1) Quick! Make a list of five things that make you mad. Write for ten minutes about one of them.

2) Go to the library. Copy down the first sentence from ten different books with intriguing titles. Do a ten minute “free writing” exercise, using one of your sentence starters.

3) Take one of your childhood memories (as we did in class) and free write for ten minutes. Make up a story from it!

4) Clip out intriguing pictures from magazines and stick them in a file folder. Pull one out and take ten minutes to write a fast story about the picture.

5) Quick! Write down five things you know how to do. Write about one of these, as if you were teaching someone to do it.

6) What's your favorite vacation spot? Why? Write a three paragraph travel brochure, convincing someone to go there.

7) Make a list of five unusual people you know. Write a short story about one of them. (Make parts of it up, if you want.)

8) Read the picture book called “Lily's Purple Plastic Purse,” by Kevin Henkes. Write for ten minutes about one of your early school memories.

9) If you could create your own world, what would it be like? List five things that would be different from the world you know today.

10) “He was surprised to see it there in the tree.” Take this sentence and write for ten minutes, whatever comes to your mind.

As you decide which of the above ideas you will use to work on more, to create a complete story or book, remember the words of Katherine Paterson:

“An Idea is a Sound from the Heart.”

 

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