Thursday, March 11, 2010

Grade 5 Character Charles Beaudoin School

Wednesday at Charles Beaudoin I led a workshop with grade 5s on character. Then, while currently I forget the names of the great teacher and student teacher in the background, I did remember to take a few snapshots. You can tell a lot about the character of the school and teachers by the energy and verve the students exhibit. Look at these walls--they're covered in stories and writing tips. The students were terrific to work with as they went straight to writing from our prewriting exercise. It's easy to talk about writing, it's another to work quietly inside your head when all around you the world is teeming.

Death on Youtube--the rewrite

First of all we need to change the title since YouTube is a trademark. So we have suggestions from grade 5 at Charles Beaudoin: Killing on the Internet, Death on a Skateboard (mine), Killing on Video.

Well as brainstorming goes, I've come up with this one because of something my good friend
and fellow writer Gisela Sherman said: Death Goes Viral.
Another friend and writer Lynda Simmons (Getting Rid of Rose) suggested I need more of a sense of place. So off I went to Maple Skatepark and took some photos. Who remembered that it was so small. There's also a tiny one at Brant Hills but only one BMX biker at a time could go in that one.

The push is on. I want to have this off to my agent and Norwegian Publisher on Friday.
Wish me luck.