Mostly The Lion

Inkreadable Kids' second session ended last week, but not without a few minor glitches. On Thursday, my 4:15 Scene Stealers class had to be postponed until April 17th because there was too much going on in the student's scholastic world. As a fellow WISer, I could well understand the stress associated with the WIS world. Although, I must say, I wasn't a fifth grader there, so I didn't realize the level of expectation for primary schoolers. I didn't get there until the seventh grade, and the pressure to belong was also tied up with the pressures of being twelve. Which, many parents will tell you, is the start of something wicked.  Not mine, of course, I was a perfect angel of a pre-teen, (Brooklyn bridge, anyone?)

Moving over to the 5:15 Short Story Class, I had typed up the story that my student wrote and we presented it to mom and little sister, to much applause and fanfare. My student took the story home and read to other family members, where it was pronounced "gripping in parts" and "quite awesome". I was quite pleased with that result. It turns out that this student is back with me for a Scene Stealers installment, which I am quite pleased about. I was also asked advice about my student entering a writing contest. My response was that I though it was a great idea. Except that I think I may have spoken too soon. Writing contests are great if the young person wants to do it, and there are some great ones out there. But I also think they can cause someone to hate writing, especially if writing is not a passion of theirs. When I first started blogging about Inkreadable Kids, and the vision that I have, I said that I'd come late to writing. I was an adult writer, I know myself enough to know that if I'd been pressured into it, I would never have started. The passion for writing has to come organically, or not at all. In my case, neither of my parents had a facility for writing. I discovered it on my own. 

Friday brought surprises galore. The boys actually wrote multiple stories. Actually, it'd be more accurate to say that multiple store were started. We started off this Short Story Module with the boys writing one set of stories, and then in the second class changing stories altogether. They are brothers and they started out writing similar stories. The older brother started out writing a story about a boy who becomes an engineer and invents a new kind of train. It was left unfinished. I hope he goes back to it some day. His brother wrote a story loosely based on Wolverine from XMen that involved the invention of a new war plane. While not set in that universe, there was apparently a lot of violence going on. You may remember from an earlier post that there were ten nuclear bombs dropped on New York City. That's all I know from that story because he didn't want to read it. He did say that he had completed that story. The story he ultimately read was a story of a hungry lion who finds a magic talking tree that grants him any wish he wants. The lion, being an enterprising sort of lion, wishes of course, for candy and soda. And gold. There has to be gold, of course. How else is a poor lion going to keep himself fed? The story took an interesting turn because the lion went to his friends and told them about the tree. They all went to find it, but it had disappeared. It  reappears in the story, but doesn't seem to grant any other wishes. The lion ends up disappearing, presumably to a soda and candy filled world. Everyone lives happily ever after. But mostly the lion. That has to be the best ending to a story. EVER.  The surprises didn't stop there, however. My third student read his story of a boy's daring escape from an evening spent at the zoo. Through a snake pit. This young man has a little brother, who must be about four. While we were reading, he "wrote" his own story, and then read it out loud to us. It was the story of the Scrapey Scraper. It was just awesome.

I mailed the Saturday student's story to her. Her mom and I are going to have a conference tomorrow, but it seems that she wants to write two more Annabeth and Emma adventures. That's one who is staying. The two brothers are also staying with me. As are my thursday students. I have two new students starting as well one on Friday at 4:15, and one on Saturdays starting at the end of the month.

Well, that's it for this Inkreadable installment. Stay tuned, as always, there is more to come.