Weekly diary and "Zhou Ji"

[Miracle Child]

Hi,


Has anyone tried getting their children to write weekly diary (for english) and "zhou ji" (for chinese)? Thought of doing that, but unsure…
1. is it an effective tool to promote expression and writing?
2. how to encourage child to write?

[smum]

I did tried to get my P2 boy to write daily English journal. I got a template from the web. He need to indicate what are those happy, sad, thankful things that happened. But after a few weeks, my son is always writing the same thing. So not sure if it is really effective. Or maybe my method is not right.

[Miracle Child]

smum:

I did tried to get my P2 boy to write daily English journal. I got a template from the web. He need to indicate what are those happy, sad, thankful things that happened. But after a few weeks, my son is always writing the same thing. So not sure if it is really effective. Or maybe my method is not right.

Thanks, smum. Is there such a template available? Could you share with me? I am still unsure whether to start though...

[H2O]

I brought my son "Diary of a Wimpy Kid". He read it and found it interesting. He is starting to writes his own diary.

[Miracle Child]

H2O:

I brought my son \"Diary of a Wimpy Kid\". He read it and found it interesting. He is starting to writes his own diary.

Hmmm....that's an idea too! I have been seeing a lot of kids read this book recently. Is the book good? :? I flipped through it once (very quickly) in a bookshop...I thought it was kinda like conveying a \"bo-chap\" attitude or perhaps an indifferent behaviour (may not be that bad in such stressful generation)...at least, for the few pages that I read. But it sure was quite a funny book. Any comments of the book? Thanks.

[buds]

[Editor's note: Topic selected for http://www.kiasuparents.com/kiasu/content/encouraging-your-child-keep-diary.]


A diary represents a private space in life, a beautiful solitude,
the moments before we go to sleep just to stop and note what there is
about the day or about life at the time. It's like a friend that is always
there and is always a comfort. In bad moments I write, and usually end
up feeling better. It reflects back to me things that I can learn about my
world and myself.

A diary is also a tool for self-discovery, an aid to concentration, a
mirror for the soul, a place to generate and capture ideas, a safety
avenue for the emotions, a training ground for the writer, and a good
friend and confidante.

The benefits of writing and keeping a journal

The first and obvious use of writing a diary is that it helps us to
remember something later... a reference to look back on. It may be
that we do not have time to work out what is going on right at that very
minute - keeping a note in a diary helps us to recapture the moment later
so that we may look at it more deeply. It may also be that we need to
remember to do something e.g. write a letter on behalf of someone we
are working with. We jot the task down - and then when we have time we
can look back at our diary or organizer and pick out the tasks we are left
with.

Second, the act of putting pen to paper (or finger to keyboard) engages
our brains. To write, we have to think. By keeping records, one is able to
monitor the practice. Journal writing encourages engagement and
reflection.

Third, it isn't just that writing a journal stimulates thought - it allows us to
look at ourselves, our feelings, and our actions in a different way. By
writing things down in a journal the words are now 'outside' of us. They
are there in black and white on the paper or on the screen. We can
almost come to look at them as strangers - 'Did I really think that?', 'How
does this fit with that?' In other words, our words may become more
concrete - and in this way we can play with them, look at them in another
light.

Fourth, writing things down in a journal also allows us to 'clear our
minds'. Having made a note of something we can put them on one side
for consideration or action at a later point. We can only handle so much
at any one moment. Trying remember this or that, and deal with current
situations, can sometimes mean that we are not focusing on what we
need to. 'The journal offers a way to sort out the multitude of demands
and interactions and to highlight the most important ones'.

Last, and certainly not least, making journal writing part of our routine
means that we do actually take time out to reflect on what might be
happening in our practice and in our lives generally.

From this we can see that writing and keeping a diary holds the possibility
of deepening our self-understanding, and to making added sense of our
lives and what we believe. It can also help us to entertain, contain and
channel troubling emotions and gain perspective. We may also develop
a greater awareness of daily life; become more alive to what is
happening to, and around, us in the daily round. At a practical level,
writing and keeping a journal can both help us with administrative tasks
(like reporting what happened, when and why) and with the process of
setting goals and managing our time and priorities.

Mark Smith

There are many ways to write a journal or a diary these days.
>Traditional diaries : ring bind books or notebooks
>Creative diaries : loose leaf paper within ring binders,
beautiful textured & recycled paper, scrapbooking
>Quick diaries : Organizers, Planners
>Using a word processor
>Handphones / PDA's
>Blogging

I personally prefer the traditional diaries for my daily thoughts.
There's a feeling of permanence... something very real and very
concrete. Something that i can show and share to my girls when
they're all grown up... something that reflects a history of my life,
written over a period of time, which awaits a quieter time in life
for fulfillment.

