I had an interesting and fun time at a school on Monday doing sessions with the kids, this time with two awesome groups of grade 3s, and also a year 9 writing group. That was a session looking at the different ways picture books can work, especially when dealing with more adult ideas.
We looked at anthropomorphism in Nobody Owns the Moon (Tohby Riddle), right through to When the Wind Blows (Raymond Briggs). There’s a contrast!
My favourite thing though was when we did a story exercise on the board. It’s amazing how a simple exercise can yield very potent ideas… We took a basic scenario – boy walking to the movies at night – and looked at how it changed radically just by altering the age of the boy. We tried 25, 15, 8 and 2. Then we threw in a theme of war and looked at what kinds if stories we’d get! The two year old scenario was especially intense – what would make him walk through the night by himself?
I must remember to use these exercises more in my own writing! They always deliver something surprising.
