“No wonder your son is such a great writer.”

My husband and I have been volunteering at World Vision where our son works. People have been telling us how proud we must be of James and this was one of the comments. My reply? Yes, my writing did have something to do with James developing good writing skills, for several reasons. He was 12 in 1994 when I started my writing career. I checked his writing assignments for school. And I remember telling him, as I had told his sister that he should always write his best, whether the teacher is checking grammar or not. Never turn in poor writing.

But most importantly, and if you are an aspiring writer, this is where you can help your children and they can help you. James checked my writing! It had been over 20 years since I’d had any formal writing training and I didn’t know a preposition from an adverb. I instinctively knew how to put a sentence together but I needed help with proofreading. I took some classes and read books. I shared what I learned with James then insisted that he double-check my writing and I checked his.

James also developed some awesome computer skills and created a website for me and several other websites. He had people three times his age writing for his Silver Surfer website.