Pre-teens with great imaginations love the Other Stars, Other Worlds online camp! It's the perfect mix of structure and creative freedom. Many parents find their strong reader has a great imagination but her writing skills are lagging behind. Why?
Well, there are many easy ways to kill a child's enthusiasm for writing:
lack of writing time in brick and mortar schools
overly harsh instruction during the creative ideas-gathering phase of writing
lack of freedom in creative writing choices
The Other Stars, Other Worlds summer camp is an online camp where students have fun catching up. It's also a fabulous choice for kids who already love writing as well as those who play D&D or video games. Older teens, meanwhile, flock to the online workshop City of Doom.
The process:
We start by creating a map of our new world together. This gives the student a base upon which create a story. There's an infectious enthusiasm for many learners in taking great ideas and then adding their own customizations onto it.
We continue by adding in our own individual ideas for our own story. For example: The world as set up by the campers may be a forest world with twelve tribes of elves, yet each learner gets to build her own tribe. Perhaps your learner creates a lost elf tribe stuck in a hidden part of the world when one character accidentally breaks free. Your learner gets to decide for herself what her story will be.
The end product: learners almost effortlessly create a sustained writing project. This writing often demonstrates point of view, dialogue, and other key creative writing elements.
Here are more reasons these workshops are an outstanding success:
It's so much fun for the learner, but actually utilizes many important academic skill sets: -Organizing their thoughts with pre-writing exercises -Reading their work out loud to their peers (--if they want to. Most want to read and share.) -Listening to others in an engaged and respectful way -Assessing others' writing & giving articulate, respectful feedback -Deep focus on a task -Engaging in collaborative creativity -Learning elements of novel plot structure
These workshops meet fifth grade common core standards for California & most other states in creative writing, such as Virginia.
Many parents notice their learner are so excited that they continue writing, even after the workshop is over.
Your learner can take this camp online in the comfort of your own home--or even grandma's house!
Finally, this workshop is flexible in accommodating many types of learner:
This workshop has a collaborative feel at the beginning, yet offers independent creativity for highly individualistic learners: Although we begin by assembling a thick layer of multiple ideas from all the learners that sparks the imagination, there's room for strong individualistic learners. Some create their story set in the world's past or future, or up on a moon looking down on the world. They're barely tied to the creative adventure--and they like it that way. The workshop can accommodate their need to be separate from the rest, and yet still remain nominally, part of the group.
The workshop offer creative structure AND creative freedom for precocious/ gifted students: Each day, students get exercises to kick off their imagination. But if they already have a story in mind or if they already know what they want to write, they don't have to use the exercise. So learners who spend the time after the workshop planning can immediately dive into their own fertile imagination. Gifted students can continue to scribble pages at home, and if they write faster than the other students, that's okay! They can go faster, longer, and harder than the rest if they want.
For learners that need time to ponder there's some wiggle room: Although we come up with ideas the first day, we test out those ideas the second day and make adjustments. This works well for some learners who had time overnight to ponder and come up with ideas in a no-pressure situation. Because the workshop extends over a week, they have time to build their ideas overnight, at a slower pace, more gradually.
Highly creative learners who usually struggle socially can thrive in this online experience: An easy, predictable structure to the online camp lowers the bar for positive peer to peer social interactions between learners.
Feel free to leave comments or questions below.
As always, if you or someone you’re raising is interested in writing a big project, you can let me know in the contact form and we can chat about you/your learner and the project to see if I can help.
