Storytelling for Young Writers

We will learn how to generate new writing. We will cover how to find ideas and trust them and discover 'free-writing'. We will learn how to trust ourselves to express what we want and how we want.

Topic 1: Plot/Story and what happens next to make the story interest others.

Topic 2: Characters and Narrators: Who are your characters? Tell us about their joys, their flaws, the way they present themselves and the way their actions can be in conflict with their own notions of self. 

Topic 3: Setting and context: How does the landscape influence the characters and their stories? 

Topic 4: Style and how we want to add more details to our stories though verb choices, adjectives, actions, and structure. 

I teach by example by which I offer published stories, ask the students to bring in short stories and novels they love, and we talk about the way they were written, noticing choices made. Then we write in a similar style and see how it feels. Does it make sense? Does it help you, the writer, to have a role model? 

After that we read outloud to each other our new work, asking for constructive feedback. (What we noticed and enjoyed, what we wanted more of and where we got confused.) 
Then we leave the class with actions to take, new prompts and ideas to explore on our own.