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Teaching - Different Styles

6/10/2012

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I spent the weekend with over a hundred Girl Guides aged 4-17, though mostly I hung out with the younger set. Our them for this camp was the Queen’s Jubilee. The girls were challenged with learning twenty facts about the Queen and her family. And while most of the girls ran around reading posters and reporting the facts to earn small flags of felt, some girls ran into trouble. These girls had different learning styles than the rest. So, instead of insisting that they do the task as it was laid out, I adjusted it to fit their needs. For some it was as easy as teaming them up and walking them through the task. But for four girls, just thinking about finding twenty facts, answering all those questions, and sifting through so much information seemed overwhelming. They wanted to participate, but they were scared they would fail.

These girls have learning difficulties. It doesn’t mean they can’t learn, only that they learn differently. By adjusting the task and using positive words, high fives, and repeated success, the girls went from tears of frustration and the feeling that they were going to fail AGAIN, just like they had so many times before – to smiles, laughter, and a racing search for the next poster. In the end I heard the best thing a Girl Guide leader can hear,
“This is really fun!”

The girls thanked me again and again for helping them be like all the other girls with their flags pinned to their shirts. I just told them I knew they could do it. That they are smart. It’s something kids who have different learning needs don’t hear often enough.

So if you see a kid struggling, don’t write it off as not trying. Most of the time these kids have to try twice as hard as everyone else just to come up with average. Give them a hand, adjust how you present the task. Talk them through their fears of failure. Give them lots of praise. And don’t let their despondency turn you off of helping them – they are just afraid. It happens to us all.
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Make Every Scene Count

6/8/2012

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I've been madly editing my latest draft of Boiled Cat. This book was originally written in the 90's. I've grown a lot as a writer since then. One of the things I've noticed is back then I would write scenes I thought were funny, cool, or just sad. What I failed to do was tie them into the overall plot or theme of the book.
Every scene that goes into your book has to do something. There is no point in putting in a scene if it doesn't either push the plot forward or explore the main character(s). Make your writing work for you. Don't let it just hang out and watch TV. Push each scene to do as much as it can for whatever you are writing. Make every scene count.
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Goal, Motive, Conflict

6/4/2012

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Goal: What your character wants.
Motive: Why your character wants it.
Conflict: What or who is stopping your character from getting it.
External: The goal, motive, and conflict that is more apparent to other characters in your story.
Internal: The goal, motive, and conflict that has to do with the more emotional part of your character.
As a writer you need to be aware of both internal and external goal, motive, and conflicts of your main characters. Even with minor characters, goal, motive, and conflict are important to the story. Being aware of these beyond the surface - the bad guy is just killing people to be bad - gives more depth to your story. It can weave characters and plot lines together. It makes the reader relate with your characters. If you are getting stuck knowing just what your characters are supposed to do next - it might be because you are not completely in tune with your goal, motive, and conflict.
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The Truth About Fear

6/3/2012

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The writer sits, staring at the screen. “No,” she mutters, looking at the words she has spent the last many months creating. “No, not good enough. No one will like it. I doubt there’s even a market. Even if there is, somebody’s done it better than me.” Still she reluctantly saves the document before shutting the computer off and walking away. And so it goes for fifteen long years.
Yeah, that was me. Afraid of rejection. Afraid to even try. I returned to the same novel time and again, revising and revising. Never ready to take the next step. Too fearful of the unknown.
Fear of failure is nothing new to writers. After all who likes to be told, “we don’t want you.” It’s like a blow to the chest. There’s really no preparing yourself. Still, it’s something we all have to go through if we really want to be published authors. We have to walk through the fire. Temper steel. Face our fears.
What ended up helping me was to look at some of the authors I admired and really see their journey. After all no one starts out famous. Superman took five years to get published. Stan Lee almost lost his job when he first suggested Spiderman. Stephen King felt so bad about his rejection by Random House he filed away his first novel, “The Long Walk”. Even his novel Carrie began as a few pages thrown in the trash, only to be rescued by his wife, who insisted he continue. J.K. Rowling was told that nobody would want to publish Harry Potter because it was too long and set in a boarding school. It took her agent a year to sell the manuscript. My favorite manga author, Masashi Kishimoto, spent all of high school and most of art college trying to win the Hop Jump award. When he finally did, and had a professional editor to work with, he was rejected for over year before finally hitting on Naruto. The thing is, nobody makes it overnight. Period. Every author has to face rejection.
So I finally took a gulp of courage and submitted a few chapters of Boiled Cat to Orca Press. To my delight, they asked for the rest of the novel, only to later reject it. But it gave me hope and more importantly, much needed experience. Now I have two books published, I’m starting my journey into self-publishing, and I still have more than a few rejection letters under my belt. And you know what? Rejection still sucks, but the truth about fear is, it gets less the more you face it.
So no more talking down to yourself. Finish your manuscript, story or poem and head for the stars. What’s the worse that can happen? You end up right where you were, but a little wiser and much more brave.
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Getting to Know Your Character

6/3/2012

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Starting a story? Had it bouncing around in your head for a while? Think you know all your characters? Maybe not.
Now, I’ve encountered some resistance when telling authors this. They don’t like to hear that they don’t know their own characters as intimately as they think they do. But calm down everyone! It’s not such bad news – and it’s an easy fix.
First – if you haven’t already done it. Write a character sketch. Those of you who play role playing games like Dungeons and Dragons you’ll already know what this is. It’s where you write out a kind of dating chart: Pets, favourite colour, weaknesses, strengths, family, race, loves, hates, etc. Basically whatever you want. There are some good ones on the internet, though I usually just make up my own specific to my project.
Next – give your character a … well… characteristic. A facial tick or special movement like sighing through clenched teeth every time something doesn’t go his way. A word or phrase. An object that the character is never without (if you take it away it’s going to be a big time plot twist). Do this for every big character (or even EVERY character) in your story). It adds dimension and makes the character easy to spot in a crowd.
Now – take your character out for a walk or a cup of coffee. Get to know them and their views on the world. Ask questions that aren’t even in your story – “How do you feel about the politics in Egypt?” “Do you like Fall or Spring?” You don’t have to write these out either. Just play it out in your mind as you’re taking a stroll or sitting in a café staring out the window. Ask yourself how your character would react to the different people you see and why.
Finally – write a short scene (and I mean SHORT, after all you need to get on with writing your original story) detailing an average day for your character. The kind of day they have before you, the writer, screw it all up.
And there you have it. Do this and you will know your character like a best friend. You may even miss them when you are done writing the story. I recommend doing this for ALL major characters: heroes, villains and secondary characters that stick around for any length of time. Although you may not use all you have written in your preparation, the readers will feel your work and it will make your story deeper and more convincing.
So give it a try and see if this technique works for you!
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    Kim Firmston

    Writer, Teacher, Mutant. What more could you want?

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