Linda Rief: Keeping a Notebook Makes Me Pay Attention

Notebook Shelf

Don Murray used to carry around laminated cards about the size of a bookmark, that said, “Nulla Dies Sine Linea—Never a Day Without a Line.” He gave them to anyone and everyone who asked him about writing. It was his mantra—and the most important advice he gave to all of us, the reminder to put our thinking down every day, or it would slip away.

Every day Don wrote in his daybook. “The most valuable writing tool I have is my daybook… All the writing in the daybook is a form of talking to myself, a way of thinking on paper….The daybook stimulates my thinking, helps me make use of those small fragments of time that on many days is all the time I have to write. There is no sign of struggle. I’m not fighting writing. I’m playing with writing. …The daybook also keeps my writing muscles in condition; it lets me know what I’m concerned with making into writing; it increases my productivity….(it’s a place) where you can do all the bad writing and bad thinking that are essential for those moments of insight that produce good writing.”

Influenced by Don, I keep a Writer-Reader Notebook. I have more than 25 years worth now, and I can trace every piece of writing I have ever done either personally or professionally, to these notebooks. I admit that I don’t write in my notebook every day —and I realize so many things I wanted to remember are gone. Still, what I have, gives me a lot from which to work and with which to play.

Every note I have ever taken at a workshop or conference, every passage I have wanted to remember from books I am reading, and all the pictures, sketches, and random notes I just didn’t want to forget, reside in these notebooks. The notebooks hold the nuggets of ideas I have saved that help me remember my thinking. In most instances I have no idea where or when I will use some of this writing, some of these sketches, or some of these professional notes, but they are there waiting patiently for the right moment—the moment when I need them.

I have moved from lined spiral-bound notebooks to large bound notebooks with blank pages. These work best for me—inviting sketching and leaving me room to set up the page in any way I choose. 

My students are prominent in my notebooks. My grandchildren have crawled, toddled and walked their way in also.

As we were watching the Anne Frank movie in class, I was sitting behind my students, watching how reverent and shocked they were throughout this movie. 

Sketch of Students
(Click to Enlarge)

On my oldest grandson’s graduation from high school I found pictures of him picking apples at our house, wanting to remember those little hands that have now become those of a young man. 

Photos of Hunter
(Click to Enlarge)

I have been teaching myself drawing—practicing what I read in journaling and sketching books. What have I learned, just like writing—practice, practice, practice--the more I sketch, the better it becomes. Sometimes the sketches lead to writing. Other times they simply allow me to slow down, take a breath.

I sketched Rye Ledges on a marine biology field trip with our students after several years of trying to get rocks looking like rocks. 

Postcard of Rocks
(Click to Enlarge)

Sketch of Rye Ledges
(Click to Enlarge)

As I was working at my computer one day I watched a squirrel at our bird feeder, grabbed my notebook, sketched and wrote. 

Bird Feeder

I ask students to sketch their thinking as readers and do it myself when the book creates images in my head. As I was reading The Great Gatsby I wrote out my frustration. 

Joy Sketch
(Click to Enlarge)

Reading A Separate Peace, there were so many passages I wanted to capture that I thought they had to be written on that tree I kept imagining. 

Tree
(Click to Enlarge)

And as we were reading and discussing “Nothing Gold Can Stay” from The Outsiders I kept thinking about how quickly the years go by and put together my thinking with images and writing from being a grandchild to watching my grandchildren. 

Circle of Life
(Click to Enlarge)

Painting & Reflection
(Click to Enlarge)

When I go to conferences and workshops I take notes in this notebook. Sketch notes from a workshop with Kylene Beers and Bob Probst last December in Maine. 

Workshop Sketch Notes

(Click to Enlarge)

Penny Kittle and I gave a presentation at the New England Reading Association. She asked us to draw our hands after showing Sarah Kay on YouTube saying her poem “Hands.” This has stimulated lots of stories for me, some of which have become longer pieces. 

