Zine Worhshop 101
Job Position: After school programs Mondays 4-5pm Creative Writing Class (4th-8th Grade)
There are 5 girls in the library on day one.
"Anything that has the word writing in it just isn't gonna get a lot of kids to sign up."
That's what I was told when I presented the class to the after school programs coordinator, and that's what one of the five girls told me today when when we looked around and saw that about 25 kids promptly shuffled out of the library at the end of Homework Club hour to Sports Class (my great competitor). I find it rather ironic actually, because in 4th-8th grade, my life was dominated by sports, and definitely NOT dominated by creative writing. I'll try to keep that in mind when I say ask the kids, "are you doing sports of creative writing today?" And they answer with an enthusiastic and very honest "SPORTS!"
Despite my small numbers, I am excited about the group that I have. They did and said all the right things, and by that I mean they are received a series of unanimous and resounding "YES" replies from me in response to all of their questions.
Student: Can I draw pictures?
Me: Who's zine is it?
Student: Mine.
Me: Who makes decisions about your zine?
Student: Me.
Student: Can I write whatever I want to?
Me: Whose zine is it?
Student: Mine.
Me: Who makes decisions about your zine?
Student: Me.
Student: Can I take my journal home?
Me: Whose journal is it?
Student: Mine.
Me: Who makes decisions about your writing?
Student: Me.
I'm pretty sure that by the end of the hour, the girls realized they already had the answers to their own questions.
Supplies:
I brought a large 3-drawer tupperware filled with glue stick, scissors, stamps, Sharpees, ink pads, hole punches, string, paper and magazines. In addition, I gave them each a brand new composition book because good writers always need a place to write down their ideas.
Intro:
I started by introducing myself as a teacher and a writer, and letting them know that I want to teach this class because I believe that anyone can be a writer. A writer always starts with something they know about, care about or have an interest in learning more about.
Then I introduced the concept of "zines" by providing them with a stack of kid and adult written zines. My plan was to let them spend the first half of the hour looking at the zines, talking about them and sharing what they notice. I wish I had given them more time to just browse, but that teacher part of me urges me on to get them going for fear that they might lose interest and start to goof off or get bored.
I'll bring them back again next time, as I continue to collect more.
The first thing I had them do was open up their new journals and make a list of things they like and things they know a lot about. I wanted them to make a pocket guide today following the model I brought in on What's a zine. We talked about margins first, and planning for photocopying and distribution. In my own example, I already made the first mistake with margins, because parts of my original were cut off, which the girls were able to identify right away. It was an unplanned mistake, but it turned out to work in my favor.
The girls were hesitant to start on their lists, but once they got going, they each had 5-10 things on paper that they liked or knew something about. I'm not quite sure they understood the idea of making a pocket guide though. Together we folded out a 6-page mini-zine layout, which I thought might help them with their planning to prepare each page. Truthfully only one of the girls got really down and busy with her zine. She decided to do it on Crazy People and I she did drawing on each page that showed a different style of crazy person. Another girl got really excited about the hole punch and sat there punching holes in her notebook cover almost the whole time. She was also insistent on telling me several times that she might not come back next week.
The other three were doing some drawing in their books, but mostly they got really into cutting out magazine pictures.
"I'm doing mine on lipstick" declared one 5th grader.
"What is it about lipstick that makes you want to write a pocket guide on it?" I asked her.
"I don't know. I just like the sample colors in this magazine."
**************************************************************
For next week I think I need to think about the possibility of preparing a short strategy lesson on choosing a topic to write about. I might even experiment with introducing quick-write warm-ups to get started. I think what might be best for this group will be to write for a collective zine together. It might make a stronger group if we are sharing ideas and working on one goal, but each with our own individualized contribution. I also want to look at the pocket guides that they worked on for the day (only one actually finished completely) and do some photocopying to see how well they planned with pages, sequencing of ideas and margins for ideas about the technical layout of their zines.
