Writing Tip

Writing Exercises for Family Entertainment:  1 of 6

Have you ever thought about writing as a form of family entertainment?

Writing can be fun and even therapeutic.  Not only can writing itself be fun,  but learning to write can provide an opportunity for family entertainment.  And it's not that difficult.

In today's world of lightning-speed communication, we still all need to write to communicate.   Beyond the cryptic tweat and text, we write an e-mail to search for a job, carefully compose an apology to make up for a mistake, or send a message at work to help do our job.  Communicating with one another continues to be the base of a relationship.  Writing can be a valuable tool to build that base.  So it makes sense to hone our writing skills.

At the same time, in this accelerated world, family members are preoccupied with their individual activities –Mom and Dad with their jobs and with maintaining a comfortable dwelling for the family, and kids with school, sports, band, debate club, and, of course, their chores.  Sometimes we have time to read a book, but seldom do we have time to practice our writing skills.  Frequently we find writing to be a drudgery and avoid it, basking in the brevity of social media.

So let's try a simple first exercise to polish our writing skills and have fun with the family.  To start, decide which writing implement you can share—a laptop computer or even a large piece of paper pasted on the wall with felt-tip pens for everyone.

Each member of the family – except the cook – is to describe how the cook makes dinner.  You can divide the items among each family member or everyone can describe the entire event.

First, don't forget to tell us about the cook: in a hurry, enjoying or hating the task, quick movements, procrastinating, using every pan and dish in the kitchen, cleaning as part of cooking or creating a huge mess
Then use at least 3 different action verbs to tell us how the cook actually prepares our dinner.  Does he/she slide a pan onto the stove?  Attack the microwave door to insert a frozen dinner? Pierce the cellophane package?  Pounce on the potatoes?
Finally describe the result.  I must remind the teenagers especially who are participating that this is a writing exercise, not an opportunity to critique your parents' or your sibling's cooking skills.

When you complete the exercise, read it aloud either while you are sitting around the table eating the meal, or at the next opportunity when you get together.

This is a simple exercise that can be repeated.  Keep paper and pen nearby the kitchen in case someone wants to do it again.  Other members might see your writing and choose to contribute.

For our next exercise, let's combine the exercise of writing descriptions with the output of actually drawing pictures from the description.  You don't have to be an artist to enjoy.