Sketch Notes, Hand
(Click to Enlarge)

And what are the last two pages in my current notebook? An article cut from the newspaper pasted into my notebook with notes from Anthony Doerr after hearing him speak at the Portsmouth Music Hall, written in April. The cover of the latest book from one of my former students, Abby Carroll, and notes from her reading. Then nothing—until two emails from today that I did not want to forget. Jotted down—and dated. So much to remember.

Anthony Doerr Notes
(Click to Enlarge)

Book Cover, Notes, E-Mails
(Click to Enlarge)

One of the greatest pleasures of keeping a Writing-Reading Notebook, and asking students to keep one also, comes from hearing from one of them every now and then. Four years after having Lil in 8^th grade, and having heard nothing from her for four years, I received this email:

Wednesday, January 17   9:51 PM

“Mrs. Rief,  I counted my journals tonight. I have written 21 since eighth grade. Thank you!”  Sincerely, Lil”

Keeping a notebook makes me pay attention to the world. It slows me down. It lets me breathe. It makes me a deeper listener, a stronger observer. It lets me think. It captures what I want to remember. It gives me a place to think, and think again.

Here's something to try.  Watch “Hands” by Sarah Kay on YouTube. Then, read the text of "Hands." Ask the students (I would suggest 8th grade and higher) to find a line they like and write off that line for several minutes. At another time they could trace their hand, as I have done and put some dash facts on each finger that remind them of a story that has to do with hands, as I did. They can go back to any of these pieces and extend the quick write to a more developed piece. This summer, carry your notebook with you. Sit in front of a painting at a museum and sketch it. Take it to the beach, sit by the lake or ocean and sketch what you see, write what you are thinking.

Linda Rief is the author or coeditor of five Heinemann titles, including Inside the Writer's-Reader's Notebook, The Writer's-Reader's Notebook, Adolescent Literacy, Vision and Voice, and Seeking Diversity , as well as the author of 100 Quickwrites. She is an eighth-grade teacher at Oyster River Middle School in Durham, New Hampshire, and an instructor in the University of New Hampshire's Summer Literacy Institute. She is also a national and international consultant on issues of adolescent literacy. In 2000 she was the recipient of NCTE's Edwin A. Hoey Award for Outstanding Middle School Educator in the English/Language Arts. Her classroom was featured in the series Making Meaning in Literature produced by Maryland Public Television for Annenberg/CPB. 

Linda and Heinemann are generously offering 2 giveaway books, so we will have two winning commenters on this post. Please leave your comment by Thursday, July 29, 2017 to be entered into a drawing for one of two of Linda's books: Inside the Reader's Writer's Notebooks or Read, Write, Teach.  I will announce the winners in this space on Friday, July 30, 2017 as well as on Twitter and at The Poem Farm Facebook page.

Available through Heinemann

Available through Heinemann

Please know that Sharing Our Notebooks welcomes all kinds of notebook keepers - of any age and interest - to open up their pages and share their process.  At the present time, I am accepting all notebook entries and am especially hoping to receive some entries from boys and men who keep any kind of notebooks.  If you are interested in writing in this space, please contact me, Amy, directly.  I took a little break from this blog to write Poems Are Teachers: How Studying Poetry Strengthens Writing in All Genres (Heinemann, Fall 2017)...but I'm back and welcome you!

Please share a comment below if you wish.

If you are under 13 years old, please comment only with a parent 

or as part of a group with your teacher and class.

Katie Liseo: The Chance to Be Adventurous as Writers

“Can I stay in during recess and work on writing?”  This is not a usual phrase uttered in many elementary school classrooms and in fact, this is a phrase I’ve rarely heard in years prior to this one.  However, this year these words are not uncommon, often asked by several students as we all get up from our share at the end of writer’s workshop and prepare to line up for recess.

So, what was different about this year? Let’s go on a journey back to August, back to the beginning of a new school year with endless possibilities, fresh routines, new friends, and blank writers’ notebooks.

I have the privilege of working on a grade level team of educators who are risk takers-  we keep what’s best for kids in our forefront which drives us to always push ourselves to try new things and see what happens along the way.  As we sat to think of the possibilities for writer’s workshop this year, we kept coming back to an idea that we really, really wanted to try in the past but just hadn’t quite figured out how to get it started ….independent writing projects, otherwise known as back-up work.

