How to Create Ideas for a Children's Story

Do you want to be the next big children's author? Do you just want to write a book and don't know where to start? Is the dreaded writer's block monster breathing down your neck? Writing a children's story doesn't have to be hard work, as a matter of fact, it should be fun!

There are times when authors wrack their brains to come up with the best idea out of a pool of junk. People spend months and even years coming up with story lines that they think would suit whatever age group they have chosen to write for. Once they have finally chosen an idea, they are often exhausted and end up taking a break before the story even begins. This process can be pain free and enjoyable at the same time.

First off, use your imagination. You know, the imagination is the part of the brain that usually ends up shoved to the back under piles of information about the "real world." Once you grow up, you are expected to put away all childish ideas and think outside of the box, but still within the real world box. Whip out your imagination, dust it off, and get it back into shape. This is a pretty easy task if you have small children around. Play with them! Take them outside. Do activities that you used to do as a child. Pay attention to how they see things. One of the best activities is looking for shapes in the clouds. It's much harder once you become an adult. Take a child out to watch the clouds and soon a floodgate of imagination will fly open.

Once you have your imagination back into shape, it will be easier to come up with a topic for a story. You can take the time to write down all of your topic ideas. Try to expand them a little. Come up with a direction you want your story to take. Do you want it to be humorous? Do you want it to have moral? Do you want it to be based off of real life or off of fiction? All of these questions should be considered and answered. Some other questions to think about is who the main character will be, what age group are you writing for, and is the child going to be able to relate to it?