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Story Starters Creative Writing Curriculum
Story Starters is a creative writing
curriculum
that gives the start of a story and leaves it hanging—awaiting
the creative genius of your student. This is a multi-level
curriculum for grades 4 to 12, though you can use it with
younger children if you read to them and they narrate their
ending back to you. It is reasonably priced and non-consumable.
There are illustrations for each story. The
author, Karen Andreola, collected antique illustrations over a
15 year period and used them to illustrate the stories. It's a
nice touch, and keeps you wondering how the story is going to
relate to the picture when you flip through the book.
The section for teachers is well organized with
easy to follow instructions. No, it doesn't grade the writing
for you, but the author includes a section on grading that is
very helpful and doable for parents. Sometimes parents have a
fear of teaching writing, because they have no clue about
grading. The guidelines in this section are "real life helpful"!
Relax, you can teach writing.
Next up are the 67 story starters—plenty of
interesting stories without endings. Often the story starters
are followed with Writing Helps (questions to help start the
writing process) and/or Additional Challenges. For students who
are eager to write, those are optional, but may be used for
improving the rough draft.
There are additional sections that include helps
for improving a writing project, lessons on writing, and more.
Overall, Story Starters is a gem that takes the stress out of
learning and teaching creative writing.
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