Click to enlarge any image.

Katlyn created a writer’s notebook just for her back-up work.

This was something that we had read about in STUDY DRIVEN by Katie Wood Ray and had learned about firsthand from respected literacy consultant, Matt Glover.  We mulled over the idea for a few years, then after a visit from Matt last June, we knew we were ready to get this idea up and running in our classrooms. We knew the what: we wanted to give our students the chance to be adventurous as writers, explore new genres, to transfer old and new skills/strategies as writers, and to take hold of their writing lives.  We wanted them to be self-directed in their process but the only holdup was that we were not too sure of the how.

When thinking of how to launch writer’s workshop this year, we were guided by the words in Aimee Buckner’s NOTEBOOK KNOW-HOW: STRATEGIES FOR THE WRITER'S NOTEBOOK and Ralph Fletcher’s A WRITER'S NOTEBOOK.  We wanted to launch the workshop in a new way with the focus being on the notebook.  Notebooks had always been a pillar in our writer’s workshop, but they were not being used to their fullest potential.  We wanted students to truly use their notebooks, not just keep one at school.

We always hoped their notebooks would travel back and forth from school to home, on road trips, to holiday celebrations, etc.  We hoped that their notebooks would brim with ideas for possible writing pieces, be a place they could turn to when no one else would listen, be a place for reflection, and even hold yearnings and desires for their futures.  We wanted students notebooks to be a poignant and purposeful piece of their year as a 4th grade writer and beyond.  Aimee Buckner’s launching strategies and Ralph Fletcher’s inspiring words gave us the springboard for creating a sacred place to house beginnings for countless future writing pieces and we just needed to give our students opportunity and time to explore themselves as writers, and back-up work was just that.

After generating many entries, students combed their notebooks 

and noticed patterns in both their own and each other's entries.

It was a few weeks into the school year and we had begun to fill our notebooks with promising ideas. This lead to an a-ha -- why not let them take one (or several) of those ideas out of the notebook and use these as sparks for our students’ very first pieces of back-up work.

We created this chart at the beginning of the year 

with examples from student’s notebooks.

We invited students to choose an idea from their notebook that they had more to say about and from there, we nurtured this idea with focus lessons that centered around applying skills that they knew to use as good writers and focusing on their processes and reflecting as they worked through their own independent, self-selected pieces of writing.  As a teacher, I choose to intentionally model with genres that I knew were not taught in our district's units of study.

 We wanted our writers to see the possibilities beyond the genres we studied.  Of course, techniques and skills learned from those genres would transfer to back-up work, but we wanted writers to discover their “secret writing lives”- the kind of writing that kids often wished they could do in class, but couldn’t.  We wanted them to realize that they could be inspired by a new genre or an author’s unique style and make that their guiding force for a back-up piece of writing.

We wanted this back-up work to be the writing they would turn to when they had time to work after an immersion into a new genre, when they had writer’s block, at home, or when they were working in self-directed time while guided reading groups were taking place.  As the year progressed, so did our realization as teachers as to what this new opportunity meant to the writers in our classrooms.  We saw writers taking risks, setting goals, collaborating, and truly living writerly lives.

Selena’s first piece of back-up work was inspired by 

Peter H. Reynolds’ book THE DOT.

Back-up work quickly fueled this writing energy in our classrooms that had never been felt before.  Students were doing things like seeking out the music teacher to collaborate on a song and asking family members and neighbors for writing tips.  Notebooks were being taken home and used more than ever before.  Students were truly seeing themselves as writers all of the time and not just during our writer’s workshop block.  We even held a back-up work writer’s celebration halfway through the year.

For this celebration, students could showcase as many pieces of back-up work as they wanted; some even choose work that was still in progress and talked through their process with visitors at the celebration.  Some had published pieces and some didn’t - the purpose of the celebration was not to show a final, polished piece  for that’s not what back-up work’s all about.  Rather, the purpose was to celebrate their lives as writers.  This writer’s celebration felt different because each writer had something unique to share and they so beautifully articulated their process because the writing they were sharing was completely and 100% theirs.  From there, the rest is really history…

One student created a plan for a poetry anthology 

which was part of back-up work.

