Ideas from Life

Penny explains how her childhood ambitions inspire her books for middle-grade readers. This workshop will show students how they can use their real life to generate ideas for stories.

Penny asks students to come up with character ideas based on their former or current hobbies. Students are then invited to spin “The Wheel of Misfortune” to be given an obstacle/problem for their character to face.

Students begin writing a story based on the character facing this obstacle.

• Diary writing for inspiration and writing practice
• Creating motivation for characters
• Creating obstacles for characters
• Generating story ideas