Our blogs

Regular news and insight from our many poets, writers, educators and facilitators

09 November 2024

Posted by Frankie

Junior & Young Writers: Week 9 [Wild Words] - Mystery & Choose Your Own Adventure

Hi Writers,

For week nine, the theme was a very popular, 'choose your own adventure stories'.


To begin, the group chose fireworks to represent their weeks for check-in. We had some

slow weeks described as a slow-burning, colourful firework. We also had an annoying week,

like a firework that never ends, and a week that was like a firework that looked promising but

ended up being disappointing.


Then, we played Riverbank, where the group had to jump forward every time Claire said

river and back when Claire said bank. The last person moving was disqualified. We finished

our warm-up with some Buzzy Bees before discussing what makes a good choose-your-

own-adventure story. The group agreed that good adventure stories could include murder,

robbery, villains, monsters, conflict, clues, danger, and tricky choices.


Using the pre-prepared bags labelled 'Genre', 'Characters', 'Setting', and 'Quest or Crime'

the group wrote their ideas on slips of paper and placed them in the appropriate bags. Once

everyone had come up with several contributions for each bag category, we mixed the bags

up and pulled out several slips to use for our own stories. The stories were a lot of fun, with

plenty of random chaos.


x


In the young writers group for check-in, we had a disappointing week, like a fireworks display

carried away by the wind. We also had another anti-climactic fireworks display that started

off hopeful but was pretty average.


For this group's warm-up, we played a slightly different version of 'I Went to the Store' which

turned pretty macabre, with various body parts being bought and plenty of suspicious items.

The group came up with a few new suggestions for what makes a good choose-your-own-

adventure story, such as betrayal, plot twists, and not making it predictable.


Next, we refilled the four bags with new ideas, mixed them, and then chose several random

ideas from the bags. The combination of unusual characters and settings made some very

entertaining stories!


see you next week 



Previous

Archive

Back to blog

What's on

Find out more

Our projects

Find out more

Our films

Watch now

Headlight Press

Find out more

Latest news

03 September 2024

Newsletter - Autumn Part One

News and Opportunities for Writers and Writing*New Course* Writing as Spiritual PracticeHow do we talk about, and write about, that which is beyond language?...

Read more

Our blogs

Regular news and insight from our many poets, writers, educators and facilitators

Find out more

Resources


Why not get in touch?