The school year is about to end in our homeschool. We are just wrapping up some loose ends and working on some projects.

My eldest child is about to graduate from elementary. Hooray! Honestly, I didn’t expect us to homeschool this long when we were just starting. I told my husband before that I will just try homeschooling our firstborn until Grade 1. Wow! He’s now in Grade 6 and about to graduate!

I can’t thank the Lord enough for bringing us this far!

Last year, we started using National Book Store’s Draw & Write Notebooks. I wrote about these in a previous post last year. My goal and wish then was that my kids would learn to like writing more and that they would improve in their composition skills. I know how important it is to learn to compose your thoughts and ideas and how it can help them whatever profession they choose to have in the future.

True enough, the notebooks encouraged the kids to write more often and to put captions or descriptions on their drawings. They like drawing more than writing.

I thought of ways to encourage my eldest child to practice and improve his composition skills. I asked him to make a list of topics that he is interested in and to choose what he will write about. Then, on top of what he writes, he can draw to illustrate his ideas or story.

He liked this activity and it moved him to write more.

One day, he decided to write about one of his current favorite topics   — Minecraft! When he started writing about Minecraft, he wrote more frequently and spent more time writing.

There were days when he would just write and write. There were times when he would write late into the night. There were days when he would write before sleeping. He was very passionate about the topic that he got to fill notebook after notebook with his writings!

He would show me every day what he has written and he makes sure that I have read what he wrote that day.

Some days, I give him suggestions. Most days, I would tell him how happy I am that he is writing.

Before we realized it, he has finished writing his first book!

When he has written around 4 notebooks about Minecraft, I asked him to make an outline that includes all the topics he has written about Minecraft on his notebooks. I checked his outline and suggested what he needed to write on top of the topics he has written.

He finished writing his book last year, 2020.

When many students and people were losing their motivation and passion for their goals, my son had a goal and he achieved it. I’m so grateful to God for that! That was so much more than I hoped or prayed for!

I don’t know if it helped or influenced him that I also wrote a book myself last year when the pandemic started and it even won in the Cardinal Sin Catholic Book Awards. Maybe, maybe not. I have not asked him that question yet. I was just pleasantly surprised that he decided to write a book.

This project is so apt for his last year in elementary. He can apply the many lessons and principles that he learned on language arts in this book project. He can also apply and learn many other lessons and principles from various subjects as he works on publishing his book. He finished his Evan More English Grammar curriculum for Grades 1-6 around 3 years ago. Last year, we used Evan More also for spelling and a mixture of different resources for composition.

Right now, he is typing or encoding his book on a computer. He is learning typing and formatting.

I also taught him how to make a book cover using Canva.

When he is done typing, I will teach him how to edit his work. I will also help him edit it before publishing it.

I have written and published 10 books so far, with more books in the pipeline. Most books were self-published, but I also have books published the traditional way. Thus, I can coach and mentor him on this project.

There is still much work that he needs to do before he can publish his book. I’m not sure if he can publish his book this year. I hope so. But, I’m excited for him because publishing a book is a wonderful adventure and he can learn a lot in the process. He is just starting. I will also teach him how to market and promote his book.

We plan to publish his book on Amazon also just like many of my e-books.

He is so blessed because he is having this kind of mentorship and education at such a young age. I learned how to write and publish a book only when I was an adult. He is only 12 and still a child!

He is blessed because he is homeschooled using the interest-led and child-led approaches. Instead of written tests, he has been working on real-life projects or tasks for most of his elementary years. This book project is just one of them.

Do you have a child who is also an aspiring writer or author? Or are you an aspiring writer and author? Would you like to be coached and mentored also by me? I had been coaching and mentoring adults on this in the past years. I invite you to check out my coaching packages if you think that having a coach would help you move closer and faster to your dream and goal of becoming a published author.

I also have an upcoming series of talks on book writing and publishing. You may read more about the details and register here.

Do you also homeschool or plan to homeschool your child? You might want to join the Homeschooling Parents Support Group Ph or the Catholic Homeschooling Parents Support Group. I would love to see you there!