Writing workshop - the 'how' of writing

Yesterday, I met up with several hundred teachers in Colchester to talk about writing.

I talked about how I had turned an episode from real life into a story for my book 'Barking for Bagels'. This meant thinking about 'who tells the story?' (ie who 'narrates'? Omniscient narrator? First person? Child? Or the dog?!

Then thinking of story as beginning with problem/dilemma/lack of something, and how to resolve it through 'helpers' and facing challenges/obstacles;

thinking of characters' motives and their 'story arcs' through a story.

If you want to give a character depth then you have the power of the flashback or 'back story'.

I talked of 'reveal-conceal' as the motor for making you want to know what comes next. (We experimented with different images or motifs for how to generate 'reveal-conceal' - one teacher came up with receiving a parcel with the right address but the wrong name on the address...)

Then I talked of prequels, sequels and spin-offs (eg movie of 'Where the Wild Things Are' which justifies or reveals why Max is angry, and last page of 'Bear Hunt' where children 'fill in' what the bear is thinking.)

How you can play with characters, settings and time-frames to alter stories that already exist. I talked of my book 'Macbeth United' which is an update of 'Macbeth' transposed into a children's football team!

And there was time to talk about the easiest way to start poems is to read a poem and say to oneself, 'I could write a poem like that' as triggered by the poem's shape, rhythm, rhyme scheme, an image or images, feelings, or indeed anything that comes to mind.