First Bit of Writing Advice

I have been blessed to have a steady stream of writers come into my classroom every year and I always worry that when students leave they will lose that spark for writing, mainly because there is no one asking them to do it. I know from personal experience that finding the time to create new writing pieces is difficult. We seem to make time for everthing else in this world except writing. One way to change that is to read books that make you want to pick up the pen and start something fresh. The first book that did this for me was Stephen King's On Writing. It is filled with great writing theory and practice. It gave me some new ideas to work through as well as the inspiration to start a fresh story. I would encourage anyone who enjoys writing to look into reading this phenomenal little book. I have offered it to a few writers who (hopefully) found it helpful in their prose as well.