The Cinema Usher Internal Monologue. An internal monologue is a great way to show the thoughts of someone in an interesting way. It comes over like a flow of thoughts. Ask your students to imagine a cinema usher (perhaps one of the 1940s? reference materials could include a painting by Edward Hopper to show the scene).

This resource is short but effective. You read them the opening of a story where a young woman is travelling alone in America on a night train. It has been especially written to intrigue and encourage a response. Ask your students to continue the story.

IMPROVING THE WRITING OF DIALOGUE A top tip to improve the writing of dialogue including an example to read out to your students. This is a great little exercise to improve the writing of dialogue. I have found in 35 years of teaching English to students across the age range that there is a strong tendency to write flat and unconvincing dialogue when students introduce it into a story.

Give a copy of this poem to your students written especially by Johnnie Young. Ask them to draw images from the poem on the sheet and colour them in.

This exercise is designed to help teach how to get your students to make description in their stories work for them. I have found in my long teaching career and have seen thousands of descriptions which are all very well but serve no particular purpose in the story. They just sit there as an extra. This resource shows a comparison: a straight forward description of a landscape and then that same description adapted to show how it can be used to move the story forward.

This exercise is great for getting students to write, and it is particularly useful for those who are reluctant to write. Encourage them to let the writing flow. In a dream the images and events flow in seemingly haphazard order. Encourage them to play around with sentences. In a dream anything can happen. You can fly, you can jump from one place to another. You can jump from one time zone to another. Things dissolve into each other. Everything is a bit surreal. There is something about the nature of a dream that allows a free flow style and is good fun. I find that if you read your students the example dream then encourage them to write about their own dreams you will get some extraordinary work.

Read this poem about an encounter between a wild woman and a snake. Then ask you students to write a poem about an encounter between a person and an animal.

This opening has been specially written by Johnnie Young to engage the interest and curiosity of students. Read it to them (and furnish them with a paper copy) and then ask them to continue the tale. What did happen next? You will find that this will fire up their imaginations and produce some excellent creative writing.

The Words for an Assembly This is the transcript of an assembly for students to listen to in the age range of 13-16. Education covers many things and the focus of this is to encourage students to use the beauty and skill of 19th Century Novels to give them not just appreciation of great writing but, at the same time, encourage them to be calm and enjoy the moment.

THE EXTRAORDINARY ORDINARY This resource is to inspire students to write about an ordinary thing in an extraordinary way. It provides an explanation ( a transcript to read to the students if you want to) and a worked example. If you show your students the picture and the worked example it will inspire them to write their own imaginative visions.

In this resource Johnnie Young has found during his 35 years of teaching creative writing that students love to write about suspense but in practice they often go in too quickly and then find it hard to regulate the suspense. This resource, which has been carefully crafted for 13-15 year olds, shows a simple straightforward overall structure and plan and then an example of an outline plan fleshed out. The students therefore have a choice about how to use it: Try to think of their own scenario or Write out, develop and expand the outline plan fleshed out in their own words. An opening is provided to help kick start the activity.

This resource demonstrates how to write a poem based on a pattern of three colours. I’ve presented three drafts of an example poem and you may wish to show your students the progression. They may which to highlight changes and see if they prefer them. Is the poem improving through its progressive stages? If so, why? There are provided also ideas on how to get them started as well as ideas for presentation once finished.

How to teach the writing of a poem about a river This resource provides details of a step by step guide for you to encourage your students to write a poem about a river. It provides detailed guidance with options of the actual words you might use which I have found work well with this. It is important that the initial notes from the prompts provided by the stages are written out in rough draft basic poetic form to make up the structure of the poem which can then be improved on. It is the rewriting and editing process which is so important for this idea to work well and therefore a series of improved drafts are shown as an example to help inspire creative ideas.

Syllogism: getting your students to think by using a short story. Read your students the short story about granny’s cake and explain to them the syllogism (ie: “ You always love my cake. This is a special cake and therefore you will love this cake.” Then follow the discussion suggestion (after the story) and ask them to write their own short stories which include their own syllogisms. This will help students think critically about logic and reasoning in a practical and fun way. It will also help them expand their creative imaginations by the use of syllogisms. A few examples are given in the discussion section together with an outline of a story based on a chosen syllogism to help the students get started by giving them a worked idea.

This resource gives an example of a creative analogy and includes a you tube video short

Ask your students to write a short story about someone who does the wrong thing and then has to deal with the consequences of it. Read your students the short story called: “Mum’s Marzipans” to inspire them.

Treasure Island: close reading great literature to help improve creative writing. This is a great writing task based on a piece of close reading from a master story teller: Robert Louis Stevenson. A writing task is set to write a character study in approximately 100 words and then the character description from the opening of Treasure island is examined with close reading skills. Notes are given to show how skilful Stevenson included so much in his description and then the teacher asks the students to re-draft their own descriptions using some of the techniques discovered in the close reading to enhance their own work.

I stopped to look more closely. These days and especially these days, we all realise the increasing pressure on our students. The speed of change, the uncertainty, the anxieties all around. This exercise is designed to provide a little oasis of calm in a busy world and at the same time help with their writing skills and, in fact, use their writing skills to help create that oasis of calm. The task is for them to imagine walking in the countryside somewhere when they come across something that causes them to stop and just look. It may be a thing of beauty, or a thing of curiosity or something unusual or unexpected. Then ask them to write about their walk and then describe the thing they stop for in such a way as to create a calmness of perception. Below is an example to read to them entitled: “The blue bird on the old statue”. Read it through with them and discuss it and point out how the writing slows time down and provides a meditative observation. Then ask them to have a go themselves. You may wish to have ready a selection of pictures of things found in the countryside to help boost their imaginations.

Stonehenge. An intriguing opening for a science fiction story for your students to continue. Read the following opening of a story about Stonehenge. It is designed to hook in your students’ interest. Then ask them to continue the story in accordance with their imaginations which will be fired up.

Bring character traits to life in a fun way. Having taught English for 35 years I have seen many thousands of descriptions of characters written by students of all ages. If you want to improve the outcome you have to improve the way the task is set-up. I have observed many writing task set-ups aimed at producing descriptions of characters. Very often the teacher will provide a list and say: “Describe a character. Think of height, clothes, voice, mannerisms, eyes, hair etc ” and the student will produce a description, following the prompt list and the outcome will often be rather flat. This resource provides a fun way to bring the description of character to life and make it more interesting and the method used can be re-used again and again for different types of content. The key to enhancing description of character is to introduce character traits and put them into action. Detailed instructions are provided about how to deliver this resource and a model answer is provided to help show the students effectively how it works. Also a ‘mix and match’ chart has been carefully prepared for writing task practice and a worked example using the ‘mix and match’ chart is provided for illustrative purposes.

What variations can you make with this one small text? This is a wonderful exercise to jump start your students when you have creative writing in mind. Give them this introduction: “Imagine you have been hunting for a rare glimpse of a particular elusive tropical bird in the swamps of the vast South American Amazon basin. Read the short version and then write an extended version based on your imagination. “ Hand them a copy of this short version of the text entitled “Tropical Bird” and read it through with them. Tropical Bird short version I arrived after hours of wading through the swamp and saw to my great delight the beautiful tropical bird which I had been chasing after for so long. It floated on the water and sang a little song. Now ask them to expand this piece of writing with more information taken from their own imaginations. If they are unsure about what to do or how to do it show them the chart below which includes ideas for them to use or adapt. A fully worked example is provided for guidance.