5 Ideas to Get Students Writing Letters—Inspired by the Letteracy Deck!

Go to the mailbox and 9 out of 10 pieces of post are junk (to the recycle bin they go!), and the last of the 10? A bill. Ugh.

But, what if the next time you went to the mailbox there was a handwritten letter waiting for you?

Cue: Letteracy Deck.

Letteracy Deck is the first-ever outdoor letter writing park. What?!

You’re going to love this idea! Founder Anne Bratass’ gives a glimpse of what Letteracy Deck is about: 

“Handwrite or draw a letter or postcard today — and mail it.

You’ll feel both free and full: free of screens with their algorithmic manipulations and culture war distractions, full of your best self. Reunited with your essential goodness.

Crucially, you’ll also be reunited with the best selves of others when you set the paper letter trail in motion and others gleefully reciprocate. A letter! A real letter!

Surely that’s a state of civic well-being and well-wishing we crave now.

This is the conclusion I’ve reached after working 500-plus hours at Letteracy Deck, the world’s first and only free, public outdoor letter-writing park that I created in June 2023 on the shores of Lake Superior in Grand Marais. Writing, drawing and mailing frames the short, clear heart truths we feel, but rarely share.

Perhaps now more than ever, we need to share through handwritten correspondence—that millennia-old slow, soft, gentle medium of connection.“

— Bratass, Anne. “Letters from Grand Marias,” Star Tribune (2024).

Because cozying up to pen a postcard on a porch overlooking Lake Superior in Grand Marais, Minnesota isn’t practical for everyone, how could you start a handwritten letter/postcard writing group with students? 

According to Anne, starting Letteracy Deck was easy–and is filling people with joy!

Here are 5 ideas to get you started:

1. Share the Letteracy Deck article.

Spark interest in this idea by sharing the Letteracy Deck article with friends at school to get people pumped and ready to start postcard/letter writing parties.

2. Brainstorm.

Have a virtual or in-person informal brainstorming session to talk about ways to apply the Letteracy Deck principles with students. Remember to follow these brainstorming norms: 

• All ideas are welcome
• No comments or evaluation during the brainstorm
• The more ideas the better
• Don’t worry about duplicate ideas at this point

          Consider how letter writing is connected to your literacy standards or goals, content area 

          writing, and how writing is intertwined with the Science of Reading–Sedita’s Writing Rope,

          anyone? 

3. Make it unique.

“Letteracy Deck,” is an intriguing, idiosyncratic name for letter writing that includes words to describe both: letters and literacy, along with the place where the writing happens. What kind of distinctive name could you and students come up with to communicate that letter writing is happening where you are? One idea, borrow “letteracy” and match it with a new locale: Letteracy Lunchroom, Letteracy Under the Lindens, Letteracy Library…

4. Gather materials.

Keep it simple. Once the idea is shared and floated to students, hunt for a cool place for letter writing, and provide the tools needed: paper, envelopes, pens/pencils, and stamps. 

Remember, the writing can be student-to-student, student-to-teacher, student-to-family, student-to-? etc. The writer decides to whom they wish to write! 

5. Now, write.

Now let the writing begin! Spread joy and connection with the price of a postage stamp. 

Hooray for letters!

_{Read Anne Bratass’s original article about the Letteracy Deck and explore her non-profit, The Minnesota Children’s Press, for more strategies to inspire your students to read and write!}

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