Wednesday 28 March 2012

Move Over Mr. Spielberg

I’m all for kids being creative. In theory and in reality, too - most of the time.

In earlier blogs, you’ll find proof of my support of the arts in schools. I’m passionate about following one’s artistic dreams. Really I am. But why does it have to be so…messy?

I don’t want to complain, because I treasure all the “art” and crafts that my children make. It’s the process of making that pottery pinch pot, oil painting, and glittered Christmas card that I have an issue with.

See this painting of the horse? Looks great, doesn’t it?
My hardwood floors now have brown and green paint permanently scrubbed into their grain.

In the name of fostering creativity I’ve stepped in clumps of play-doh in all it’s unnatural states. Soft blobs that squish between your toes, hard pebbles that stab your heels, and wet goo that stains your skin. How it gets wet, I don’t have the stomach to even consider. As a well-seasoned parent, I have come to accept there are some things I never need to understand. 

I’ve scrubbed crayon, marker, paint, charcoal, and chalk from every surface of my home. Yes, that includes the inside of my oven. Doesn’t every child want to see what happens when you melt crayons? Just a suggestion - it’s a good idea to place them on wax paper on a cookie sheet. It's never advisable to lay them, encased in their paper wrap, directly on the rack. Just a suggestion.

And why must craft glitter be so small and impossible to vacuum up? Tiny girls are attracted to their sparkle like bees to honey and me to chocolate. 

Glitter - like war, I’d like to scream, “What is it good for!?” 

In their search for the next weapon of mass destruction, the CIA or KGB must have accidentally created glitter. There’s no other logical explanation for its existence. Glitter is now banned from my house, so it can no longer become permanently lodged between my oak floor boards - next to the oil paint. 

There has been countless rolls of tape, pipe cleaners, cotton balls, tiny beads, Popsicle sticks, and bottles of glue sacrificed for the sake of nurturing my children’s creative intelligence. 

This brings me to this morning. My eldest announced she was “making a book.” Before you get too excited, as I did, she is not writing one. She is not putting pen to paper and letting her imagination soar. She is leaving all literary aspirations to me. Instead she literally made a book. Rather than use a few pieces of paper, folded neatly and cut precisely, she eviscerated a note pad. (See photo evidence.) 


The end result? A mini replica of her latest favourite book The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.

Cool, for sure, but why? Because she needs props for her movies, of course. Yes, her latest avenue of artistic exploration is movie making using dolls as actors.

Pretty smart move, if you ask me. Dolls are much lower maintenance than union actors. No meal breaks, no expensive salaries, no questioning their “character’s motivation,” and no intrusive paparazzi to deal with. (Unless by paparazzi you’re referring to her little sister.)

Her movies are hilarious, based on real life, and always feature a screeching mother demanding her daughters do their homework, wear socks, and get to the car before they are late, late, late! 


Since I am completely unbiased I can say she has natural talent, a good eye for lighting and wardrobe, and an ear for realistic dialogue. She’s resourceful and imaginative. She’s made a mini kitchen out of cardboard boxes, with a marble tile for a counter top. A long dressing mirror laid on its side has become the walled mirror of a dance studio.

Has the goo, the paint, the sparkles, the tiny beads, and countless stickers and rolls of tape been worth it? Yes, they were the creative building blocks for her artistic soul. 

Will she become the next Steven Spielberg? Who knows.  

But in the meantime, I will cherish the memory of this afternoon when she burst into the living room, pulled me off the couch, and led me into the sun room. 

“I got the light just right. The way it streams across their faces makes them look so real. Come see,” she said, her voice high-pitched with excitement. 

And I have to admit, because I am unbiased, the dolls did look real. As real as her joy. As real as my pride. 
So look out Mr. Spielberg, my girl’s making movies, too.

Friday 9 March 2012

Back to School

I never thought I'd brag about revisiting middle school, but I am proud to say, "I returned!" I did my first school presentation to help celebrate International Women’s Day at my daughter’s middle school.

This is the institution I attended. The same school where I flunked out of French class, was cut from the 7th grade volleyball team, and slow danced with a boy for the first time.

The song - Open Arms by Journey. My age - 12. The boy - shall remain nameless.

But I digress. This past Monday I wasn't there for a Sadie Hawkins Dance. I was there to discuss writing. My topic? Top 10 Writing Tips. There are possibly hundreds of tips I could’ve shared, so it was hard to narrow them down. I decided to share pointers that I hoped a classroom full of 10-13 year old wanna’ be writers, would find helpful.

