COURSE 1
12 hours of instruction, at least15 hours of writing, depending on your child’s enthusiasm:
$100
Course 1 takes young writers through the fundamentals of how to brainstorm, outline, and write a story that could be self-published on Amazon. Most kids struggle with meeting the length requirement of 24 pages on Amazon. However, with Mark’s plot design strategy coupled with his method of using descriptive phrases, sensory details, and realistic dialogue, 24 pages becomes attainable to all but the youngest writer – and there are still options for those whose story is too short.
The different sections of Course 1 are shown below.
Each bullet in the list will consist of multiple videos, each 5-10 minutes long.
Mark has used these writing strategies with numerous schools to help kids develop their own stories, many of which were self-published. Now, Mark is excited to offer a more complete product to the homeschooling community.
“As a homeschooling parent myself, I wish I had this kind of course for my son,” Mark said.
“We would have had our son write numerous stories, maybe about the anxiety that drove him from the public school system and into the homeschooling world,” Mark’s wife commented.
Course 1 is for young writers between 8-10 years old. Basic grammar will be addressed – complete sentences, punctuation, proper dialogue structure, how to use paragraphs and chapters, . . . however this is NOT a grammar class. The majority of the focus will be on Creative Writing and Storytelling Strategies.
Storytelling strategies are shown on this page. Younger kids can struggle with some of the concepts and will likely need parental involvement both with the concepts being taught and in writing motivation.
All students will receive an electronic copy of my 28th novel, I Hate It When Aliens Do That. I will talk about how I planned and outlined that book as well as use it as an example for specific storytelling strategies.
Free eBook with Course 1
COURSE 1 OUTLINE
– Brainstorming your story
– Point of View Character
– Finding your Narrative Voice
– Character Development
- Protagonist
- Antagonist
- Secondary Characters
- Character descriptions
– Plot Design
- Creating the Hook
- Go on a Quest
- Dark Night of the Soul
- Finding the Inner Hero
- Final Conflict
– How to structure chapters
– How to Create the Setting
- Sensory Details with Setting
- Emotions in Setting
– How to Show and not Tell
– Effective Dialogue
- Eliminating “he/she said”
- Using action in dialogue
– Suspense and Tension
- Sentence Structure
- Cliff-hangers
– Descriptive Phrases
– Crafting Battle Scenes
– Putting it all Together
– Editing with Grammarly
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Get your kids writing today! The self-esteem they’ll gain from self-publishing on Amazon will be EPIC!
