Junior Writers Workshop

Junior Writers graduates (minus one, who was sick).

Today was a wrap for the first session of Junior Writers level 1! What a wonderful experience. Over the last three weeks, I watched as these young minds absorbed all kinds of information, fueling their creativity and imagination. There was so much personality in each story created, and it was a beautiful thing.

How did Junior Writers get started?

My C had come to me several weeks ago, while I was in the thick of writing my novel, and asked me if I thought he could write a book. I was completely shocked and taken aback. Then he began to tell me the story that was brewing in his head. It was a wonderful thing. You may recall that my C has dyslexia and all things reading and writing have proven to be an exhausting struggle. Yet there he was, standing before me, and declaring loudly that he wanted to write a book. (I may have teared up.)

After this, my mind went to work... how was I going to teach him to write a book? I shared this with a friend, who happens to be brilliant with ideas, and she suggested I teach a workshop. I was immediately on board and together we brainstormed what this would look like, and it all just came so naturally. Junior Writers was born. I started with the intention of six kids. I could comfortably fit six in my dining room. But the response I got was incredible, so I decided to open it up to eight. I could fit eight. Not long before the class was going to begin a friend contacted me and asked if I was full because her daughter wanted to be a part of it. I was completely full, but I knew this girl, she's sweet as punch, and so I caved and said yes. So now I had a full dining table and was going to have to move kids to my kitchen island, which then opened up two more spots. They were filled in 30 minutes. Suddenly I had 11 kids! It was so exciting! One ended up having to drop, so in the end, I had ten, which proved to be the perfect number.

Over the last three weeks, we dove into character and scene development, show vs tell, synonyms, and we mapped out an entire storyboard, start to finish. Then today, our final day, they all had the chance to read part of their story to the class. Because writing isn't just about what we put on the page, it's also having the courage to share what we create.

As they were leaving, they all asked... will you do this again? How can I say no to that?