Let me take you to my kitchen table a couple of summers ago. My husband Jeff, bless him, decided dinner was the time to help our son Jake with his college essay. “What about your Eagle Scout project?” Grunt. Next night: “What about the time you broke your arm?” Slump. Night after that: “Ooh, what about leadership?” By the end of the week, Jake was eating dinner practically horizontal.
Jeff wasn’t wrong to want to help. But the more topics we threw at Jake, the more he froze. We were trying to help and making it worse. Here’s what finally turned it around, and the do’s and don’ts that go with it.
Why throwing topics at your kid backfires
When you hand your teen a topic, it lands like pressure, and it quietly signals their own ideas aren’t good enough. So they freeze. The fix isn’t a better topic. It’s getting out of the driver’s seat.
What TO do
- Brainstorm together. A real, no-judgment brain dump of moments, especially small ones. Volume over perfection.
- Ask questions that help them dig deeper. Not “what’s your topic,” but “tell me about a time you surprised yourself” or “what were you feeling in that moment.”
- Proofread for typos and grammar. Mechanics are fair game and genuinely helpful.
What NOT to do
- Don’t rewrite it in your voice. The moment it sounds like you, it stops sounding like them.
- Don’t make it sound like a 45-year-old wrote it. Admissions officers can tell, and it works against your kid.
- Don’t fix the content. You can fix the commas. You cannot fix the story.
The system that got Jake unstuck
We stopped trying to write “the essay,” because that phrase alone is paralyzing. Instead we brainstormed several possible topics, not one, and we wrote in small story chunks. Not “write your personal statement,” but “tell me that one moment, just a few sentences.” Write a bunch of little chunks independently, and suddenly there’s no blank page, just a kid telling small, true stories that grow into the real thing. It’s the exact system I use with my students, one-on-one and in small groups.
Why this matters more this year
With so many schools dropping their supplemental essays, the personal statement carries more weight than ever. It’s often the main place your teen’s voice shows up, which means the voice has to be genuinely theirs.
Your real job
You’re not the writer. You’re the guide. The brainstorm partner, the question-asker, the comma-catcher, the calm. When your teen learns to tell their own story, that’s the actual win.
Want the whole system walked through live? I’m hosting a free workshop, How to Support Your Teen Through College Applications (Without the Stress), on Tuesday, July 1 at 8 PM. I’ll take you through the brainstorming and the story-chunk method step by step. It’s free and you’ll leave with a real plan. Sign up here.
You can fix the commas. You cannot fix the story. And that’s a good thing. You’re doing better than you think.