Everything Mark states in his research are those that i agree with.
I started very young with the influence from daddie. He writes
everything in his diary. A teacher of mine used to keep 'a black
diary' for all the naughty names he said... which i never believed.
For all the reasons and benefits in putting our thoughts on paper,
I have made this daily record keeping a daily routine... yes, it is
a discipline for young children. Best started from young, when they
are able to write...

I started out by getting my girls a nice diary the like, be it in a favourite
cartoon character or just a nice pink one... :roll: (girls!)

She was into Kung Fu Panda phase then... so she requested this. :lol:

http://www.postimage.org/


Then, i start by asking them to think about the stuff that happened
throughout the day. Kiddies dun just naturally have something to think
or something to write, so hafta prompt for a start. Both my girls started
keeping a diary of their own in N2.

Diary starters, can be about what they learnt in school... about a new
friend... about how they felt for the day... about anything interesting that
may have happened that day (etc)... It's exactly like relating in a story
they bring back to \"share/tell-all-about-it\" after school but only now to
put it in print.

It can be the simplest stuff coming out from them... It's non-judgmental.
Heck, it doesn't even have to turn out grammatically accurate or have
100% correct words spelt. I award them for effort. And not award them
in physical sense, like rewards of any kind but only in encouragement
sense. This is to allow for them to learn to enjoy writing from their hearts...
a personal achievement/fulfillment.

It's a start, like this one from my younger girl...

http://www.postimage.org/


http://www.postimage.org/


Then, she began writing other things apart from PE and i love my mummy
just like this page...

http://www.postimage.org/


After she barely finished the Kung Fu Panda book, she shifted her interest
to pink stuff... which was this Sweety notebook...

http://www.postimage.org/


By this phase, her writing process has matured. I instilled the practice
of having a proper spacing, leaving a line and she asked if she could
draw at the end of her input for each day to end the diary page... so
of course it was cool with me! So you see, now she wants to do some-
thing in her diary out of her own free will, which was an additional task
on top of the writing.


http://www.postimage.org/

She can also remember the songs for the days of the week, so i get her
to write it out. At this stage, i drummed in the month of the year intro to
her too! Her teacher usually only writes the dates in numbers ie:10-07-09.

When she relates her story to me with onomatopeiac sounds, i told her
that these sounds can be put into words as well.. this can be guided with
Phonics.

http://www.postimage.org/

After she finished and we read it thru together, she agreed with me that it
made her diary input that day more interesting...

She grew to love writing it enough to put in emotions in her journal.

http://www.postimage.org/

From the time she took a first peek at her jie-jie's Geronimo Stilton
story books, she got inspired to write her adjectives in a more pop-out
fashion, like in the word FUN here in this page...

http://www.postimage.org/


Soon enough, she diverted her attention to Barbie... following the ever
changing trend of growing girls like jie-jie..

http://www.postimage.org/


By Barbie phase, she is already able to churn out the ideas on her
own without much/any prompting. She can also finish the daily diary
on her own with exceptions to the times she may shout out some help
needed for spelling the words properly instead of just guessing them.
During this phase, she is also exposed to margin... a P1 prep. Hee!

http://www.postimage.org/

http://www.postimage.org/

http://www.postimage.org/

My younger girl is now in K2 and with this diary writing discipline, i'm
hoping it will help her with the start to early writing which she will have
to do next year in Primary 1. I also introduce the parts of speech plus
simple grammar rules to aid her in good writing skills. My elder daughter
writes flowingly now and doesn't require assistance. Both of them are also
old enough to be able to enjoy reading through the stuff they have wrote
in their diaries for the past years, they'll laugh about it together and will
reminisce the moments they revisit in their diary pages.

It may not be much now. But like what sashimi likes to say, \"..... and at
the end of it all, there's a souvenir for keeps.....\"

This is one kind of souvenir for me to cherish those times when they were then...
mummy's little girls... :love:

[Miracle Child]

Thanks for sharing, buds. Really can see the \"transformation\" in the way and the topics she writes about. I hope to encourage my son to write....he is quite lazy. I started with a holiday trip and had encouraged him to write about what he saw or how felt about each day of the trip....at the end, still an empty book.... Will try again.

[winth]

Talking about getting the child to start, able to share how you managed to let her write?


I had encouraged DS1 to draw about his stuff and now he has portfolios full of drawings. So I guess, that’s success.

But for writing, what did you do?
I mean what did you say her to do when she first pen her thoughts?
Where you there with her when she first wrote?
Did you give her ideas on what to write?

[winth]

You’re making me real excited with his diary.


I’m buying him a diary today!
Maybe start with Ben10 or some Bakugan thingy.

Dunno what’s latest for boys?
Got any idea?

[RRMummy]

winth:

You're making me real excited with his diary.


I'm buying him a diary today!
Maybe start with Ben10 or some Bakugan thingy.

Dunno what's latest for boys?
Got any idea?

Winth ah, why not bring him along and let him choose.. think it will make him get all excited to write in it too..