A strong piece of writing doesn’t happen by simply putting a pen to a blank sheet of paper.

Please don’t ask your kids to do this!

Writers block is real, and you don’t want to trigger it in your kids.

Successful writing requires creative idea generation, organization, multiple drafts, restructuring, revising, and editing before it’s finally done.

There’s a lot to great writing. It would be wonderful if we could all compose an excellent piece on the first try.

But writing doesn’t work that way. Ever.

And AI doesn’t put out excellent writing either. Yes, it can be a time saver in certain situations, for older adults who are already skilled writers and know how to use AI appropriately.

But our kids need to learn how to write for themselves. They need to develop those skills to prepare themselves to succeed when they go out into the world. They must discover their own unique writing voice and style.

So how do you bypass the terror of the blank page and get your kids started? 

The answer is to break up writing into smaller, more manageable steps. This simple idea is the brainchild for the 5-step writing composition process that we use in all our Writing Rockstars courses.

Begin With Prewriting Activities -- An Easy Entry to the Writing Process 

In our Essay Rockstar courses, the first two of the five steps in our writing composition process are prewriting activities. Don’t underestimate them! Spend time here and encourage your kids to be as creative as they like.

Prewriting is a great place to grow your kids’ confidence by validating their thoughts and ideas, especially if the technical aspects of writing, like structure and grammar, are difficult for them.

Prewriting Activity 1: Brainstorm Content Ideas. 

When brainstorming, the key rule is that no idea is a bad idea. The purpose of this prewriting activity is to get your children comfortable and confident with generating and sharing their unique, creative thoughts.

Your kids should write down what they actually think -- and not worry about what they should think or write. There’s no right or wrong in brainstorming.

Some of our favorite brainstorming activities include the following:

Listing. Make all sorts lists related to a topic. Go crazy with it! Use different colored gel pens to make it more fun.

Mind mapping. Either create a mind map by hand or use some fun mind mapping online applications to brainstorm ideas, like bubbl.us, an application that allows your kids to enjoy playing with color coding and moving assorted bubble shapes around a page.

Cubing. Brainstorm ideas for a topic from six different perspectives. Define: what is the topic? Compare: what is the topic like or unlike? Associate: what does it make you think of? Analyze: what is it made of? Apply: how can it be used? Argue for or against: how can you support or oppose the topic?

Define, past, present. Begin by describing a topic, its key features, and its strengths and weaknesses. Second, share the history of the topic, the influences on it, and how the topic changed over time. Third, link the topic to related topics today and explore how they influence each other.

Prewriting Activity 2: Organize Content Ideas. 

The second prewriting activity we use in Essay Rockstar is to organize those cool, creative ideas that kids generate in brainstorming into an outline. The outline serves as a writing guide kids follow as they compose their first draft.

Spend time on this prewriting activity too!!! It activates critical thinking skills, and as with brainstorming, it’s an excellent confidence building opportunity for kids who struggle with the technical aspects of writing composition.

In Essay Rockstar, we take our students through a process where they identify main ideas for their essay from their brainstorming activity and color code them. Then they do the same for supporting details for each main idea, until a clear outline or writing plan emerges.

We also have a free ebook with 24 teaching tools, called graphic organizers, that help kids sort and organize their ideas. This free pdf gives explanations on how and when to use each type of graphic organizer. They’re an excellent aid for kids who need a little boost to get going with organizing and outlining. I suggest that you download it!

Remember to save the ideas that don’t make the final outline elsewhere. Create a “save for later” idea bank or folder that your kids can revisit another time to use for another writing project. You never know when it’ll come in handy.

A Note About Artificial Intelligence

As mentioned earlier, children and teenagers need to learn to write for themselves. In all academic settings, using AI to write their papers is plagiarism, and your kids could face severe consequences if caught using AI. College professors and high school teachers use a variety of AI checkers regularly to ensure students are writing their own work.

Kids mustn’t be deprived of opportunities to activate and develop their creativity and critical thinking skills by a reliance on AI. AI can be a time saving tool in certain situations. But it can also easily become a crutch that hinders your kids’ intellectual development. Please be careful when allowing your kids to use AI, and put limits on its use.

Free Writing 

In Essay Rockstar, the third step we use in our writing process is called free writing. This activity is also helpful with overcoming writers’ block.

Free writing is a way to write an initial rough draft. Kids simply open their outline and write about every idea on it in rough paragraph form --- with NO ATTENTION TO GRAMMAR OR PUNCTUATION.

Free writing is a way of getting a first draft out onto paper that still allows thoughts and ideas to flow freely while writing. The focus is on explaining the students’ ideas fully without interruption, which happens when they stop to think about grammar and punctuation. We urge our students to write as they would speak to help develop their own writing voice and style.

Another way to practice free writing is through journaling. In our free Top Teach course, a large several lessons are devoted to helping your kids get comfortable with writing by practicing a small amount of free writing in a journal on a regular basis. Please go to our Courses page to access it.

There are a lot ways you can help your kids bypass blank page paralysis. Try as many of them as you can!

Lily Iatridis is the founder of Writing Rockstars, an online writing program that prepares teens for college level writing.