As the school year comes to an end and the days get warmer, we urge you to stay creative in the summer months! In fact, we hope you will START.WRITE.NOW. We’ll give you tips on fun things to do and places to go, a spot to share photos of your creations, and the opportunity to win prizes for your art and writing.

We hope that START.WRITE.NOW will keep the imaginative wheels in your head turning throughout the summer—and right up until September 17, when registration begins for the 2013 Scholastic Art & Writing Awards!

To share photos of yourself being creative (here are some examples), simply visit our Tumblr page (http://awawards.tumblr.com/submit), add your content, and hit submit!

This year, we’re featuring a What’s Your Story video game design contest on Gamestar Mechanic and an essay challenge in partnership with the National Constitution Center (check out our American National Tree Challenge blog post for more info!). Both provide opportunities to win prizes and recognition. We’ll also be spotlighting groundbreaking artists, highlighting one of our art and writing categories each week, and providing staff picks and juror tips on how to stay creative. For more information about these challenges and our other summer activities, visit http://www.artandwriting.org/startwritenow.

Have ideas on how to stay creative this summer? Tweet it @artandwriting or share on our Facebook wall.

And remember: Starting September 17, 2012, every 7-12 grade student in public, private, and home schools can submit work to the 2013 Scholastic Art & Writing Awards. Find out how you can be a part of our 90th year and how to submit your work here.

We look forward to seeing what you all come up with!