Throughout the summer, Pencil Tips bloggers have been
suggesting ways to inspire young writers to document their travels. Joan Waites suggested a map collage. Alison Formento provided ideas for listing facts and sharing the information in different ways. I’d like to suggest postcards enhanced
by research.
Vera B. William’s classic picture book, Stringbean’s Trip to the Shining Sea, is an illustrated group of
postcards written by a boy named Stringbean Coe on a trip from Kansas to
California. In each postcard, Stringbean describes his travel experiences in
vivid words and pictures. Share this delightful book with your students and ask
them to write their own cross-country adventure in postcards. This is a great opportunity to
combine description with geographical research. Students will need to look up
important facts about National Parks and other major tourist attractions so
they can be accurately portrayed in their writing. Words and pictures can be
created on large blank index cards (8 inches by 5 inches) and fastened together
with string or a brad on the left hand side. The end result is a postcard book,
just like Stringbean’s Trip to the Shining
Sea.
Another fun travel book to use for inspiration is Darcy Pattison’s The Journey of Oliver K. Woodman. In
this picture book, a life-sized wooden toy hitchhikes across country while his
progress is reported back to his owner through letters and postcards.
Both books depict strong characters and are great models of
how a story can be interwoven in a travel narrative. Better yet, they are so
much fun to read, your students may suggest writing their own travel letters before
you give the class assignment.
