Active Demonstration or Modelling

In the writing flow.

Active demonstration is an approach to learning about writing in which we all construct a piece together.  We heard a story about a friend of John's who is really colourful.  He is an artist and a musician amongst other things.  His name is also John.
During Active demonstration we model all of the things which good writer's do and we think aloud as we write, to show the process of constructing a story.
Before writing we made a list of all the things we need to think about as we write.  We realised that we could also use this for our goal setting for the session.

Character Writing: What do we need to keep in mind?

• Hook the reader in, keep them Hooked!
• Show don’t tell
• Paint a picture in the reader’s mind
• Drop straight into the action
• Remember to describe the setting

Characters:

• Describe them in ‘Action’
• Describe how they move and what they do
• Describe how they talk and what they say (using dialogue)
• Describe what they are thinking and feeling
• Describe how others react to them
• Describe their habits and special features
• Describe what they look like

*eyes, what do they do?

*teeth, what are they like?

*Hands

*Skin

*Clothes (if they are special or remarkable)

Lillian is thinking about the writing!

We wrote about John's hungry friend also called John.  

Furious!

I met him when I was 17.  He looked like a rat at the piano, fingers flying over the keys.  A piano playing rat.  A rat genius!  He was only ten years older than me, but he already behaved like an old man.  An old man at 26.  Be careful of this guy; he can be fun but he can also be poisonous.  His name is John Niland. 

"Don't call me John Island!"

"Where's my dinner", he yells stomping his foot, jumping up and down, a haka, his shaggy hair falling over his flashing eyes.  "I need to eat! Now!"