Get creative writing going with Bardsy writing

Writing is one of those areas people either love to teach or hate to teach it. Almost everyone has a story from their school days of the nightmare assignment they never thought they would be able to write. Bardsy hopes to solve this for you, and puts together a great creative writing program for your reluctant writers.

 

(This post is sponsored by Bardsy, all opinions are my own)

What is Bardsy?

Bardsy is an online homeschool writing curriculum for reluctant writers. They believe what most of us already know, writing isn’t just limited to your language arts curriculum, but interacts with all areas of life, so you better learn how to write.

They also know many kids struggle with writing. They sit down at the computer and stare at a blank computer screen and think, “What will I write next?”

Bardsy has come up with a way to help your kids around that.

Complete honesty, Princess isn’t a fan

I gave Princess the login to Bardsy and turned her loose. After a few weeks, I checked in with her to see what she thought.

“It’s okay, but I already know most of this, and it’s too easy for me.”

She went on to explain her problems with the character generator, and more.

I listened to her complaints and thought, “Your complaints are the exact reason many other people would love this.” You’re a bit of an unusual kid because you love to write, and I’ve had you reading books on how to write characters and plot development for the last two years.

You’re not the target kid to use this.

She shrugged her shoulders and said, “Okay Mom.”

Let me tell you why I think it’s a brilliant creative writing program

Princess loves the challenge of the blank screen. Most kids don’t. Left to themselves my boys will just sit there and rewrite the same story over and over again.

They give your kid a headstart on writing something. Take their character creation kit (click through and sign up for it, it’s a great resource even if you don’t use Bardsy).

Recently I’ve been using WorldAnvil for creating a world of my own. Bardsy takes some of the same ideas, and makes it kid accessible. They give you ideas to create a character with some character traits or maybe a type. They have worksheets and ideas for a story setting, and you can use whatever you want.

Honestly, I think Princess didn’t give this site half a chance because she thought she’d outgrown it.

I’m looking at it as an adult and thinking, this is a great way to jumpstart creative writing ideas.

 

Once you sign up try out Prospero

Prospero gives your kids a framework. As you go through, you pick out the worksheets (you fill out online) that you think will help you, then you start answering questions.

This is one of the Prospero sheets. I actually chose every single sheet they had, which is truly not the best way to make use of their site, but I wanted to see what all of them looked like because I liked the clean and colorful way it looked.

Yes, I’m like a crow and shiny colors attract me. That’s why my notes are multi-colored.

Bardsy encourages you to answer only the questions that help you, which is good writing advice. It’s actually the same advice I find in the writing books geared for professional authors I’ve read recently.

I think Bardsy is a brilliant way to get creative writing ideas flowing

I know my daughter isn’t a fan, but the more I play on the site, the more I see a great place to get creative writing ideas.

Here is my quick list of ways you can generate Creative Writing Ideas on Bardsy:

1. Prospero- plug in answers to the questions and get a head start on writing your story
2. Story spinner, get a character, a setting, and a theme (Princess wrote a lion tamer in space story this morning while chortling at how ridiculous it is, she obviously hates it)
3. Short writing lessons (5-10 minutes)
4. Character creator worksheets
5. Book Clubs (talk about your favorite books with other writers, I still remember writing a Narnia inspired story in middle school)
6. Read other kids’ stories (seriously I would have thought she would love this)

How to sign up for Bardsy

This is the other thing I like, Bardsy is a monthly subscription, so if you only need it for a few months you’re not paying for a whole year’s worth of subscription.

Bardsy is $8.99 a month for access to all writing tools, video courses, & lesson plans. Cancel anytime – No Problem. I recommend you give it a try. You might find your child chortling to themself as they write about a genie on a cruise ship trying to find their identity.

I’m gonna be totally honest. I like to just spin the story generator and get new ideas. The story ideas are fun and silly.

I like fun and silly sometimes.

More creative writing ideas

• NaNoWriMo for homeschool
• NaNoWriMo character description
• If You Give a Mouse a Cookie writing prompt
• What if a dinosaur came to life writing lesson