1st Edition

The Story Maker Motivator

By Frances Dickens Copyright 2011
    230 Pages
    by Speechmark

    The Story Maker Motivator is an inspiring resource for educators and anyone else aiming to help secondary school pupils write and think creatively. Based on tried and tested activities and approaches first presented in the authors' award-winning book for primary schools, this is a unique collection of classroom materials.

    "If I was Head of English I would definitely use it. It is packed with ideas, there are so many lessons a teacher could get out of it. It is different from anything I have seen." Roger Mason retired Head Teacher of Backwell Secondary School, Bristol.

    Topics covered include narrative planning, beginnings, cliffhangers, suspense hooks, endings, objects, characters, feelings, settings, speech and sound, descriptive story elements and thesauruses.

    Other key features include:

    - a mixture of photos, illustrations, and scenarios to inspire creativity;

    - sample plans to help you devise stimulating lessons;

    - downloadable resources containing printable versions of activities and lesson plans.

    Suitable for English teachers, student teachers, EFL teachers, special needs teachers, learning support teachers and parents working at home with their children, this wide-ranging resource provides a unique approach to broadening writing and thinking skills.

    You may also be interested in the award-winning book for primary schools by the same author: The Story Maker.

    Introduction, 1 Planning a successful lesson, 2 Beginnings, cliffhangers, suspense hooks and endings, 3 Narrative planning, 4 Objects, 5 Characters, 6 Feelings, 7 Settings, 8 Speech and Sound, 9 Additional descriptive story writing elements

    Biography

    Frances Dickens

    Student feedback on The Story Maker Motivator lessons:


    "You have taught me to describe things in powerful words instead of boring words.  You have also taught me when you describe something then link it with other things to make my writing interesting.  I have enjoyed many lessons with you like the role play. All your hard work and effort has made a big impact on me and inspired me to write stories." – Sintan, Year 7


    "I enjoyed it when we were describing a haunted house and we turned off the lights and all we had was a candle! I was scared myself. I got so many ideas for my spooky story description. I had so many ideas I wrote 2 pages instead of 1 paragraph." – Julia, Year 7


    "Thank you for all of our lessons. They were all an interesting and new experience. I especially enjoyed the treasure chest and the last spooky house lesson, although I enjoyed all of the lessons – your lessons were inspiring and I wrote well after." – Noah, Year 7


    "I found your workshop very inspiring. It really helped me to write more easily and made writing more enjoyable for me.  The sheets with all the words and their basic meanings (happy, sad, angry) were really useful as it helped me use a wider variety of words correctly. The objects were especially inspiring, they really made me think and form stories around them. Thank you so much I have been inspired by your methods and I really enjoy writing now." – Hester, Year 9


    "What I really enjoyed doing was the worksheet on beginnings and cliff-hangers. I’ve always liked writing stories but sometimes I always find it hard to grab the reader’s attention and make them want to read more and now, using your technique, I can really see my story writing improving. Another thing which I also found really helpful was the sheets on feelings which give you loads of different words which meant the same thing. Because I haven’t really got a wide vocabulary so instead of using words like reticent, reserved, coy etc., I’d usually just write shy or nervous." – Sumaya, Year 9


    "Thank you very much for coming into our class and teaching us about writing creatively. I learnt so much and it gave me inspiration to start writing stories. Your methods helped me to spark up ideas for all the different sections of the stories that you helped us on. All of the different tasks were interesting for me because it gave me an idea of all the different aspects that a story needs." – Joe, Year 9