School Rules! Writing. Emma MacLaren Henke
flipping through news magazines
when you’re writing a personal essay
about your favorite holiday memory?
a. calling your grandma, who makes the world’s best Thanksgiving dinner
b. browsing family photo albums
c. paging through your journal from the last year
when you’re writing a book report?
a. listing books by authors you enjoy
b. wondering how a favorite character would solve your problems
c. asking your friends about the novels they love
when you’re writing a hISTORY
report about colonial America?
a. watching a documentary about colonial cooking
b. looking through your notes from history class
c. chatting with your mom about your family’s trip to
Colonial Williamsburg
when you’re writing a haiku
for your school literary
magazine?
a. thinking about your favorite colors, sounds, and tastes
b. picking out details of an interesting photo or painting
c. listing words you love because of the way they sound
As you might have guessed, they’re all right answers!
Your life, your experiences, and your thoughts are
the best sources you have for writing ideas. School
writing assignments usually give you a starting point,
such as “Tell a story from your summer vacation” or
“Write a poem about your favorite season.” But most
assignments leave plenty of room to imagine, research,
and develop your own ideas.
Pencil
Point
Ideas can come from
anywhere, anytime.
Keep a notebook to
record questions that
cross your mind, to-do
lists, words you love,
conversations you
overhear, jokes that
make you laugh, what-
ever you like! Ideas
for all your writing—
whether for school or
for yourself—can go
in your notebook.
TIP: You might want
to keep a special
notebook just for the
exercises and prompts
in this book.
Let It Pour!
Brainstorm your way to a flood of ideas.
Suppose your teacher starts the school year by giving you this assignment:
School’s out from June to September, but learning
happens all year long! Write 3 to 5 paragraphs about
something you learned over summer vacation.
Great! You went to summer camp, and you learned some new skills and made
new friends. Plus, you spent a week with your grandpa, who taught you his
favorite card games. You’ve got so many possibilities!
Brainstorming helps you choose a topic from all those possibilities and develop
ideas for your writing projects. When you brainstorm, you scribble your thoughts
quickly, without worrying about being neat or writing in complete sentences or
wondering if they are good ideas. Just write down as many ideas as you can.
Check out the brainstorming techniques on the next few pages, and try one,
two, or all three!
Mind Map
Write your prompt, question, or topic at the center of a blank page and circle it.
Then write any ideas inspired by the topic around it. Draw lines to connect the
ideas to your topic—and to each other when they relate in some way.
hit list
Brainstorm ideas in the form of a list. Start by writing your topic at the top of
the paper. Then divide the paper into three or four areas.
Next, start to brainstorm the main points or ideas you might want to explore,
putting one idea at the top of each area you marked off. Leave plenty of room
below each of those ideas to brainstorm and list your supporting points.
Learning to Canoe
MAIN IDEA 1: summer camp
-really wanted to go
-first time, needed tons of supplies
-didn’t know girls in cabin
MAIN IDEA 2: canoe lessons
-embarrassed because everyone
else knew what to do
-DON’T STAND UP!
-different strokes
MAIN IDEA 3: how I did it
-practice
-working with team
-Eagle Island!
Pencil
Point
Boost your brainstorming
by setting a timer for 5 or
10 minutes. Keep writing
ideas until the timer
beeps—without judging!
Just write down anything
that comes to mind as fast
as you can. When you’re
done, look for the best
ideas. There are some gold
nuggets in there!
question Yourself
Take a look at your topic, and think about the basic questions you want to answer
in your writing:
Brainstorm answers (when you know them) and think of new questions, too.
Learning to Canoe
WHAT? learning to canoe
WHO? me, along with summer camp
friends
WHERE? Camp Woodsy, on the lake
WHEN? this summer
WHY? wanted