One of the differences between kids and adults is the fact that kids feel much stronger emotions in situations. When children get angry, they are angry with every fibre of their being. When children are happy, they are so overjoyed. Also, for children, everything matters and everything is serious. Adults sometimes wonder why a child would go on and on about something that seems so simple an unimportant. But it isn’t unimportant for children. They see and view things very differently indeed. For instance, if a child can’t find his favourite shirt, he searches and looks everywhere and is very upset when he can’t find that precise shirt. Adults just find another one to wear. Or if a child doesn’t want to go to bed, she may be frantic with tears, while adults may just grab a book and read for a while. This difference in perspective also has to be captured by adult writers for kids. They have to feel the strong emotions in their writing that children feel and they have to act like children would in particular situations. Unless a writer could capture these strong emotions, her story won’t echo with kids and they won’t understand the author. One really important way of being able to do this is to watch kids in their normal environment. When are children happy? When are kids sad? When do they complain? When are they beaming with delight? All of these will give you important clues when you write your own stories. What children’s writers must capture is the life of a child. The more the writer can do that, the more successful (s)he will be as a children’s writer. ~ Irene