Kara wrote a play; auditions will be held during recess. 

The first performance should be any day now.

Back-up work is a cornerstone of our writing lives now.  Since jumping in and making back-up work part of our growing writerly lives this year, students have written numerous songs, become playwrights, poets, graphic novelist, started a school newspaper, written reviews, crafted “choose your own adventure” tales, written odes, comic books, greeting cards (which were briefly sold in our school’s front office), the list goes on and on.  Students are even going to feature their back-up work in our school library for fellow students to check out!  And as a teacher-writer, along with my teammates, I have worked on several back-up writing pieces of my own.

Students have created back-up writing partnerships outside of their initial writing partnerships, and they have formed collaborative groups centered around creating a poetry anthology, a mini series, or just to bounce ideas off of one another.  What is so amazing is that these collaborations are personal and purposeful.  Students often sing their fellow writers' praises and choose to work with someone based on a strength that writer possesses or a shared passion for a particular genre.  Reluctant writers are more motivated than ever- they work hard on our unit work because they know that they have their own writing life waiting for them.  The transfer of skill and stamina to writing both unit work and back-up work by all writers is impressive, and growth is evident.

Raymon was inspired by figures in Greek Mythology 

to write a choose your own adventure story about King Midas.

This piece of back-up work started as an idea in his writer’s notebook 

and was taken out of his notebook and to his drafting pad.

As the teacher of these amazing writers, I cannot speak enough to how powerful it is to hear the hum of a room with students who have a true passion for writing.  They continue to be just as passionate and excited towards their unit writing work, however seeing their eyes light up as they share a piece of back-up writing is really as good as it gets in a teacher’s world.

This piece of back-up work was inspired by a writer 

who had some questions about the weather.

As we approach the end of the year, I overhear my 4th graders questioning the 5th grade teachers in the hallway about back-up work and pleading that it has to be a part of their writing lives next year. I smile as I walk past because this too, is something I didn't expect to hear and it is music to my writing teacher ears.

A recent note from a student.. My favorite is his last line- 

out of all things to thank me for, he chose back-up work.

To learn more about about back up work, read this post by Dana Murphy at Two Writing Teachers.

Katie Liseo is a 4th grade teacher in Kansas City, Missouri.  Katie has been teaching for 5 years and loves learning alongside each of her students and colleagues. She enjoys reading many education blogs such as: Two Writing Teachers, Indent, Edutopia, Mr. Schu Reads, and The Poem Farm. She also loves learning from all of the collaboration that takes place via Twitter (@KatieLiseo).  When she is not nerding out on school related things, Katie enjoys hanging out with friends and her dog, Oliver. 

In honor of Katie Liseo and her students' inspiring notebook work, Sharing Our Notebooks will send a copy Aimee Buckner's NOTEBOOK KNOW-HOW: STRATEGIES FOR THE WRITER'S NOTEBOOK to someone who comments on this post.  Please leave a comment, including a way of contacting you should you win, by Sunday, June 12, to be entered into the drawing.

Please know that Sharing Our Notebooks welcomes all kinds of notebook keepers - of any age and interest - to open up their pages and share their process.  At the present time, I am accepting all notebook entries and am especially hoping to receive some entries from boys and men who keep any kind of notebooks.  If you are interested in writing in this space, please contact me, Amy, directly.

Please share a comment below if you wish.

If you are under 13 years old, please comment only with a parent 

or as part of a group with your teacher and class.

Laura Shovan: Working on a Jigsaw Puzzle with Moving Pieces

Notebooks are great for recording ideas and research, writing first drafts of poems and scenes, for sketches and doodles. But there comes a time in the life of a big writing project when an author needs to get organized. That's when I go for the binder.

