Teach for Understanding

Saturday, 27 May 2017

Creative Narratives for Creative Writing

Upper Elementary Snapshots (2016) and Crafting Connections (2014)

Note! Start blog at Creative Learning for Creative Writing!

Task 3

The third and final task for students is to individually create their own creative narrative using the scaffolded knowledge as a foundation. Students will either plan what they want to write or they can just write whatever comes to mind, which is known as Free Writing.

The task will last the entire lesson. For those that want to plan, they can have fifteen minutes to do so or come to class prepared with what they wish to write about. There is no minimum word limit to this task, however, there is a maximum at three thousand words. Now I know that seems like a lot and that it's not possible to reach that amount of words in an hour or however long the class goes for. Let me tell you, while three thousand can be quite a lot for one hour, everyone writes at a different speed. The goal is to write a story that has a backbone of structure such as characters, point of view, plot, themes, action and dialogue. As well as the sound of voice using adverbs, adjectives, descriptive language and metaphors.

There is a prompt for the narrative that the students will create: "Every Lock Has Keys"

This site has several good suggestions for better writing:

Hernandez, 2012

The idea of this task, is to have fun with writing, to experience the joys of creating original worlds that characters of your own mind get to experience and enjoy; solve puzzles even, save a princess or a prince, kiss the frog or defeat the evil wizard.

So all I can say, is good luck, have fun and write from the heart.

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Creative Voice for Creative Writing

"Authors must find a "voice" for each of their characters that is believable, appropriate, and consistent."
(Wiehardt, 2017 para 7)

The voice of a narrative includes many different devices and techniques to give it life. Syntax, diction, dialogue, tone, and pacing are all techniques used by writers to bring their narratives to life.

Everyone has a different voice. Not just vocally but when writing as well. It is unique to the author and shines through the soup of words and worlds to give the readers a little of the author. It distinguishes one author from another. Voice gives meaning to the words.

An author's style, quality that makes writing unique, that conveys the author's attitude, personality and character falls under voice.
It is the characteristic speech and thought patterns of the narrator of fiction. Voice has much to do with reader's experience of literature, and is one of the most important elements of writing. (Wiehardt, 2017 para 2)

How can voice be applied to narratives? How is it done?

There are many ways to breath voice into a narrative. It can be through themes, metaphors, and arrangement. Through adverbs, adjectives, descriptive language and even conjunctions.

Whether you write fiction or non-fiction, you must find your writing voice. But what does that really mean? Here are 10 questions to find your voice.:

Photo by BdwayDiva1 (creative commons). Adapted by The Write Practice. Used by Alicia Glasson 2017.

Task 2

For task 2, as in task 1, students will be asked to look at the narrative,"Inevitable Death" by Tifany Nguyen, Californa, USA. In pairs they will discuss each element of narrative voice gaining knowledge in these elements. They will then search through the narrative to find these elements making annotation where each of them are. Using the example of edited narrative: "Inevitable Death" by Tifany Nguyen, they can gain knowledge of what could be found in the narrative. The class will then have a discussion, grouping all their ideas about narrative voice into one discussion. Students are then asked to take out the elements of narrative voice and view what is left and make their own conclusions as to why it is important to have voice in a creative narrative.

In the edited copy of this narrative, I have used the following to illuminate the elements in which I would like students to focus on:

Green highlighter for adverbs.
Red highlighter for adjectives.
Blue pen for descriptive language.
Green pen for metaphors.

Wiehardt, G. (2017). Voice in Fiction Writing. Retrieved from https://www.thebalance.com/what-is-voice-in-fiction-writing-1277142

Creative Structure for Creative Writing

Structure in a creative narrative is important.

It is the beginning, the middle, the end and somewhere in between.

This starts with the beginning. An event that starts off the narrative.

Then it travels to the conflict. This is the problem that needs to be resolved. It can come in any form, such as man against man, man against nature and even man against inner struggle.

The climax is between the conflict and the problem solved. It is the edge of the cliff that the characters stand upon and decide whether they jump or not. It is where the conflict comes to a head and it is the height of the story.

Then comes the resolution. It sees the problem solved, such as a crime being solved.

The end is the tying up of loose ends in a neat bow. Finishing the story may end with "Happily ever after" or even "The End".

After the foundation is set, the first layers can be added.

Then it is time to add the point of view, plot, characters, setting, theme(s), speech, action, emotion and genre. These are the guts of the story.

So what does this mean for a narrative? How is this useful?

Well, even if the base line structure is there, a story is nothing without the guts, without a point of view the thoughts provided by the author is scattered. Without plot, there is no direction. Without characters, there is no one to tell the story. Without setting, there is no location. Without theme, it is bland and dull. Without speech, it would be like a silent movie. Without action, there is no tension, no drama. Without genre, there is none of the above.

So how do these help? What can be done?

Task 1

Take a look at the text "I Think We Just Killed the Mayor of Seattle" by Nikolas Kvenvolden, Washington State, USA. In pairs, look at each of the layers above. Try to work out where each of these are situated in the example narrative. Afterwards, have a class discussion to find any similarities and conflicts of views, perhaps another pair has the same idea or even a different one that hasn't been thought of.

