Kids' Camp

It has been quite a while since I've posted on this blog. But, my goal is to post at least once a week as I begin my first year of teaching.

This week, I'm seeing what it's like to work with younger kids. I'm helping another teacher with the kids' camp for the Flint Hills Writing Project. In the morning, we had 6 kids (of 8) who were 1st-3rd grade. In the afternoon we have 4th-6th grade. The difference in the mood of the camps is striking. The morning kids were all boys full of energy. Though they were able to write more than they thought they would with our photo gallery activity, they still took a lot of prodding, and physically writing took a lot longer with the younger ones. This afternoon, there are 11 kids (mostly girls), and they are so quietly writing away you could hear a pin drop.

I'm finding that it takes a lot more work to help kids round out their stories than with middle school and high school students. These kids are still in that plot-driven state, and only so many things can happen to their main character before the story needs to be over. I'm hoping we can get more descriptive, more specific, and deeper characters by the time the week's through. My favorite question is going to be "How did they feel when that happened?"

It's definitely neat to hear all the ideas they have though. We played a game where one student starts a story, then each adds a sentence. It got a little... weird. You know, a pie who wanted to hit someone, so he hits a person, then the person eats him, then he goes through the sewer to the ocean, where he is eaten by a shark... you get the drift.

What really struck me most was when we had the 4th-6th graders pull out the laptops. You can just tell what a computer generation we have... these kids can pull up Word, save their document, and type using (mostly) correct fingers. They need help spelling gentle, but typing--they got it. The only few bits of trouble are because the computer's a Mac.

Also, the one kid who was refusing to write more than a page on the huge lined paper (you know, the kind with the dotted line in the middle) is now typing away, really quickly, adding sentences to his story. Of course, it's about how the neighboring tribe came over and blew everyone up with grenades, but hey, he's writing.

You can check out the kids' writing at fhwpkidscamp2010.blogspot.com. We'll be posting all week.

Until next time,

Tamara