Make Report Writing Easier with this Visual Format

As children learn to write, they are also learning how to tell stories. Often when kids are starting to write stories we encourage drawing a picture and writing about what is shown, whether they are retelling a favorite fairy tale or a story from their most recent vacation.

Pictures can likewise be helpful when early writers seek to give nonfiction reports on something they have learned about. You Clever Monkey has printable report writing templates for sale to use in your studies of bees, butterflies, ants and spiders.

But the same concept can be used for lots of report-style writing, whether you provide the pictures for the student to write about or have them draw something related to what most stuck out to them or interested them about the subject.

This is a great way to get over the “I don’t know what to write about” hurdle and to help kids gain confidence in how to put together simple reports.

[Photo via You Clever Monkey.]

Several countries have a day set aside to honor and recognize their inventors, but Nov. 9 is a special one that’s known as Tag der Erfinder in German. It’s celebrated in Germany, Austria and Switzerland and it falls on Nov. 9 because that’s the birthday of Hedy Lamarr.

Hedy Lamarr is widely known as an actress but there’s a lot more to her story. You can get a little of it geared to little kids in the Little People, Big Dreams book Hedy Lamarr (32 pages, hardcover, published 2023 by Frances Lincoln Childrens Books, suggested retail price $15.99).

The book explores her birth in Austria and how she spent time when she was young coming up with inventions. She became an actress, married an arms dealer, made her escape to America and became an actress again.

But she also helped develop a frequency-hopping signal device for airplanes that was used by the Americans and their allies during World War II. That technology became the basis for wireless technology such as wifi and GPS.

While Inventor’s Day is a great time to learn about Hedy Lamarr, you can take this opportunity to check out books and do little studies on lots of different inventors. If there’s an inventor or an invention your child is particularly interested in, that’s a great place to start. It’s fun to think about all the things we use every day that didn’t always exist; someone had to invent them!

For a start here at Craft Gossip you can learn more about Garrett Morgan, who invented traffic lights; Maria Oroso, who developed a clay oven that could cook food without electricity; and more female inventors and scientists.

And for more general inventors’ fun, check out this inventors word search from Fun Findery (and another from Let’s Do Puzzles) or take a quiz on inventors and their inventions from Flanders Family Home Life.

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