Day 6: Polishing our Writing

Though the day began gray and wet, that didn’t stop everyone from brightening up the room with their enthusiasm and smiles, excited for another week at UNCG Young Writer’s camp.  One ran straight for the door, quoting “I want to get started right away.”  Two girls had stylish shirts with the phrase “Go Far”, which in a way, reminded me the camp’s purpose of encouraging our next generation of writers to exceed their limitations.  For our morning activity, Mark from the high school group and Amy, the UNCG education professor who organizes the camp, read passages from the book, Poetry Matters by Ralph Fletcher.  After discussing the literary devices, such as personification, rhythm and word play, of “At Grandma's House” and “The First Time”, the students were asked to write a line for a poem.   Then they passed their papers down to their partners so they can write the next line.  When the activity was over, three students volunteered to read their poems.  It was the perfect way for them to practice reading aloud to a crowd.  Some poems were about their dogs while others were about the soothing feeling of a summer breeze.  

As for their Melon Project books, the students are doing a spectacular job with their editing.  They are adding sounds, illustrations, colorful fonts, interesting facts from their research or from their imagination.  According to a confident young writer from the camp, he advised that his story “is going to be the best cause I made it myself.”