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This November Celebrate NaNoWriMo!
posted by: Melissa | October 19, 2012, 07:07 PM   

 

It usually starts about now.  Many of my friends post on Facebook and send  emails about how I WILL NOT see them until December.  Several friends  will put countdowns on their Facebook pages which, once November 1st hits, they’ll update frequently and in detail.  All of November, I’ll see posts like: “Wrote 1,274 words tonight, 35,862 more to go!  Female protagonist is taking a turn I didn’t expect!”  It gets worse when I try to invite one of these friends to the movies. The response I get is something like, “No, sorry, I have 10,000 words left and there’s only a week to go!”

 

So what dries up my social life in November?  For the past several years, a nonprofit called the Office of Letters and Light has hosted National Novel Writing Month in November, also affectionately called NaNoWriMo. The goal of NaNoWriMo is simple – write a 50,000 word novel in one month.  Participants write, and write like the wind!  There is no editing, no culling, no worrying about the ever so many minutiae that often bog writers down. The only thing that matters is getting a story down on paper.  The power of NaNoWriMo comes from community.  There are forums and hashtags and counters.  People post their progress obsessively and encourage their friends who may be struggling – and there is never any judgment that the quality of work may not be up to par.

 

NaNoWriMo is not just for adults; they’ve also fine-tuned the program so it can be used by students and teachers. The educator page includes instructions for ordering a classroom kit, lesson plans, and links to a teacher community.  It also allows teachers to sign up as a facilitator and set up a virtual classroom. Most importantly, they provide planning workbooks for teachers to use in October to help their students prepare for writing and to help teachers align their lessons with the Common Core curriculum.

 

NaNoWriMo is a positive experience for students all around.  For those students who already love reading and writing, it allows them to shoot for the stars and set their imaginations free.  For students who are reluctant writers, the removal of the fear of judgment plays an integral part in their development.  By emphasizing building a story that appeals to them over other aspects of writing, many students are able to find pockets of creativity and depth that they didn’t even know they had.

 

Students also get to experience being part of a larger community all focused on the same goal.  Not only are they working alongside of hundreds of thousands adults and students all around the world on the same thing, but also with published authors they all know and love.  Authors your students will know like Lois Lowery, Kate DiCamillo, Walter Dean Myers, Scott Westerfeld and so many more all give pep-talks to the students as the month progresses.

 

NaNoWriMo is a quality experience for students and teachers alike.  There are plenty of resources out there for ambitious teachers, so start planning! We hope that you consider being a part of the movement this year. Happy writing!

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