When Amy asked me to put together a post about constructing THE LAST FIFTH GRADE OF EMERSON ELEMENTARY, I knew that the centerpiece of the post would be my big, giant binder of revisions. However, my novel in verse started small -- as a page of scribbled notes (and one important doodle) on the back of a writing conference handout.  Here is the story, from scribbled notes to my new book.

Click any photo to enlarge.

Literary Inspiration

I read SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY during my first year of teaching high school English. The class was “Literature About Society.” I loved the layers of this verse novel, published in 1915. Each poetic monologue adds to the nuanced view the reader has of a small town outside of Chicago.

The idea of re-setting SPOON RIVER in a fifth grade class bubbled up after I started working in elementary schools as a visiting poet. But it didn’t really solidify until…

Human Inspiration

 … my son’s fifth grade year. I was active at his school and knew his friends, his teacher, and observed many little details about their class.

They were obsessed with the WARRIORS series. They made little origami boxes out of Post-it notes and kept their erasers in them. Their teacher, Mr. Schoenhut, shook hands as the children walked into the classroom each day. (BTW: Robbie is in the red and white stripes.)

Initial Book Ideas

The summer after Robbie moved up from fifth grade, I was at a local SCBWI conference. Agent Stephen Barbara and I had a conversation about SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY, a book we both loved. That night, I sketched out the initial ideas for my book. You can see above where it says “Spoon River ES.” On the left is a sketch of a concrete poem in the shape of a boy – one of the few things on this sheet that exists in the finished book.

Jason Chen's Bio-Sheet

Initially, I stuck close to the structure of Spoon River. I developed a collection of 30 poems, each in the voice of a student in one fifth grade class. There was no true plot, but together the poems were a portrait of a year fifth grade.

When I received feedback, readers liked the voices but didn’t understand what this was. It wasn’t a novel yet.

Over several years, I developed the characters. Above you can see a bio-sheet for one student: Jason Chen. It lists his character arc, what happens to him in each quarter of the book, facts about his family, who his friends are, what activities he likes. I have a sheet like this for every character.

Early Character Seating Chart

I created spreadsheets and lists and kept writing. The book went from 30 pages and 30 characters, to 50 pages, and finally 150 pages and 20 character when it sold. It was like working on a jigsaw puzzle with moving pieces.

One of the ways I kept track of the voices was by making seating charts. This is an early one. Some of these characters were cut from the book.

Giant Draft Binder

Working on revisions with my editor meant cutting two more voices and overhauling the book again.

Above you can see the giant binder where I kept drafts of all of the poems. Each tab represents one character. Every time I worked on a major revision, I pulled the book apart and focused on one voice at a time, so that each character’s voice sounded consistent and true to him or her. Then I reconstructed the order of the poems.

Despite cutting two voices, the book grew to 180 poems during this final phase.

Almost eight years later… THE LAST FIFTH GRADE OF EMERSON ELEMENTARY made its debut. It was a team effort, with lots of help from my agent, Stephen Barbara,  my editor, Wendy Lamb, and the team at Random House Children’s Books.

Laura Shovan

Laura Shovan is former editor for LITTLE PATUXENT REVIEW and editor of two poetry anthologies. Her chapbook, MOUNTAIN, LOG, SALT AND STONE, won the inaugural Harriss Poetry Prize. Laura works with children as a poet-in-the-schools and was the 2015-2016 Howard County Poetry and Literary Society's writer in residence. THE LAST FIFTH GRADE OF EMERSON ELEMENTARY  is her debut novel-in-verse for children (Wendy Lamb Books/Random House).

Visit Laura Online Here:
Website
Blog
Twitter
PDF of LAST FIFTH GRADE Educators' Guide

Laura has generously offered to send a signed copy of THE LAST FIFTH GRADE OF EMERSON ELEMENTARY to someone who comments on this post.  Please leave a comment, including a way of contacting you should you win, by Sunday, May 22, to be entered into the drawing.

Please know that Sharing Our Notebooks welcomes all kinds of notebook keepers - of any age and interest - to open up their pages and share their process.  At the present time, I am accepting all notebook entries and am especially hoping to receive some entries from boys and men who keep any kind of notebooks.  If you are interested in writing in this space, please contact me, Amy, directly.

