Lesson 1: Sprints & Prompts

A sprint is a round of writing, head down, no interruptions. Many writers do sprints as a way to get ideas flowing, without worrying about editing or making every point perfectly clear. Today you are going to sprint for 20 minutes.

A prompt is a starting idea to help writers get writing. You can choose one of two prompts:

1) What celebrity would you like to be stuck in quarantine with, and why?

2) Write a story inspired by this photo of a bridge.

Lesson 2: Workshopping & Big-Picture Feedback

A workshop is a gathering of writers who read each other’s work and critique.

Big-picture feedback is the kind of feedback a real-world reader might think when reading — This is confusing. I wish I knew what this character looked like. I loved this, but I would love it even more if you added _________.

Read your partner’s piece and provide three pieces of big-picture feedback. Offer up two things you liked about the piece, and then note something you felt was missing, or confused you, or you had a question about. This last thing doesn’t need to be negative, but usually there is one thing a reader thinks could be different, or could be added. I wonder how old the character is? I don’t understand what happened at this point. I’m not sure why the writer included that piece of information, I wish they’d added a sentence explaining why. I love that tiny character, I wish she was in the story more!

It’s up to a writer to decide how to use feedback. They might realize a section is confusing, and change that section. Or they might think — great! I was trying to create a sense of mystery, and it’s working. Workshopping allows writers to see what readers think, but ultimately it’s up to the writer to decide what to do with the information.

Lesson 3: Writer’s Bio & Proofreading

Most literary journals and many magazines include a writer’s bio at the end of an article. The biography is short (50-100 words) and gives a tiny sense of the writer’s life. Usually a writer’s bio will contain information about where the writer lives, one or two other things that the writer has worked on recently, and a bit or two of something the writer likes to do that isn’t writing.

Susanna Baird is a writer and editor living in Salem, Massachusetts. Her fiction has appeared most recently in failbetter, and X-R-A-Y featured her creative nonfiction in April. When she’s not writing or reading, Susanna likes to hike with her dog, nap with her cat, and goof off with her family.

Many times a writer will connect themselves to the specific piece they are writing with an extra sentence or two. So if I’m writing a mystery story, I might add a sentence about my favorite mystery authors or share a recent mystery show or movie I watched, or if I was writing a story about witches, I might say something about Salem being Witch City.

I would like each of you to come up with your writer’s bio, to run with the pieces you wrote last week. You can use whatever name you’d like for your writing name. I just use my name, but I have friends who use their initials, or use a nickname or their full name — first and middle — you can choose whatever you’d like. Some writers use a different name for different genres. For example, J.K. Rowling uses “Robert Galbraith” for her series of crime books for adults, which are aimed at a different audience than the Harry Potter books.

Things you might want to include in your bio: where you live. Sometimes writers name the city or town, but other times they’ll be less specific — “the North Shore of Massachusetts” or “Essex County” or just “Massachusetts” or “New England” or “the Northeast.”

Your jobs other than writing (probably student! Feel free to include grade and school, or not!).

One or two interesting projects you did recently — think about things you’ve done for school. If you’ve done any writing for school, definitely include that, but if not, just pull a few interesting things you’ve done for school. And if you don’t have anything (because school is weird right now), just skip it!

If you can think of any connections with your story, throw them in. Mention the show your celebrity is in and how you love it or are waiting for new episodes, or if you wrote fiction, maybe mention a few books you’ve been reading, or authors you love.

Write a little bit about what you like to do when you’re not writing. Cook? Color? Paint? Play Roblox with the Roblox Detectives? These little details help turn you into a real person for the readers.

Final note: These are yours, not mine. You can make them whatever you want, and you can change them each time you write a new piece for the …. what is this journal going to be called???

When you are done (let’s say by bedtime), send the story to me and to the person whose story you read last week. (So reverse order - if this is confusing ask me.) Each of you will proofread the other person’s bio. Proofreading is when you read for mistakes - missing capital letters or commas, words spelled wrong.

Here is a fact that all writers know - Writers are the number one WORST proofreaders of their own writing. Always find someone else to proofread anything you wrote. Your job as a writer is about content — what you are saying — and style —how you are saying it. Let someone else do your proofreading.

The easiest way to proofread will be to print out the story. If you do not have a printer at home, I can print it and drop it off at your house tomorrow morning. Just mark up the story, and then take a photo and text the photo to the writer so they can make the changes.

We will read the bios out loud during our meeting tomorrow. Reading aloud is a great way to catch errors - sometimes your eyes will miss something but your ears will catch it!

I can’t wait to get your first stories out into the world. (Please note: I will never publish anything you don’t want me to publish. If you’d rather skip anything, anytime, just ask!)

