Writing Creative Nonfiction for Children

Creative nonfiction for children is just a new term for an old writing skill. How to make informational text colorful and exciting for readers. Nonfiction is a popular choice for young readers, but to keep them reading requires some tricks of the trade. Many of the same writing techniques used in fiction writing can be used to make nonfiction articles or books more that just a lot of facts.

Employing these techniques can turn dry informational text into a story to be enjoyed by readers. Bare facts can be made more interesting by creating a mood, expressing emotions, clever use of dialogue or storytelling techniques like flashback.

Specific details are critical in nonfiction projects. Details help the reader to visualize the scene being described. Details add substance and interest to your book. The addition of quotes and anecdotes are another element to be used to add depth and dimension to the writing. Humorous stories will enrich and add interest to the text.

Fiction writers create scenes as they develop their stories. This same device works for writers of nonfiction as well. This is where the time honored cliche, "show don't tell", comes to play. Creating scenes moves the text forward smoothly and engages the reader, making it easy for them to visualize the events in the story.

A good lead is critical in all genres. This is especially true in nonfiction. A good lead might pose a compelling question or begin with a dramatic scene. An authentic scene could include small or memorable details a reader is not likely to know about the topic or person in the book. A good beginning is critical to the reader. Author and editor, James Cross Giblin, suggests starting with a dramatic factual scene. In his book "The Riddle of the Rosetta Stone", Giblin begins:

'Near the entrance to the long, high-ceilinged room stand two magnificent granite statues of Pharoah Amenophis III, who ruled Egypt about 1400 B.C. And beyond it, resting on a simple base, is a slab of black basalt, a volcanic rock.'

'Next to the statues and the head, the slab seems unimpres- sive at first glance. It is roughly the size of a tabletop- three feet nine inches long, two feet four and a half in. wide, and eleven inches thick. But many experts would say that this rather small piece of rock was more valuable than any of the larger objects in the room. For it is the famed

Go To Page: 1 2

Articles in this Topic    Discussions in this Topic