KIDS FIRST! News

The holiday fun begins today, December 5 at CYBERCHASE Online with the downloadable original song and mini music video, “When Penguins Fly,” and a preview of “Harry’s New Year’s Eve Countdown,” the new CYBERCHASE For Real segment in which Harry (Matt Wilson) figures out a way to start the New Year off a winner.

Dr. Alice Wilder, co-creator of “Blue’s Clues,” has come up with a new project to help children learn the process of story writing. Think It Ink It Publishing is designed to inspire children of all ages to practice creative writing in a way that entertains, educates, and promotes self-esteem.My 8-year-old is a big-time-writer. The child is constantly coming up with stories. Think It Ink It provides professionally illustrated books give a child the opportunity to write an original story and become a published author. I was curious to see how my son would react since he usually comes up with stories from scratch.A cool feature is a small pack of post it notes with lines that kids can put on each page to write their rough draft so they don’t have to erase on the final copy. My son loves the notes and the pencil which comes with the kit. In fact, he was a bit distressed when he momentarily lost his “special pencil.” He’s still in the process, but is really enjoying the writing process. According to him, “It makes it a lot more easier ‘cuz I thought up the words already after I looked at the pictures.”A neat option is that we can order his story and it will come to us as a regular hardcover book. A great feature.I know some children really have a problem putting a story in order and getting words on a page. I think this is a great tool to get them started so they story development becomes second nature to them and they develop the freedom to write whatever they want without being hampered by fear of structure.Who knows? In a few years we might see some of these kid’s creations in our KIDS FIRST! film festival!