About 120 students at Heineman Middle School participated in the Young Writers Program portion of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) in November.
Under the guidance of Team 8-2 literacy teachers Becky Sisler and Karen Fuesz, students set an individual total word count they wanted to achieve for the month, broke it down into a daily average, and then wrote every day during class. Students planned their stories in the weeks leading up to November 1, and the teachers started preparing for the project over the summer.
“Many even wrote on the weekends and during the holiday break!” Sisler said. “As a literacy teacher, I can’t think of many moments more rewarding than when students are begging me to give them more writing time during class because they want to keep working on their stories, and yet, this is what we experienced on a regular basis.”
Students kept track of their milestones with sticker charts and stayed motivated by reaching their daily word goals and earning small incentives.
“We are very proud of all of our students, and they created some terrific stories,” Sisler said. “This project was a huge success, and we can’t wait to do it again next year!”
The assignment will continue in coming weeks, as students to hone in on a favorite chapter that they will revise and edit. They also will have the option to revise the whole novel and publish it through CreateSpace.com.
Learn more about NaNoWriMo at https://ywp.nanowrimo.org/.