Please share a comment below if you wish.

If you are under 13 years old, please comment only with a parent 

or as part of a group with your teacher and class.

K.A. Holt: The Satisfaction of Jotting

Notebooks?
Notebooks.
Notebooks!

They are the genesis of any book I write (and the format of my two most recent books). At least one notebook is in my bag wherever I go. I have them on my desk. I have them in the kitchen. They are in the living room on the little table by the lamp. There is one for poetry I write when I travel,

one for poetry I write at home, and one suction-cupped to the wall in my shower (for real). Every manuscript I work on has at least one notebook dedicated to it.

And, lo! When it is school supply buying season, my cart is so filled with spiral notebooks it is almost (almost) embarrassing.

I use notebooks to brainstorm, to organize, and often to actually write parts of my first drafts. Then, once my draft is finished and I’m on to revisions, I use a notebook to keep track of plot threads.

I have pages that serve as repositories for sticky notes so that I can really see my progress towards the finish line.

It probably wouldn’t be possible for me to write a book without notebooks. They are an extension of my brain and they offer freedom that I can’t seem to find in a blank computer screen. This is a discovery Timothy makes in my newest book HOUSE ARREST.

In HOUSE ARREST, Timothy is court ordered to keep a journal and he thinks it’s a terrible idea. But as he gets used to writing little notes and ideas he begins to discover his voice. Soon, Timothy can’t imagine not having his notebook. It gives him an outlet, and he realizes that sometimes it’s much easier to write your feelings than it is to say them out loud.

In my book RHYME SCHEMER, Kevin’s notebook is a little different.

He uses it to write ideas and thoughts, too, but he also uses it to write poems. And not just typical poems. Kevin takes pages from books that have already been written, and he uses those words to make little poems of his own. At first he doesn’t even realize it’s poetry. It’s just a way for him to use his notebook to express himself. He knows that the things he writes don’t have to be perfect, they’re just interesting ideas that tickle his brain.

In a notebook you have the satisfaction of jotting down an idea and then slashing through it when it’s terrible. BUT, even with that slash it’s not gone. So maybe when you get to your third draft, your fourth, your fifth, when you finally know your main character and what he or she is after, you can flip through your notes, see the slashed through idea and think, “Wait a second now… maybe if I just do this [another note is added with an arrow pointing to the first one] then everything will work just right!” There is something glorious in the permanence of notes in a notebook, even the slashed through ones.

Several months ago, I was alerted to a crowd-funding site where someone is creating a notebook that will send your notes into the cloud. But wait… there’s more! You can also microwave it once it’s filled with notes, so that you can start all over again after you upload everything. Of course I ordered one just to test it out, but I will admit I’m skeptical. Even if the microwaving works, and I could just use one notebook forever, I don’t know if notes in the cloud are going to cut it. I need to see my scribbles. I need to feel the pages. I need the visceral experience of words on a page.

Plus, how could I ever microwave away the little messages I find? With so many notebooks around the house, my kids know exactly where to find me.

Want to try something fun with your notebook? Find a magazine or newspaper, some scissors, glue, and a black marker. Rip or cut a page from the magazine or newspaper and glue it into your notebook. Then, take your black marker and circle the coolest words on the page. You can try to make a sentence with the cool words, but you don’t have to. Once they’re circled, use the black marker to color over all the other words. Bam! Look at the awesome poem you just made!

K.A. Holt is the author of several books for young people, including the new middle grade verse novel HOUSE ARREST, and RHYME SCHEMER, a Bank Street Best Book of 2014 and an Amazon Best Book for Kids and Teens. She lives in Austin, TX and eats a lot of tacos.  You can find her online HERE.  If you'd like to see inside of K.A. Holt's studio, you can do so HERE at All the Wonders.

Thank you to Chronicle Books for donating a copy of  K.A.' new book, HOUSE ARREST, to a commenter on this post.  Please leave your comment by Tuesday, November 17 to be entered to win.

Please share a comment below if you wish.

