Back to School: Week 4

This week we have the night off as our tutor is invigilating.  We also had last week off due to the school being closed for half term.  As a result I managed to complete my Christmas story which was started in this particular lesson.

I am choosing tonight to catch up on my class notes:

Recommendations

• The Cambridge Guide to Literature and English
• Hogans Heroes - well written episodes.
• Hodder and Stoughton website
• Nora Ephron

One of my classmates shared a good analogy: there are two types of writer: 

1.  The architect - plans the story out.
2. The gardener - Plants the seed and watches them grow and nurtures them

Important elements of a short story

• Length - defining the structure
• Number of characters
• Start as close to the end of the story as you feel you can
• 3D emotional characters the reader can empathise with - in particular ones that are quirky.

Class Activity

Sketch a few ideas for a Christmas themed short story.

We had ten minutes for this particular task.  I think I spent seven of those minutes freaking out about my blank page and three frantically scribbling down my brains idea transcript.  Amazingly I came up with something to write about.  In fact we each came up with something which showed our individual interests.  We will later enter these stories into this competition by the end of June.