Lesson 4: Descriptive Writing - Objects

Being able to describe something so your readers get a sense of it is a skill that sets great writers apart. This is true of writers of fiction, and of writers of nonfiction. I once had to write a news story about people who were upset that a giant tree was being chopped down. My readers were going to better understand why the neighbors were upset if I described the tree - how big it was, what kind, but also where it was and what it did for the neighborhood - did it provide shade along the sidewalk? Did it fill up one corner of a park, making the park more beautiful? Had it been part of the neighborhood for a few years, or was it an old tree that had been around longer than anyone living?

For this week, I want you to write a description of an object, anywhere from 100-300 words.

When you describe your object, tell me what it looks like, but try to move beyond shape and color (though include those!). How does the object occupy space, and how does it exist with the other things around it? Give me clues as to the “life” of the object.” So for example, if I decide to describe an old book, I might tell you where the book lives, and I might look at the book for signs that it’s new - price tag still one, book cover still shiny - or signs that it’s been read a lot - maybe there is a stain where someone put a drink on the cover, or maybe the pages are a little wrinkled at the edges, or maybe the cover is ripped or the colors on the cover are faded.

A helpful method when describing is to compare an object to other objects. You might say “the book didn’t look as new as the other books on the shelf” or you might compare it something totally different - “the pages of the book were as soft as an old quilt.”

Another way of adding to a description is to describe the environment the object is in, and other objects the book is surrounded by. If the book lives in a room with books all over the place - on shelves, under the bed, on the dresser - then I might assume the book is owned by someone who loves to read. If the book is sitting in a bag with softball equipment, then I’m thinking the owner plays softball. With a tree - is it in a yard, and are there objects nearby that indicate kids might live here? Dogs? Is it one of 200 trees growing in the woods, and if so, is there a path nearby, or a pond?

You can also describe different states of the object. If you chose a tree, for example, you could describe what it looks like when the wind is blowing, and how big the leaves are, which would indicate what season it is. We have a flowering tree in our yard, but now many of the petals are on the ground, which lets me know that we’ve gone by the spring period when the flowers are in bloom.

Feel free to Google your object - facts about your object might help readers get an even fuller sense of what you’re describing.

We’ll swap pieces tonight, and each reader can ask one question about the object. Once the writers answer those questions (in writing), we’ll proof the pieces tomorrow and get them posted! We can include photos of your object, but don’t share the photos today, as I want all of us to read the pieces without seeing the object first!

Lesson Five: Editor’s Notes

Sometimes, especially in literary journals, an editor will add a note to the start or end of a piece, making a note about a detail or theme that spoke to them, that they want to bring to readers’ attention. This week, as Pyper catches up on past assignments, each of you will act as her editor on one piece, not only serving the regular editorial functions - feedback and proofreading - but also composing brief editor’s notes to run at the beginning of her writing.

Lesson Six: Profiles

A profile is a story focusing on one person. Sometimes a profile is simply a piece that lets you know what a person is like in general, and sometimes a profile focuses on something particular about that person. For example, you might write a profile of Kim Driscoll, the mayor of Salem, that gives you an overview of what she’s like — what she looks like, what she likes to read or eat or watch on TV, where she’s from, how she spends her time both at work and away from work. But you might also write a profile of Kim Driscoll during the coronavirus pandemic. You’d probably include some of the same details — your readers always want to know what the subject of the article is like — but you’d primarily focus on what Kim Driscoll is like when she’s dealing with a pandemic upturning the life of her city.

A great profile writer is very good at observing, asks excellent questions, listens well to what the interview subject is saying, and akes what they say and asks good follow-up questions. So if Kim Driscoll said, “I like to read when I’m not at work,” the interviewer might ask “What’s your favorite book of all time?” or “What are you reading right now?” or “Do have any genres that are your favorite?” This is how you take a general detail and make it specific.

You all are going to interview your friends about what it’s like being a middle schooler (or if you want, you can do specifically 6th grader) during a pandemic. For today, I’d like you to read a great profile that an amazing writer named Susan Orlean wrote years and years ago of a 10-year-old boy named Colin. You can click on the link.

Article: The American Man at Age Ten

The article does mention sex, and briefly mentions abortion, which is when someone terminates a pregnancy, and uses the word “slut” which is derogatory and sexist. You will notice that the writer included all of this, even though some of it might be controversial, because the writer’s job is to present a full picture of this kid. The writer isn’t going to choose only the stuff that makes the kid look good, or only the stuff that won’t upset readers (including the kid’s parents). The writer uses as many details as she can to give the readers a full picture of this kid.