Jeff Anderson: The Project Journal

A Book with a Bank

Inspiration

Charles Darwin inspired the journal strategy I am sharing. How did this evolve you ask? While reading CHARLES AND EMMA: THE DARWINS' LEAP OF FAITH by Deborah Hieligman, I learned that Darwin’s brain over connected and was over stimulated and often got quite cluttered. Enter Charles Darwin’s solution: alphabet journals—an A journal dedicated to things beginning with the letter A, and a B journal for things pertaining to the letter B and so on. Categorization. The brain loves categories, groups, and classification.

For me, Charles Darwin’s idea evolved into keeping project journals.

Like A Bank

To the point my Zack Delacruz Journal is a Zack Delacruz bank. Since my debut middle-grade humor novel, ZACK DELACRUZ: ME AND MY BIG MOUTH, is the first in a series, I needed a project journal for all things Zack—a Zack Delacruz bank. This project journal became a bank in which I deposited ideas—notes made on gum wrappers, Post-its, or any writable surface I could scrounge up in the wild of the world. To complete the deposit, I tape it into the project journal.

I’ve already finished book two in the Zack Delacruz series (Look for it in the fall of 2016). Now, I am working on book three, collecting and making as many deposits as possible. Later, withdrawls from the ideas the bank will help me add humor and natural textures from real life, which is essential for realistic fiction.

Lately, I’ve begun calling my Zack Delacruz project journal a Zank—short for Zack Bank. That’s right, Zank.

Notes Taped Into My Journal 

(Deposits in my Zank)

Lots of Tape and Post-Its

While drafting this book, I took paper and pen to one of my favorite restaurants, Chris Madrid's, and took notes on everything because I used it as a setting for a scene in ZACK DELACRUZ: ME AND MY BIG MOUTH. Below, you can see illustrator Andrea Miller's interpretation of the scene.

Interior Illustration

by Andrea Miller

Stories need drama and character changes to be interesting. As a former sixth grade teacher, I deposited voices and situations into my project journal. Andrea interpreted those voices and situations into illustrations like the one you see below.  A book has a long journey, from project journal to many drafts, to final draft, to illustrator, designer and completed book.

Interior Illustration

by Andrea Miller

Make a Project Journal

Is there a book you want to write? Maybe you find yourself writing about a particular topic all the time--a friendship or pet or interest? Or maybe you want to start writing about a topic. Do it. Make a project journal for anything that’s worth its own journal to you. Pick a journal that’s right for your subject: Is it short and compact or a long and winding road? Small, large, lined? It’s all yours to decide.

Don’t Forget the Pen

When you go out into the big wide world of wonder, don’t forget to bring something to write with. It may ruin a few pairs of pants, jackets, or shirts, but the collection of ideas will be worth it. When you see something of interest you want to remember or that MIGHT be a deposit in your bank, scrounge for a writing surface, scratch down your thought or observation, and when you arrive at home, tape it your new bank. Make a funny name for it, like Zank, and it will be even more fun.

Me & a Few of My Project Journals

Jeff, a full-time staff developer and writer, shares strategies from his books MECHANICALLY INCLINED, EVERYDAY EDITING, 10 THINGS EVERY WRITER NEEDS TO KNOW, and REVISION DECISIONS with teachers around the United States and beyond. ZACK DELACRUZ: ME AND MY BIG MOUTH is his first humorous middle grade novel. Right now he enjoys talking to students about this new series.

See a fun book trailer for ZACK DELACRUZ: ME AND MY BIG MOUTH by Georgia librarian, Kristen Deuchle HERE.

Follow Jeff on twitter @writeguyjeff
Find Jeff on the web - writeguy.net

Buy a copy of ZACK DELACRUZ: ME AND MY BIG MOUTH at your local bookstore or go HERE for a link!

Much gratitude to Sterling Publishing  for offering a giveaway of Jeff's new book, ZACK DELACRUZ: ME AND MY BIG MOUTH to a commenter on this post.  Please leave your comment by Sunday, November 1 to be entered into this drawing.

Please share a comment below if you wish.