I'm getting excited to learn more about this group and delve deeper into who they are as writers and artists!
There are 5 girls in the library on day one.
"Anything that has the word writing in it just isn't gonna get a lot of kids to sign up."
That's what I was told when I presented the class to the after school programs coordinator, and that's what one of the five girls told me today when when we looked around and saw that about 25 kids promptly shuffled out of the library at the end of Homework Club hour to Sports Class (my great competitor). I find it rather ironic actually, because in 4th-8th grade, my life was dominated by sports, and definitely NOT dominated by creative writing. I'll try to keep that in mind when I say ask the kids, "are you doing sports of creative writing today?" And they answer with an enthusiastic and very honest "SPORTS!"
Despite my small numbers, I am excited about the group that I have. They did and said all the right things, and by that I mean they are received a series of unanimous and resounding "YES" replies from me in response to all of their questions.
Student: Can I draw pictures?
Me: Who's zine is it?
Student: Mine.
Me: Who makes decisions about your zine?
Student: Me.
Student: Can I write whatever I want to?
Me: Whose zine is it?
Student: Mine.
Me: Who makes decisions about your zine?
Student: Me.
Student: Can I take my journal home?
Me: Whose journal is it?
Student: Mine.
Me: Who makes decisions about your writing?
Student: Me.
I'm pretty sure that by the end of the hour, the girls realized they already had the answers to their own questions.
Supplies:
I brought a large 3-drawer tupperware filled with glue stick, scissors, stamps, Sharpees, ink pads, hole punches, string, paper and magazines. In addition, I gave them each a brand new composition book because good writers always need a place to write down their ideas.
Intro:
I started by introducing myself as a teacher and a writer, and letting them know that I want to teach this class because I believe that anyone can be a writer. A writer always starts with something they know about, care about or have an interest in learning more about.
Then I introduced the concept of "zines" by providing them with a stack of kid and adult written zines. My plan was to let them spend the first half of the hour looking at the zines, talking about them and sharing what they notice. I wish I had given them more time to just browse, but that teacher part of me urges me on to get them going for fear that they might lose interest and start to goof off or get bored.
I'll bring them back again next time, as I continue to collect more.
The first thing I had them do was open up their new journals and make a list of things they like and things they know a lot about. I wanted them to make a pocket guide today following the model I brought in on What's a zine. We talked about margins first, and planning for photocopying and distribution. In my own example, I already made the first mistake with margins, because parts of my original were cut off, which the girls were able to identify right away. It was an unplanned mistake, but it turned out to work in my favor.
The girls were hesitant to start on their lists, but once they got going, they each had 5-10 things on paper that they liked or knew something about. I'm not quite sure they understood the idea of making a pocket guide though. Together we folded out a 6-page mini-zine layout, which I thought might help them with their planning to prepare each page. Truthfully only one of the girls got really down and busy with her zine. She decided to do it on Crazy People and I she did drawing on each page that showed a different style of crazy person. Another girl got really excited about the hole punch and sat there punching holes in her notebook cover almost the whole time. She was also insistent on telling me several times that she might not come back next week.
The other three were doing some drawing in their books, but mostly they got really into cutting out magazine pictures.
"I'm doing mine on lipstick" declared one 5th grader.
"What is it about lipstick that makes you want to write a pocket guide on it?" I asked her.
"I don't know. I just like the sample colors in this magazine."
**************************************************************
For next week I think I need to think about the possibility of preparing a short strategy lesson on choosing a topic to write about. I might even experiment with introducing quick-write warm-ups to get started. I think what might be best for this group will be to write for a collective zine together. It might make a stronger group if we are sharing ideas and working on one goal, but each with our own individualized contribution. I also want to look at the pocket guides that they worked on for the day (only one actually finished completely) and do some photocopying to see how well they planned with pages, sequencing of ideas and margins for ideas about the technical layout of their zines.
I'm getting excited to learn more about this group and delve deeper into who they are as writers and artists!
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