So we reached the penultimate day of Creative Writing week for children in Muff. For the first hour the kids were introduced to speed writing and condensed writing. Initially everyone was a tad wary but as always, the dedication from each child saw the challenge met firmly and confidently by all.
After taking a walk around the community garden and a quick snack I announced that we were going to be reading Little Red Riding Hood. I explained that although they were all a little big for this childhood favourite, it would all make sense as time went on. Each child trusted me and even looked forward to the read and challenge after. So it was all bums to the reading area. Three of the girls 
offered to read the story to us all. And so we sat back and listened. We then had a chat about the story and how they all feel now having read it as older children. They each had comments to make and a great discussion followed. Then it was the Challenge! I gave each of them a character from the story (there were doubles of course!) and asked them all to go and write a story with the character in another setting from the familiar one in the book. There was laughter and chatter and eventually the heads were ready to take this on board. Just half an hour later and the bums returned to the reading area. I honestly never expected to hear the amazing stories and settings which came from these pages. When all had read their stories, a group debate got up about how the story could have ended and how characters could have been different.
I couldn’t help but smile. My motto with older students is always to ‘think outside the box’. Now after just 4 days I have a group of children doing just that.
They are exceeding all my expectations as each day goes by. Tomorrow is our last day, but I don’t doubt that this is one wee group which will continue. The seed has been planted and I hope I can continue to water it and watch it grow with time.
North West Culture Gal 