short fiction

I will have students write a work of short fiction using the story map as a guide, once they start writing the actual story they must stay very close to the original story map.The reason is that beginning writers of short fiction usually have problems with randomly straying from the main point.The other main aspect of this is that the core of the story should be at least loosely based on some real experience, and then fiction can be added on, like frosting and colorful little burning candles on a birthday cake.
I decided to go with just one image on this video because I thought it would go along with the idea of singleness of effect, which is one of the main points of this writing lesson along with staying focused on the core of the story. I chose one image
that I thought generally expressed the idea. This is not at all necessary, in fact I originally had a whole group of images picked out to use, but then decided to do it this way simply to emphasize the point.

The lesson for creative writing students is to use the story map as the core and then once the core is established the writer can expand using:

• dialogue
• description
• character development

But not:
• additional characters
• extra plot development

The story I posted on Teacher Tube follows these rules, it has a core of real experience and then just story telling all around the core. I think that using movie maker with its time limit along with a story map will be an excellent tool for short fiction and non -fiction writers. It really works by forcing a writer to stay within the story.
You can find my story example by going to teacher tube.




A rubric for the digital story can be found at
Google Docs

story map

This project is going to be about students learning how to take something from their life experiences and use it as the core for a piece of fiction. Staying with the general idea that you should write what you know. It will be okay,in fact necessary to add fiction to this core of fact. One of the biggest problems all writers and especially novice writers have with short fiction is keeping the story line focused. Since this is a piece of short fiction it is critical for writers to keep focused on the main story details. The story map will work to help develop plot and keep writers focused on a central idea. My story map takes an actual experience I had, and then quickly expands into fiction. This story map will be used an example for students on how to do this, as well as showing students some basic elements of short fiction.