"Moin and the Monster was my favourite book because there's a sequel!" said one child, holding up Moin and the Monster Songster."Mine was The Very Glum Life of Tootoolu Toop," said another. "It was mysterious and magical!""I liked Fantastic Mr Fox. But my all-time favourite is The Witches."And in the midst of all that, one child held up Dragonflies, Jigsaws and Seashells, her eyes shining as she told me she got it, was reading it and loved it so far.How could I not have enjoyed this reading programme? Six children, three books, 12 online interactions. It was perfect in so many ways! Moin and the Monster The first book we read together was Moin and the Monster. With this one, we did an all-time favourite activity - creating a monster together and naming it. Then, the children worked with rhymes and then made a monster rhyme of their own. Shapeshifting … [Read more...]
How to Write a Limerick
What is a limerick?A limerick is a (usually humorous) five-line poem with a strict AABBA rhyme scheme. It's fun to write and, usually, fun to read. I've always loved limericks by Edward Lear, and over the past few years, I've read many, many more. Do you remember the nursery rhyme 'Hickory Dickory Dock'? That was probably the first limerick most of us learned!Why should I write a limerick?While I can't give you an answer to that, I can tell you why I work with limericks so often at creative writing workshops I conduct.Limericks are fun.Limericks are funny.Limericks have a definite structure, which forces us to pay attention to both rhyme and meter. Read more about that here.Limericks are short, with no room to wax lyrical.What do I need to know about limericks?The best way to understand the form of a limerick is to read dozens - or hundreds - of limericks for … [Read more...]
A Guest at the Writers’ Club
I love inviting people to talk to my Writers' Club - I think a new person brings a new kind of energy. With this being my fifth year with the Writers' Club at St. Mary's, I've started planning my sessions better, and involving previous batches each time we do something new and different.Yesterday, I invited Samiksha Deshpande, an ex-Writers' Club student, to talk to the girls. She was part of my very first Writers' Club batch and wrote two stories for our sesquicentennial collection, Flickering Flames. More recently, her poem was one of the nine winners of the Book Trotters Club #SummerWriting2019 competition, which received 93 entries.Samiksha chose to do a session on limericks. I love working with limericks, so I was delighted when she chose that as her topic!I sat at the back of the class for a large part of the session, interfering only later to work with the girls … [Read more...]