BeTWEEN the Lines Class Summary 2/24/14

with Michelle Cameron

Critique of Stories

I’m thrilled that so many of these young writers are choosing to focus on one story, refining and improving it as they move forward. Among the topics we discussed this week (you’ll find some repeat from week to week as I focus on common issues):

• How imagination can make a commonplace object something magical
  
• That focusing on more description can help us see what’s going on
  
• How the senses can help us experience a story – and that whenever you can go beyond sight to hearing, smelling, etc., you really should
  
• That personification, fully realized, can provide us with a new way of looking at life
  
• How emotion can create a strong response in readers
  
• That we should learn to trust our readers, and not repeat details when they’re in very close proximity

Beginning, Middle and End

Today we discussed that a story needs – and they all knew this – a beginning, middle and an end. Some of the kids had already met up with the “roller coaster” model of storytelling, and I added the following details to that model:

• In the beginning, we’re getting to know and care about the characters and they experience the first conflict in a story
  
• Throughout the middle of a story, the stakes must continually rise as the character(s) face additional conflicts
  
• That toward the end, there’s a moment (called “the dark night of the soul”) when everything appears to be going wrong. That’s followed by the climax, which is followed, of course, by the story’s resolution.

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To put this into practice, I divided the group into two and gave them a “fractured” story that they needed to put together. Unfortunately, we ran out of time and they didn’t fully get to finish the exercise.  

But it was fun to see them trying to piece all the parts together!

Homework

Because we didn’t get fully through the exercise, this week’s homework is either (pick one):

• Continue with the story begun last week (adding at least 1-2 pages to that story)
  
• Start a new story
  

I can’t wait to see what they’ll write!