Creative writing: helping students generate ideas

Are your students having trouble coming up with good ideas for stories? Try out this activity. The bolded verbs indicate what students should do.

1. Recall something that has happened to you:

1. a birthday party; your trip to school today; a family holiday; an embarrassing moment; your greatest success…

2. Write an account of the incident.

1. Work quickly - give yourself a time limit of 10 minutes.

3. Ask yourself: what if there was more at stake?

1. What if the situation was more dangerous, more embarrassing, could have resulted in a bigger, more serious outcome?

Here are two examples:

Real life event

1. Getting stuck in traffic on the way to school
2. Sitting in an English lesson, bored and being forced to come up with an idea for a story.

Intensified event:

1. What if you were stuck in traffic, but instead of going to school, you were on your way to hospital with a woman about to give birth?
2. What if you were in a railway station instead, staring at the timetable, unable to decide where to go…after you have just run away from home.

4. Develop the story idea further, using Wh- questions:

1. Who is involved?
2. Where are they when the story opens?
3. When are they?
4. What are these characters doing in this place at this time?
5. What problem arises?
6. What happens next?
7. Why and how is it occurring?