TEACHING THE ART OF WRITING STORIES TO FIRST YEARS
"Eoin and I were chosen by Mr.Fitzmaurice to teach English, primarily story writing, to the 1st years. We were picked because we have been involved with Fighting Words every Thursday afternoon so we have done a lot of work with story writing. There were five of us picked Eoin Vaughan, Morgan Moore, Owen Johnston, Brian Barry and I. We started off brainstorming ideas of what to do during the class, what we wanted them to learn and how they can get better at story writing. We came up with some good ideas for an enjoyable class but had to get the right balance between fun and learning. We also had to keep in mind the 40 minute time constraint of the class.
In the class
itself, we gave them a sheet that we did out on the ‘Ingredients of
Story-writing’ and then told them to write a story based on four titles –
Ocean, Fear, Nature, Future."
Reflections
Throughout our teaching experience we found
that there are many skills involved in teaching. We found that we enjoyed
working in a team. We also discovered that there are many things to organise but
we would love to do it again! Thanks very much to Mr. O'Sullivan for giving us the opportunity to teach his class
.
( More great details on Fighting Words workshop run by Roddy Doyle and many others can be found in website address below!) .
Written by John O’Mahony and Eoin Vaughan.
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| ENTHUSIASTIC FIRST YEARS ARE MENTORED BY JOHN O'MAHONY! |
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| EOIN VAUGHAN KEEPS FIRST YEARS BUSY! |
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| MORGAN MOORE GETS FIRST YEARS TO IGNITE THEIR IMAGINATION! |
STUDENTS
INVOLVED WITH FIGHTING WORDS PROJECT IN FOURTH YEAR PASSING ON THEIR
KNOWLEDGE….
4th
years involved; Owen Johnston, Morgan Moore, John O’Mahony, Eoin Vaughan, Brian
Barry.
Last week,
we did a short story Workshop with the first years. After days of planning we
were finally ready. At first we were nervous, but soon we started enjoying
ourselves. After a short introduction we split them into groups. In the groups,
we asked them what their favourite book is and why. We drew a mind map on the
board with 4 story topics; Ocean, Nature, Future, Fear. We asked the class to
give ideas for stories on each of these topics. Soon the ideas started pooling
in. We then gave them paper to draw their idea for their story. After that we
gave them homework which was to write 1A4 page minimum of a Story based on
their picture. The next day they read out their stories and we were all very
impressed. They really outdid themselves!
Reflection
We think
that the first years really learned a lot from our workshop and overall it was
a thoroughly enjoyable workshop for everyone involved.
Written by OWEN
JOHNSTON
