Fieldwork

When I was doing my MA in Writing, I got a lot out of the exercises that were set, but often they don’t work for children’s writing. They tend to be geared towards short pieces of writing, and experimental, literary prose. So I’ve adapted one exercise from The Cambridge Introduction to Creative Writing (a book I highly recommend, for any writer). The Fieldwork exercise asks you to go for a walk with your notebook (I got myself one) and ‘collect data’: two real overheard conversations, three species of birds, the wors from six signs, the name of one planet or star, the names of three items in a hardware store, a make of gun, etc. etc. Finally, to take a phrase at random from a newspaper and use it as the title of the new piece of writing. You have to then write a story or poem of no more than 500 words, incorportating all your data.

I’ve done this exercise on the Masters and I know it works: you come out with exciting writing, new ideas and a refreshed writing brain. I don’t think it’s geared towards producing a piece of writing for children, though. Maybe it can work for that, but for now I decided to give it a tweak to make it more children literature friendly. My self-appointed Fieldwork task is therefore to go forth with notebook and find:

One place I’ve never been before (this is to encourage me to be more adventurous and discover new places to write about)

Three names (we are in Belgium, so there is no shortage of interesting names about)

Two numbers

One snippet of overheard conversation

One photograph or image (I’m taking the camera)

One time of day, and/ or date

The names of two objects

Two maps

One newspaper or magazine clipping.

I will then attempt to turn this data into a piece of writng, or a story synopsis.