Be a Detail Artist!

Fourth graders need a lot of practice writing detailed sentences. They're often good at writing introductions and conclusions. It's what sits in the center that gets them into trouble. They often need help beefing up the middle of a writing assignment. Does your young writer need more details to take her writing to the next level? Make it fun by mixing in some creative artwork!

• pencil
• lined paper
• colored pencils (or crayons)
• white construction paper (or drawing paper)
• Writing Topics list (see below)

What To Do:

Tell your budding artist she is about to use her creative art and writing skills to play a game! In this game, she'll be writing descriptions of suggested topics (below), then drawing pictures as you read her descriptions aloud. Want to add some cool to the game? Let her know that this is similar to what a police sketch artist does!

Step 1:
Using the list below, have your child take out a pencil and a piece of lined paper, and write at least 4 detailed sentences on a topic of her choice. Ask her to answer these basic questions when writing about a story or situation: Who? What? Where? Why? and How? If she's writing about a place or object, rather than a story or situation, tell her to answer these questions instead: What does it look like? Smell like? Feel like? Taste like? Sound like?

Writing Topics:

1. Describe a car from the future.

2. Pretend you found a message in a bottle on the beach.

3. Describe a scary monster.

4. Describe your facial expression when riding a roller coaster.