For those interested, I’ve created a PDF version of the winning collage from our fall contest. Click on the PDF link, download to your desktop, and open. Enjoy!
Archive for November, 2006
Booing and how we did it
The Yokell family wrote a delightful collage that featured a family practice called: “booing.” I want to share it with you and then you can also read the way their family went about writing. Their longer collage included a piece about All Saint’s Day which is not included on this blog but is referenced in their “how we did it” notes.
Each of these testimonials are meant to encourage you to think outside the box with your own brood. Remember, writing is mostly dialog, musing, reading, thinking, talking some more and finally committing those thoughts to paper or screen. When the words are located outside of your head, play with them. Move the words around, add new ones, cross out weak and vague terms. Upgrade “B” words to “A+” ones. Try moving the end to the beginning and see if that adds an element of surprise. PLAY~ The Yokells know how. 🙂
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Booing has always been exciting, but especially this year because we were extremely close to being caught. I could hardly catch my breath. My eyes were wide as pumpkins; my teeth chattered, my body shook and my heart pounded as fast as a racehorse running. The person we booed came all the way down to the street, in view of where we were hiding, and peered straight at us, but didn’t see us. A pillar concealed me, and David hid up against the wall. He was even closer to being spotted than I was because he was in plain site, while just my head was poking around the pillar.
What is booing? Booing is where we go to a neighbor’s with a boo sign, a poem, and a package of goodies, and put it on the doorstep, ring the doorbell and skedaddle. Then we wait until we think it’s safe, and we high tail it back home. We boo two people every year, but only after we get booed.
There once was a man on our street,
Whose security system was neat,
We would try to sneak by
Avoiding the eye,
To leave a “Boo†sign and a treat.
Whose security system was neat,
We would try to sneak by
Avoiding the eye,
To leave a “Boo†sign and a treat.
How we did it:
We brainstormed on the topic of fall, with me (Mom) writing the ideas on a white board. Each participant chose a topic from our brainstorming list. Ray dictated to me on the topic of Booing, while I typed. Afterwards, we rearranged the sentences for better flow. We also picked out unimaginative words to replace with ones that are more precise. We used an online thesaurus to find stronger word choices. David dictated to me on the topic of our homeschool support group’s annual All Saints Party. With David, I had to ask many leading questions to help him imagine being there, walking through the room, describing what he saw. Afterwards, I wrote a limerick related to Ray’s topic of “booing.â€
Speaking at PEACH
Last night I had the joy of speaking to a homeschool group about an hour from my house. This is the second speaking engagement in two months where the participants included moms who’ve used Brave Writer materials for years. In the past, I’d attend these events and no one had ever heard of me or Brave Writer.
Now I’ve got moms attending who can answer the questions better than I can!
It is wild to be at a point where moms come to meetings specifically to share with me how much Brave Writer classes and materials have helped their children. I get to hear about high school and college students who’ve gone on to perform well in their writing classes and these moms thank Brave Writer for that success. Love that!
Last night one mother brought her children with her to the talk. One little boy of about 9 missing his big front left tooth chattered away with me afterwards. We got to talking sports and I asked him if he was a fan of the Cincinnati Bengals (I happen to be, though the agony of watching them almost win aka: lose the last three games is enough to make me rend my number 9 jersey). Seth declared that he is not. I probed:
Who is your favorite team?
I haven’t decided yet.
Do you like the Colts?
Not really.
But Peyton Manning’s arm! You gotta love that.
Peyton Manning can pass, yes, but they lose like in the first game of the play-offs. I mean, they can’t stop the run.
Now really, don’t you love kids? He knew as much about the NFL as I did. He went on to tell me that his dad is a Bears fan and that they were both really mad when the Bears lost one game a few weeks ago. I got a big charge out of him.
Kids are delightful, interesting people. I’m so glad I got to meet this little guy (Seth) and his sister Sarah. Made my night.
More tomorrow. Gotta get back to my own brood.
How one family did it
I promised to share some of the processes our brave writing families went through to produce their lovely collages.
Isabella (9) and I really enjoyed this writing project! We got started when you first put it up, so we had lots of free writing, simmering, writing, simmering, writing time. Sometimes we worked on it when we were at home listening to Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons” – very cliché, I know, but we both love it.
Sometimes we worked while eating pumpkin loaf (Isabella) and drinking hot tea (me) at Starbucks. We wrote side by side, individually, but then shared what we had done. So then, our next round involved taking off on something the other one had done. At one point, Isabella got out the rhyming dictionary to find some rhymes for fall and decided she wanted to do a whole piece that was just a bunch of words that rhyme with fall.
Once we had written a lot, we did some selecting, and I did a lot of revising and editing of mine. Isabella did some revising and editing of hers. We spent a long time talking about and playing around with how we would present our collage. Isabella loves collecting things on walks and she loves drawing, so we decided to intermingle our poems with both drawings and collected things.
Also, Isabella is the one who decided to change the font colors on some of her poems and meticulously decided which colors were appropriate for each thing. Then I was obliged to do the same with my poems from that group. Though Isabella handled the font color detail, I handled all the photographing and fiddling with the technical details of getting photos and drawings on the computer.
A few things I want to point out. Notice how long the process took. When you work on writing, it is a process that occurs over unhurried time. The best work is the result of simmering, talking, simmering, writing, simmering and gathering of more ideas, words and experiences. Writing will the flow out of that immersion in the material and language.
I also enjoyed hearing that the writing happened at home, at Starbucks, over hot drinks and pumpkin bread. Why not? Who wouldn’t enjoy writing more is treats were involved?
Thanks Isabella and Susie.
Fall Collage Contest winners announced
This picture comes from Susie Hairston and Isabella Soparkar, Honorable Mentions.
On the Brave Writer Moms Yahoo List, we had a writing contest during October. The contest asked Brave Writer Lifestyle Families to write a collage about fall. Each family member was asked to contribute at least one piece of writing, but all in one piece.
The collage could include poetry, quotes from books or songs or poems, a color walk, a freewrite, dialog, jokes, personal experiences, memories, or fiction… in short, the collage would be a collection of pieces of writing written by several family members and submitted all together. Collages don’t have to have transitions. They benefit, though, from an organizing theme. Quotes from outside sources were allowed as part of the finished project.
I asked the families who submitted collages to include a short description of the writing process they went through so that I could share those with all of you as you learn how to apply the Brave Writer philosophy to your family. These brave families did a superb job of taking this ball and running downfield with it! I kept calling out to my husband as I read the entries: listen to this terrific analogy, or don’t you love this word pair?
I promised to announce the winners here. The Grand Prize winner will receive either a copy of The Writer’s Jungle or Help for High School (or an equivalent in Brave Writer materials if the family already owns these). The runners-up (two) will receive two back issues to our language arts programs (the Arrow, the Boomerang or the Slingshot).
Over the next couple of days, I’ll post some excerpts from the truly wonderful pieces I received, as well as how the writing process unfolded for these families. They have great ideas for how to inspire young writers. I’m floored by the outpouring of creativity and energy. Even a few dads and one grandpa joined in the fun! Our winners come from two different countries. How cool is that?
Without further ado…
Grand Prize Winner: The Guy Family, headed up by the very capable Anna Guy from down under: Australia
First Runner-Up: The Page Family, led by the delightful Teresa Page from the good ol’ U.S.A.
Second Runner-up: The Lippert Family, galvanized into creativity by the ever industrious Stacy Lippert also from the U.S.A.
Congratulations to all the winners and thank you to all the participants. I thoroughly enjoyed reading your work. I have a great job. 🙂
