Writing Stories About Pets for Family Fun: Pet Writing and Personification

Family fun can be enjoyed to the fullest through the process of Pet Personification, also known as Pet Writing. Children enjoy naming their pets and personifying pets in their daydreams and thoughts. Some of the best cartoons in the papers and on T.V. personify animals, and pet personification is another great tool to develop children's imagination. During the summers and other vacation periods, parents find it difficult to think of inexpensive, intelligent and creative projects to keep their children occupied. How about encouraging children to write during the summers? How about writing a story about your own pet no matter what your age?

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The first question you might pose is, "But I don't have a pet, so how can I and my children write stories about pets?' Have no fear because writers make up fictive characters and write the names out on index cards. In addition to naming the fictive pet, you and your children will next write out a description such as the age, nationality, physical characteristics and character qualities on the index cards. I would encourage children to use at least ten adjectives to describe their fictional pets on the cards. Mark the main protagonist's character description (the main pet) with a star or a special color. Then make up names of other characters in the story and describe them on separate cards.

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Once you and your children have described all of the characters on index cards, it will be helpful to draw out the plot of the story on a plain piece of paper. A pencil is needed to draw an arch labeled with these five parts of the story:

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1) Exposition -- How the story begins including the setting. Setting is where and when the story takes place.

2) Problem -- What is the conflict or problem that the personified pet will have to resolve? The problem makes the story interesting. It can be anything from a small problem to a big problem, and it can relate to problems children face in real life.

3) Rising Action -- Create details about what happens along the fictive pet's journey. Whom does the pet meet along the way? What are some of the obstacles and joys the pet faces?

4) Climax of the Story -- This is the moment right before the problem is solved. The protagonist pet might have an argument with another animal or might be assisting another animal.

5) Falling Action and Resolution -- At this point, the writer has determined how the conflict will be resolved and what the future will hold for the fictive pet. Is the personified pet successful in his pursuit?

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Problems chosen for pet stories do not have to be complex. I would recommend that children choose simpler problems than those chosen for adult storytelling. For example, Snip and Stripe (my cats, by the way) want to figure out how they can encourage Grandma to let them go out on the terrace each day to enjoy the sunlight at 12:00 noon, or Snip and Stripe don't know what to do about the new dog that has moved into the home. These are simple, light-hearted and cheerful, problems that do not cause the child-author to worry.

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The step in which children draw out the arch for the plot can be utilized to develop visual imagination. For this reason, my students integrate crayon colors and ink drawing in this part of the process. Extra credit is given for illustrations of characters. This extends the time children are entertained while developing creative imaginations which are essential to both success and progress. It is essential that the process be fun in order to be appreciated, and therefore, parents must encourage children to utilize the five senses from visualizing to kinesthetically acting out the characters in plays.

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It is important to include each of the five parts of the story. Very young children may divide each part of the story into a paragraph, but I have seen older children do stories as long as twenty pages. There is no rule that each of the five parts of a story must be equal in length or a prescribed length, but writing a short story can be just as complex as writing a long story.

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Encourage children to think of their pets as beings with feelings and needs. Children show responsibility and develop charcter when they feed and nurture their pets. By getting into the feelings of characters in a story (especially when the protagonists are pets), writers develop a strong sense of ethics and character. Not only do they learn about the story structure that has been described in this article, but they also learn about cause and effect, responsibily and relationships.

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Parents will utilize Pet Writing to teach children about "personification" in fiction and in cartoons. Personification is when writers give attributes of people to animals and objects. It will be very important for children to understand this concept when they are in upper elementary school and throughout the high school years. Writing about pets for family fun entails creative visualization, imagination, sharing ideas, and family entertainment. There is no better way to spark the creative seed within a child's brain and to instill values such as humanity and love for animal life.