Creative Writing is something that students often enjoy engaging with. However, teachers avoid creative writing, because evaluating it can be difficult. How can you say “this is better than that” in a way that students can connect with? What explicit rubrics are being created that can provide students with feedback and goals that are achievable?
By framing the creative writing piece around Choose Our Way stories, students will have specific goals (write a story with X number of choices, and Y number of endings). By scaffolding it on basic, and iterative plot graphs, students will be able to demonstrate that they are including all parts of a story.
But, what about those who don’t know where to start? That, of course, is where the Palm Story comes in, proving that everyone has everything they need to create their own unique narrative simply by looking at their hand, and taking a break from the rush to step back, slow down, and ideate.
The English Course Pack
This unit is part of the Full English Course Pack that contains every assignment, slide deck, assessment, worksheet, and evaluation required to run a complete high school English class. As always, these resources are free for non-commercial public school use.
If you would like to say thanks, consider buying me a coffee. But that is neither required, nor expected.
Unit Three: Creative Writing & Choose Our Way Tales
4.01: Introducing the Elements of a Story
- Introduces basics like genre
- Explores types of characters
- Demonstrates plot graphs
4.02: Introducing Choose Our Way Tales (COWtales)
- Explains different types of COWtales students are familiar with
- Engages students with a video COWtale
- Creates a foundational understanding of the form
4.03: Writing a Palm Story
- Guides students through the ideation process
- Encourages students to create all elements required to fulfill a basic plot graph
- Provides time to write a short, linear narrative
4.04: Writing a COWtale with Twine or Texture Writer
- Introduces programs / websites to aid in the creative writing process
- Scaffolds the conversion of linear texts to branching texts
- Provides opportunities for creative writing
English Course Packs: Full Units
Unit One: Literacy Skills
Unit Two: Poetry
Unit Three: Literature Circles
Unit Four: Creative Writing & Choose Our Way Tales
Unit Five: Essay Writing (In Progress)
Unit Six: Culminating Tasks (In Progress)
Written by…
Michael Barltrop has been teaching since 2006, integrating comics, video games, and TTRPGs into his classroom. He has been the head of English, Literacy, Special Education, and Assessment & Evaluation and Universal Design. Feel free to reach out through Twitter @MrBarltrop!
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