Your pieces will be much, much shorter, but when you read Orlean's profile, try to notice the kinds of things she tells you about Colin, which will help you think of details to include in your own pieces. If you want, read the profile aloud to each other, or read by yourselves. If any details really grab you that you think you could discover about your own subjects, jot them down as you read.

For tomorrow I want you to come up with some good questions, let’s say 10-20 each. The questions should get at what it’s like for your particular middle schooler right now. Is this whole pandemic/quarantine thing sad, boring, fun, easy, hard — all of these things? How are they spending their time? What’s different, what’s the same, what’s the bet, what’s the worst? You’ll also want to gather some general information about the person — how old, where do they live, who do they live with, things like that. We’ll share them tomorrow and then you all will have ‘til the next Thursday to do your interviews. I’ll write a separate lesson for that for tomorrow.

Lesson Seven: Interviews

First off, you need to think about the technical aspects of your interview. To cover myself, I try to take notes AND record the interview. If you guys are doing interviews over Zoom (which I can set up for you if you want, though I think your parents each have Zoom accounts), I can show you how to record them. I always take notes too. After an interview, I highlight the sections of my notes I think I will use in the story. Then I go find them in the recording so I can copy down exactly what the person said.

When you are asking questions, really listen. Sometimes the person will answer exactly like you want, but more often one of these things happens: 1) The person wants to talk about something that isn’t what you asked, and you aren’t interested in their answer. So you ask, “What is your favorite chapter in Harry Potter?” and they reply, “Ooooooh, can we talk about my favorite Disney show?” Let them finish talking, and say something nice about their answer, but then guide them back to the question you need them to answer.

2) The person wants to talk about something that isn’t what you asked, and it’s so interesting you decide to go in a new direction. “What is your favorite chapter in Harry Potter?” And they say, “You know, speaking of magic, my uncle is a magician and he owns a real magical rabbit .” You decide you will ditch your Harry Potter story and write about the uncle and his magical rabbit.

3) The person gives a really vague, quick answer. “My favorite chapter in Harry Potter is book 2, chapter 3.” They answered the question, but not in a way that’s very helpful to you. Follow up! “Oh, remind me what that chapter is about?”

Remember - you want them to feel like they are the center of the universe during the interview, but you are the one who is in charge!

After you interview type up the interview - this is a little tedious and takes a while, but it’s important to quote them accurately. Skip over things they say that are boring, and capture those things you think will make for good details in a story.

On Thursday we’ll review the scoops you got and decide how to start our story.

Lesson Eight: Introductory Paragraphs

Most readers will give you one paragraph to capture their attention. There are 900 million articles they could be reading online. You want them to stick with yours.

Before you write your introductory paragraph, think about the main point of your profile, beyond simply painting (with words) a picture of the person you interviewed. What is the main theme? Let’s say my profile is of Eddie, my dog, and I decide the main thing I want to convey about Eddie is that he’s a rescue dog with a rough past. How am I going to pull readers into that story?

I might write a paragraph that describes Eddie’s imagined childhood.

“Eddie spent his first days wandering the mean streets of Mississippi, looking for any scraps he could find to keep him going.” And the paragraph would go on like that.

Or I could write a paragraph that highlights how Eddie seems to be just like other dogs, and then later launch into the fact that he isn’t.

“Eddie looks like a lot of dogs look. He’s not too big and he’s not too small. His fur is brown; not light brown, not dark brown, just brown. He loves walks, tiny tennis balls, and all forms of meat.” Then I’d go on and say something like, “You’d have to watch Eddie for a while to realize he’s not like other dogs.”

Or I could describe a situation with Eddie that grabs readers and allows me to launch into a longer profile.

“The woman just wanted to pet Eddie. She kept saying it. ‘I just want to pet him.’ I told her to back off, nicely, maybe too nicely, because she kept crowding Eddie until he snapped. She was angry at Eddie, and annoyed with me. I was angry at her, and sad for Eddie.” And then I could launch into my profile.

In this last example, I’m writing using a first-person point of view. Writers often say POV for short. This is a style of writing that allows you to insert your opinion into a profile. The readers are reminded again and again that this is YOUR view of the person you are writing about. Sometimes using “I” can get in a reader’s way, because they start thinking about you instead of your subject. But often it allows you to put your own perspective on things. If you know your subject, it allows you to share a personal story about them, or your own opinions.

I want you all to come up with the main idea of your story. It can be very general, or more specific if you spent a lot of time talking with your subject about one thing. And then I want you to really think about your first paragraph, and how best to lead readers into your story and your main idea in a way that makes them want to keep going.