Upper Erdkinder Intersession

Written by Aleks Iwaniec, 11th Grade

During the month of January, the Erdkinder class is in intersession, where for the entire month, the students will focus on specific works, like their history or science fair projects. The high school students were also offered an elective, intensive, and advanced ELA course, creative writing with Ms. Erika, where they will practice the writer’s craft.

In doing so, they will learn about and workshop the rules (character development, setting, plot, theme, tone, voice, etc.) and process of fiction writing (pre-writing, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing) a short story. The class meets and workshops for ninety minutes each day.  By the end of the class, each student will have produced a cohesive, well-written story that will be self-published and reside  on the classroom bookshelves for all time. 

“To be a good writer, you must read,” has been said by Stephen King and other prominent writers. With this in mind, the first two classes involved students reading and analyzing  two short stories. These stories model world building, character development, plot and conflict believability, and more so that the students can then begin to brainstorm their own convincing stories. Without strong conflict and well-developed characters, any story would be subpar at best. 

In the third and fourth class periods, students dove into the pre-writing process. Brainstorming, freewriting, and mind-mapping are all techniques they have been using to get their creative juices flowing.  One of the intermediary steps will involve filling out character information sheets; Ms. Erika has told us that we will all know what our main characters eat for breakfast, the type of socks they prefer, and the vocabulary they would and would not use before we start writing the story itself.  Drafting the actual stories will begin in the second week,  followed  by many, many drafts during which Ms. Erika will guide students through the revision and editing process. Students may create any story they see fit, whether it be a tragedy, comedy, or even romance, as long as it follows the rules of writing and in some way ties in to the semester’s theme of freedom. 

Every high school student who has chosen to participate in the creative writing class has their own reasons. Some want to use this opportunity to improve their writing skills. Some are extremely passionate about writing, and some just want to explore a new interest. With all of these different reasons for joining the class, the high school students are enthusiastic about creating their own stories.