10-minute videos for years 4-8.
(age 9-14 approx.)

EACH video comes with 1-3 practical tasks and can be used
​for remote learning or in class.

try our first video for free.

We held a writing competition in August 2020. 
read the winning stories. 

Have you read any of our books? 
Here's a list.
In our free 10-minute video, Create a Character,
​Nova Weetman & Emily Gale share the process they use to create a main character for a story or novel. 

The presentation is split into three easy-to-follow steps, with a reminder at the end of the tasks the student can try. This is a fun and creative 1-hour activity.

SEE OUR PRICING GUIDE.
CLICK FOR TESTIMONIALS.

Please note that all of our videos, which are currently hosted on YouTube, are marked as "Made For Kids". Click here to find out what these means.
Picture
The Series:
​
​1. Create a Character
2. What's My Genre?
3. Choosing Your Own Adventure
4. Ideas and Where To Find Them
5. Who? When? & How? (point-of-view, tense, & voice)
6. How To Build a World
7. Structure: Mountain or Bridge?
8. The Do's & Don'ts of Dialogue
9. Show Me a Story (show-don't-tell)
10. Why Read? Why Write? Why Edit?

sneak peek of some of the other videos in the course.
In Choosing Your Own Adventure, Nova, the author of three Choose Your Own Ever After novels, gives a step-by-step guide.
A fun finale for the What's My Genre? video as Emily shows you the importance of getting to know a genre so that you can experiment, concocting your own unique brew.
A clip from Ideas And Where To Find Them.
​You'll never be afraid of the blank page after watching our video on Inside Ideas v. Outside Ideas.
A clip from Who, When, & How? (Point-of-view, tense, & voice) in which Nova demonstrates how to use our custom-made flowchart to make a decision about which point-of-view best suits your story.
In our final video, Why Read? Why Write? Why Edit? we talk about the benefits of creative writing, give lots of encouragement about editing, and share reading recommendations. Here's a short clip.
In How To Build a World we discuss ways to bring your reader deep into the world you've created using 'big picture' thinking and smaller details.

MORE ABOUT EACH VIDEO.

All ten videos are available now.

1. Create a Character: we start with what is in a character's heart and then work outwards. There are three tasks on the hand-out, which can be used for the main character in the story and any other key characters. Nova & Emily create a character each to demonstrate. Nova creates "Bea" and Emily creates "Finch".

2. What's Your Genre?: after an overview we look at the key components to consider when writing in any genre, and apply those to the character backgrounds from the first video to further develop our stories.

3. Choosing Your Own Adventure: a guaranteed crowd-pleaser! Students will be able to get started on a Choose Your Own after watching Nova demonstrate the method. The hand-out is a "decision tree".

4. Ideas and Where To Find Them: we look at what to do when faced with a blank page and generate twelve scenarios from nothing. Afterwards we explore other ways to make your stories richer.

5. Who, When, & How (point-of-view, tense, & voice): using the characters we have been developing (Bea & Finch), we experiment with first, second and third person, and use our flowchart to explore our options before making a firm decision. 

6. How To Build a World: we look at making big decisions and adding small details to make a fictional world layered and believable. The two very different worlds we have been creating for Bea and Finch are developed further.

7. Structure: Mountain or Bridge?: Nova demonstrates a mountain story structure with a famous novel and then plots Bea's story from beginning to resolution. Emily offers an alternative model and uses it to plot Finch's story.

8. The Do's and Don'ts of Dialogue: we examine some of the main pitfalls, look at how dialogue adds to character, and learn how to use it to flavour our writing.

9. Show Me a Story: "show don't tell" is a concept that gets thrown around a lot - we take a close look at what it means, when to "show", and when to "tell".

10. Why Read? Why Write? Why Edit?:  our final video breaks down the editing process we use, we share our strengths and weaknesses as writers and where our love for writing comes from, and offer some reading recommendations for 9-14 year olds.

click here to buy the series for your child or class.

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