds has decided that he is 'useless' at drawing and is very resistant to doing any. He's quite arty in other ways and happily does mosaics, stickers, colouring in and other crafts. How can I encourage him to write and draw more? If he tries to draw something and isn't happy with it, he gets very frustrated. I know there will be more writing in Year 2 and I'd like to get him to be more fluent and have fun doing it!

DS is fine with drawing but isn't keen on writing. I don't ask him to do much at home as just doing the homework is enough! However, he does love making up cartoons, and Star Wars collector cards so I encourage him with those. I've got him lots of paper, and card to write on, and good felt tip pens etc. I don't comment on what he writes or draws, other than to be positive, or ask questions about the story. Is there something like that which your DS likes? I think you have to make it fun, and lighthearted.

How about getting a little white board and pen? I picked one up in a pound shop the other day. Then he can get drawing and writing without worrying too much about mistakes as he can just rub it out! They often use them in schools too so will have that familiarity. I quite liked the Jolly Phonics series of home activity books - lots of it focuses on copying zig zags and curvy shapes on dotted lines. I found it helped increase confidence in both my previously reluctant writers when they were in year 1.

We found confidence was a problem with my son in yr 1. He was capable but didn't believe in himself. We found it helped when we started a home diary. Each day he wrote a single sentence about his day. At the end of a full week of writing he got a treat.

We had very similar with our DD who was young for the year: it's all about improving confidence cpupled with slealth practice. We found a combination of magazines (they almost all have writing puzzles/workbooks in , so pick a Moshi/Toybox/Disney type one to try), and writing small shopping lists , and treats where you work in a tiny bit of writing/drawing . Eg "ooh lets play home cinemas today. You pick a dvd, I'll make popcorn, can you make some "tickets" for us? " or "lets go to the park/softplay/wherever, shall we leave a note for Dad to say where we've gone?" - and tons of praise/remark how much better they are getting on a frequent basis. Good luck!

We do lots of what Aethelfleda has recommended. DD is Yr1 and late August born. She is a very good writer, but she struggles more with drawing and pictures - she often throws beautiful pictures she's drawn in the bin because she doesn't like them.

One trick that works for us, especially for DD's drawing, is baking cakes. On weekends we'll bake, especially rainy days; it's usually something like cupcakes or brownies, not anything particularly creative or expensive. I get DD to write a shopping list of the ingredients we'll need and draw a couple of ideas as to how she'd like the cupcakes/cakes/biscuits to look - and it's usually sickening pink icing/buttercream with hearts galore!

When it comes to making them, she reads the recipe and method, weighs the ingredients and mixes them together then licks the bowl after. Once they're baked and cooled, we follow her pictures to decorate them. She loves doing this and gets to eat the rewards too

Hi Cocktail Queen:

Two ideas.

FLIP BOOK: Have them make a stick figure or something similar and then have it move just slightly over 10 pages (trace & change one thing at a time). Staple together and flip pages and you'll see a moving figure.

CARTOON STRIP: Have them draw a cartoon about something (maybe something they've read or a movie they've watched). Encourage them to include dialogue. Gets drawing and writing going great and doesn't seem like work.

HTH

Thanks all - some great ideas there. Will give them a try :)

We bought ds (6) a book called Doodlemania from The Book People.

He LOVES it! and he isn't one to sit down and draw really but this has been a huge hit, can't recommend it enough.