Now take out these layers, cross them out and see what is left. Does it make sense? Does it make it better or worse?

Example of edited narrative:"I Think We Just Killed the Mayor of Seattle" by Nikolas Kvenvolden, Washington State, USA.

In the edited copy of this narrative, I have used several different coloured pens and a highlighter to show different aspects, which are the following:
Blue pen for dialogue.
Red pen for characters.
Green pen for setting.
Black pen for descriptive language.
Purple pen for plot.
Light red pen for action movements.
Yellow highlighter for themes.

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About Me

My name is Alicia Glasson. I am a first year pre-service teacher at Murdoch University.
I am currently studying English and Creative Writing and Secondary Education double degree and a minor in Modern History.
I have a passion for the English language and especially creative writing.

I have created this blog to help secondary students learn how to write creatively and learn to love it.
I know from personal experience that I did not like creative writing grouping up as much as I do now and I think that has to do with poor access to resources that would have made my knowledge and passion flourish, which is something I hope that this blog will do for other students.

<a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img alt="Creative Commons License" style="border-width:0" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/88x31.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>.

Creative Learning for Creative Writing

Learning Creative Writing for Students

Why am I doing this? What is the purpose of this blog? Who am I?

Alicia Glasson

alicia.glasson97@gmail.com

For this blog, I have chosen to educate year ten English students on how to look at a creative text, to look for structure, organisation of text and the voice. There are much more components to writing a creative text but that can come later. It is useful to scaffold the learning in such a way that they don't chew off too much information in one bite, that they can learn the basic foundations of what makes up a narrative before moving into the more complex components such as foreshadowing, imagery, and points of view in depth.

Using the Curriculum strands, they will be able to learn how to analyse set texts that will give them a base knowledge of structure for any type of creative writing such as a narrative or poetry. They will be able to understand how structure, symbolism and character is used. As well as using other types of texts to learn this, such as documentaries and online media that will help them understand and not just pages in a book or lines on a page. The Curriculum strands are thus follows for teachers: (ACELA1567) (SCSA, 2014), (ACELT1774) (SCSA, 2014), (ACELT1642) (SCSA, 2014) and (ACELA1569) (SCSA, 2014) for text structure and organisation.

(ACELT1643) (SCSA, 2014), (ACELT1815) (SCSA, 2014) and (ACELA1571) (SCSA, 2014) for voice.

(ACELT1814) (SCSA, 2014), (ACELY1756) (SCSA, 2014), (ACELT1815) (SCSA, 2014) and (ACELT1644) (SCSA, 2014) for creating texts.

Learning how to write emotive and powerful texts as either persuasive essays or creative narratives can be learnt through creative voice, which is something that this blog shall be covering. Learning how to use voice to create tension, writing within different genres and being able to find the voice in other written texts is important when thinking about creating a personal creative project.

The task of actually creating a written product will be putting all the above information that students have learnt into a structured text. Being able to demonstrate their knowledge of how to group themes together and write them coherently. In different mediums such as written texts, videos and documentaries. Being able to demonstrate how they can argue a point subtly and expressively in case of persuasive writings and being able to draw from their own personal experiences to create vibrant worlds that can come alive on the page or the screen. Working in pairs will help students to understand the ideas they are learning better when drawing from their own experiences. Having discussions on the topics to gather information is essential for learning a topic such as this.

The outcome of this blog is for students to gather knowledge on how to create the base elements of a creative narrative before making their own with examples provided. After learning how to create a text, students will be asked to create their own, using the knowledge that has been scaffolded for them.

Creative narratives empower our world, there are millions of books around the world on all sorts of topics. Many are from famous best sellers such as Stephen King, J.K Rowling, James Patterson, and Dr. Seuss to name a few. Creative narratives are studied in classrooms all over the globe. Why not add to the pile with a book of their own? However instead of a full book which can take years to be ready for publishing, each student will create a short story or flash fiction narrative.

At the end, it is up to the classroom teacher and the school, that each piece be polished up and ready for printing in a collection of short stories which can be sold on Amazon.com or on the school and community websites through various self-publish websites, and perhaps any money made from the endeavour can be used to renovate the schools and communities. Not only will it demonstrate the abilities gained by the students, but it will show the community how doing exercises like this will help bring the community together.

Using websites such as Amazon Self Publishing to learn how they maybe able to publish their finished collection, as well as other publishing sites. Using different types of technology to type out their narrative, perhaps using Word, Scrivener, Write or Die or even an electronic or manual typewriter for the full experience of writing, as the experience is just as important as the final product. Also with a typewriter the result is instant, however, there are some learning involved and bound to be errors as there are things like no back space and once written that is it.

Manual Typewriter: Adler Contessa DeLuxe 1970/1971
Glasson, A. (2014). Adler Contessa DeLuxe (Manual Typewriter). Perth, Western Australia.