14 December 2024

Posted by Frankie

Junior & Young Writers: Week 14 [Wild Words] - End of Term Showcase & Christmas Crackers

This week's session marked the end of term and time for Christmas break! As is tradition,

the final session of the term is showcase time, but before we had some epic performances,

we checked in as food you might find in a roast dinner. Some of the group related to pigs

and blankets, feeling all warm and snuggly with their fireplace on at home. Others described

their week as a pea—small and mischievous. We also had a disgusting week, aptly

described as a sprout.

Next, we pulled the Christmas crackers and took some time to read out the jokes and

perform charades with a few rounds of Relaxed Reindeers (Buzzy Bees).

To warm up our creative muscles and for anyone who needed work to share, the group

wrote using three prompts:

1. The point of view of a Christmas item.

2. Describe your dream Christmas.

3. An unusual Christmas character comes to visit.

Still feeling giddy from the crackers, the group tried their hand at writing their own Christmas

cracker jokes:

To kick off the showcase portion of the session, Henry. R gave us a revised performance of

his rhyming rap, 'Anthem for My Funny Bone';. Indie recited a Christmas poem. Hamish read

his story 'The Worm Who Came to Christmas Dinner', and Elsie read 'Getting Ready for

Christmas' - a tale from the point of view of a Christmas tree. Noah also kept it festive and

recited 'The Christmas Tree'.

The group then shared their favourite books, briefly describing and explaining what they

loved about them.

Hamish: Percy Jackson and the Last Olympian

Indie: Dork Diaries: Birthday Drama

Elsie: Ivy and Bean series

Juno: Who let the Gods Out series

Henry. R: The Treehouse Storey series

Noah: The Worst Witch series

To finish this group's session, we created a Christmas song in which the first person wrote

their line and then folded it before handing it to the next person, who continued on the song

with their own line and so on. It turned out great.

For the Young Writers group, some of the check-ins consisted of potatoes and pigs in

blankets for some fun weeks, gravy for a week that started well but fell apart at the last

minute, and pigs in blankets with lumpy gravy because it started off gross but got better.

After pulling the crackers and performing the jokes and charades, this group had a go at

writing their own Christmas cracker jokes.

After developing a series of abstract and concrete nouns, the group used these and the

three prompts to write poems and stories related to Christmas.

Chloe shared her Christmas-themed poem with the group, and Sonny shared a poem titled 'The Glorious Pudding'.

Berry wrote a poem from Santa's point of view called 'Sorry Santa'. Poppy recited a poem from a

previous session called 'Your Mums Armpit'. Ava wrote a poem about a bad Santa titled 'The

Furious Fatman', and Catherine shared her in-session work 'Arrogant Snow' and a favourite

from a previous session 'Leopard in the Dungeon'. Daisy recited a wistful poem, 'Morning

Hope', and Sonny treated us all to a recital of 'The Jabberwocky' from Alice in Wonderland [impressively off book!]

For this group's favourite books, we had:

Sonny: The Secret Garden

Chloe: The Game of Thrones series

Catherine: What if? and the Ones We Burn.

Daisy: The Witching Stone and Shadow and Bone series

Berry: The Girl with the Lost Smile

Poppy: Far from the Madding Crowd and Goodnight, Mr Tom

Ava: She Gets the Girl

It's been a delight to experience the creativity and chaos both groups provide!

I can't wait for next term to see what's next.

Happy Festive Season

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Junior & Young Writers: Week 14 [Wild Words] - End of Term Showcase & Christmas Crackers