Monday June 20th, 2016

First day of camp! We introduced ourselves to one another in class, and broke the ice with our "Draw A Story, Guess the Story" activity! Students were enthusiastic for camp and eager to get started on their main class project.

We're set to achieve a great amount in a short time, ending with a Book Fair Friday the 24th at 330pm. Students will publish their works online via flipsnackedu.com. Each student will receive a username and password to log in to our writing group. Flipsnack allows the student to either type their work, or upload their own drawings and content, as well as select from a variety of images and media outlets to insert into their works. Flipsnack doesn't just benefit students in camp, but also allows them to work on their projects at home when they log in to their Flipsnack website!

Agenda
Introduction
Icebreaker
Elements of A Story
Class Reading
Major Project

Introduction
We had a quick run down of our camp goals and projects. We also discussed the expectations of each student in camp, as well as what each student could expect out of their instructor. Each students took a moment to give their name and name a few things they really liked or didn't like.

Our class also discussed how we would reach each project goal, and what the final outcome of the class will be. Campers we're told there would be a Book Fair on Friday to showcase their books, not only with each student, but other IQuest campers, family members, and friends! The instructor informed the camp that we have a lot of work to cover in a short amount of time; we're spending a total of 15 hours together and creating a book. Most published works have around a 15 month process!

Icebreaker - Draw a Story
Students were handed a story board and told to draw a 6 panel short story, including the five elements of a story. Students only to drew the story, and did not write what the story was about. Once finished, the students then switched their drawings with another classmate. The classmate had to guess the students story line buy using only the illustration. Many students came up with hilarious and interesting guesses, but there were a few that got them right!

Elements of A Story
We went over the five elements of a story, mainly focusing on character, setting, and plot. We discussed the importance of each element, what they meant, and how to incorporate them into a story. We also work on activities that focused on getting each element in their story. Campers were handed a blank writing sheet to start brainstorming their major story ideas focusing on the characters, setting, and plot (3 events).

Class Reading
We have a mini library in class with a collection of books for students to choose from! Each day in camp, students get 30 minutes of reading time to help showcase different styles of writing. Students are also able to absorb various author's storytelling abilities, see what elements are included in major stories, and learn how to articulate their own story from reading in class.

 Campers were handed the "Elements of a Story" worksheet challenge after their reading time. The worksheet asked each student to highlight the 5 elements of one the story they read in class.

Major Class Project
Student discussed our large class project. We began with blank sheets of paper to draw graphs on what genre we wanted to write about, encouraging not to write about something the student is not interested as the reader more than likely won't be interested either. Students discussed their main and supporting characters,  their story setting (time and place), as well as their general plot idea. We used blank writing paper to make an outline of our story, a blank sheet of paper for our genre graph, and a blank story board to get our illustration ideas and structure down.

Our camp will us Flipsnack to create our major project. Our camp web address is: msadriennecreativewriting.flipsnackedu.com

Each student has a log in name, usually their first name, but some have their last. Students given username in class. The password for all students to log in is: iquest.

Students were shown the Flipsnack website, but we will work on the site more in class tomorrow (Tuesday). Today we focused more on getting the outline of our story. Tomorrow we'll focus more on finalizing our outline, getting out ideas organized, and checking out the Flipsnack software so students can gt the hang of what they'll be using for their major project.

Homework
Each student was asked to write a final outline and first rough draft of their story to bring to class tomorrow so we can review and get going on our first draft.