• As stated above, MSAP's program uses Theme-Stories while teaching children to hone their writing skills.

 

•  MSAP also uses Theme-Stories to aid children in reading comprehension.

 

• By design, Theme-Stories are short, child friendly, and written at different levels for different age groups.

 

• MSAP uses these mini stories for a variety of reasons including the following:

 

• To reduce children's tendencies to stray from main ideas when writing.

 

• Theme-Stories assistance writing increases children’s ability to remain focused because they write primarily about Theme-Story perceptions.

 

•  The Theme-Stories technique encourages children to pay greater attention to prose details and to give feedback regarding their readings.

 

• When children are focused, poetry-writing can become a fun and easy writing improvement tool capable of assisting them in any writing assignment.

 

•  Poetry-writing provides a form of instant gratification that is reinforced when children see their work printed on MSAP Designer Poetry Pages, included in student Memory Booklets, and turned in to Poetry Enhanced Crafts they can display or gift to loved ones.

  

• The Theme-Story System allows children to gain confidence in their overall writing ability. The more poems they write using Theme-Stories as a guide, the more their ability to remain focused improves. Eventually, their ability to focus on their own ideas, as opposed to left and right field straying, proliferates.

 

• Reading poetry is a great way to improve word annunciation. Therefore, when children read their poems aloud, they are likely to improve their diction. {Read my article about using poetry to improve word pronunciation below.}

 

• MyStoriesAndPoems encourages children to read poetry books, and to utilize resources such as dictionaries, thesauruses, synonym and antonym guides, and rhyming aides in paper form and online. Practicing poetry writing in conjunction with utilizing educational resources intensifies children’s learning experiences.

 

• Last, but not least, MSAP created the Theme-Story Poetry-Writing Technique because owner, R. Renée Bembry, thoroughly enjoys teaching children to write poetry and believes it is important to keep the arts alive!