It was exhilarating looking into those faces. Some were familiar; 5th grade friends of my daughter, students I’ve seen while lunch monitoring, and a few kids I recognized from the neighbourhood. Others were complete strangers. But all of them were eager to learn about the craft of writing.

As many of you know by now, normally I have the cursed luck of the eternally damned. If something can go wrong, it typically does. But at Ecole Viscount Alexander, on a blustery day in March, everything went smoothly. Well, most everything. I did run out of time and had to fly through the last three slides. But still, the gist, the real heart of my presentation had been delivered by then.

And I did overhear two girls, who looked to be 7th or 8th graders, comment that they could, “totally use these handouts.” I decided to take that as a good sign. And not, as my dear husband pointed out, because one of them is fishing for babysitting gigs. (Rumour has it we pay our sitters above market.)

So here, according to me, are my Top 10 Writing Tips. Have any you’d like to add? Please make your suggestions in the comments tab below.

Keep on Writing!

    1. Just write
    • Write every day. Write a lot of garbage and edit brilliantly. (Thank you Anita Daher, middle grade and young adult writer and editor extraordinaire, for this nugget.)  
    • Idea purge – get it out and tell that story. Finessing the details will come with your edits.
    2. Keep a writing journal with you  

    • In your backpack, car, cottage, bedroom, locker, or purse. They don’t have to be big. I carry my notebook wherever I go and jot down random thoughts, feelings, or observations.
    3. Think like a writer

    • Become an active observer and write down your thoughts/observations/sounds/smells/textures. If you hear interesting phrases or an odd way someone speaks – write them down.
    • Become a people watcher. There are great characters all around you – at the mall, at the doctor’s office, standing in line at the movies, on the bus.
    • Take pictures to help you describe subtle details – those details make your writing more believable and real.
    • This is the research that makes readers think, “Hey, did this really happen?” or “This sounds so familiar – I feel like I’ve been there or done that.” Or “This could’ve totally happened to me or my friend.”
    • Keep yourself wondering about people – your friends, family, teachers, everyone around you. Why do they do the things they do, or say the things they say and imagine the answer. 
    4. Keep a great ideas file
    • On your computer. A central storage place.
    • Newspaper articles that seem interesting, funny observations.
    • You can transfer all your thoughts from your writers’ notebooks here.
    5. Hone your craft
    6. Do character sketches and plot outlines
    • The character sketch will help you tell a more believable story. The more you flesh out the details of your protagonist, antagonist and supporting characters the more real your story becomes.
    • The plot outline will help you determine what the heck is going to happen in your story to your main character. I like to do a loose chapter by chapter outline. Helps you determine what really bad thing is going to happen and what your character do to resolve the problem. You need to build to this point, the climax, in a steady believable way, laying the groundwork so when your character makes the final decision, the reader says, “Of course he/she did that.” If your plot is not developed the reader will pop their head out of the book and say, “What the…where did that come from?”
    7. Tighten your writing
    • Remove adjectives and adverbs where possible. Modifiers are not your friends. Instead use strong nouns and active verbs. Use fewer, better words to say the same thing.
    • Those stronger, active verbs will add concise detail and add to the texture of your description.
    8. Show don’t Tell – this is HUGE!
    • Good writing is active writing that shows something to the reader rather than merely telling them about it.
    • Descriptive details illustrate statements and bring them to life.
    • Specific words express exactly what you want to say. 
    • Avoid labels that categorize but don’t describe: Awful, delightful, scary, pleasant, nasty, delicious, handsome, pretty, beautiful, ugly, mean, funny.
    • Labels flatten your writing. Too general and don’t create your intended image in your reader’s mind. The reader creates their own image, not necessarily the one you wanted them to visualize.
    9. Read, read, read

    • Immerse yourself in language. You will find your writing, including grammar, will naturally improve as your innate sense of what “sounds right” will grow as you read more.
    • Join or establish a book club where you can talk books with others.
    • Stephen King suggests you should read a minimum of 75 books a year. Better get started!
    10. Build your writing community
    • Establish a writing group. This helps build your writing community, filled with others who share your same dreams.
    • Get together with fellow writers to share your work, share ideas, and to get feedback. Your writing is so close to you that often you can’t see what others can. Sometimes a scene is so clear in your mind that when you write it out, you miss important details.
    • Go to public readings and book launches. Find websites for the authors you enjoy reading. They will often have great writing tips and insights.