Best Laid Plans

I have spent the past three weeks immersing myself in writing. I write almost every day. I read about writing. I write about writing. I listen to other’s writing. So, when I realized that my almost seven year old son, Zakariah, had not done any writing since the last day of school, over a month ago – I freaked out. My internal teacher voice began to shout, “What are you doing?!!! You know he needs to be writing, just like he needs to be reading!!!” I quickly began to devise a plan to “fix” this problem. Not sure why I thought a four-step plan to remedy this error was going to work, it never has in the past. But, I forged ahead anyway.

The morning after my revelation I gave Greyden and Zakariah my carefully crafted paper, complete with lines and a space to create a picture. They had just returned from Grandma and Grandpa’s house, which provided the perfect setting for a writing prompt. After revealing the beautiful new paper and pulling out a myriad of coloring supplies for them, I asked them to draw a picture and write about their favorite part of the vacation. Zakariah began to chatter about his favorite parts of the trip, and offered to write for Greyden too. My plan was working! I left them at the table and scurried off to prepare for another day of writing. After about 15 minutes of focused work, Zakariah came to show me his finished product. He had divided his space into three sections, so that he would have space to display his three most favorite parts of the trip. In the space under his pictures he had written; 1.bike 2.wii 3.fruit snacks. Four words!! That’s it. Four words!! Even though I know that drawing pictures and labeling is considered writing, it was not what I had in mind when I cooked up this amazing “write through the summer” plan.

On Friday evening, we were all sitting around the table chatting about the day’s events. That sounds a bit Little House on the Praire-ish, it seems that my mind has distorted the event a bit. I was actually sitting with the boys, attempting to pull out the day’s events from them, while Mike worked on making some semblance of order from the chaos in the kitchen. The three of them had been to see the movie, Cars 2, earlier in the day; they were each attempting to fill me in on the fascinating story. I decided to try another round of writing with them. We spent a considerable amount of time drawing and discussing their favorite part of the movie. Greyden talked about his picture, while I scripted his story. When I suggested to Zak that he should start writing, it was met with groans and whines. “I don’t know what to write.” After talking through several options, I bribed him. Yep. Bribed. I told him I would write a sentence while he wrote his. It worked. I pulled out a napkin and began to write. Once he had one sentence, we repeated the process. He wrote another sentence, and another, and another. By the time we each had four or five sentences he even said, “This is fun, Mom!” You know my inner teacher/mother was jumping for joy.

As we prepared for bed that night, Zak gave Mike a piece of the precious paper, and instructed him to write about his favorite part of the movie. Once the nighttime necessities were complete, we all filed into the boys’ room with paper (or napkin) in hand. We had decided that our bedtime routine would be altered tonight, instead of just reading, we would have our first ever Berges Tucker writing group. It was decided that Daddy would be the first to share. His words were met with praise and questions. He quickly knew how he could add to his existing story. Greyden shared with great conviction and detail. Zakariah beamed with pride as he shared his extending story. I shared the lead to a new story; which peaked their curiosity. Mike and I shared glances of pride and joy. It did not go at all like my plan; it was light-years beyond anything I could have planned. It was spontaneous and authentic, and about so much more than just making sure Zak is writing during the summer. This was about family, our family, embracing each other and sharing life together. No plan necessary.