My Sessions and Workshops

I was a primary school teacher for 18 years. Since childhood, I have had a passion for writing stories, and am delighted to now be visiting schools and enthusing children about the exciting processes of writing. I aim to show children that creating stories is a pastime everyone can enjoy - it is not just the reserve of those mysterious people we never see, called ‘authors’. My sessions are lively, fast-paced, inspiring and fun. They will engage everyone from your most reluctant readers and writers to your most enthusiastic and able pupils! I have a number of activities designed to share with Key Stage 2 children the pleasure of writing stories. I feel that you, the teachers, are the experts at delivering lessons on writing, so my session are not lessons, as such. Unless I am with the same class for a whole morning, afternoon or day, only a small amount of time will be spent writing, but the children will be active in other valuable ways. They will also find the session entertaining, and they will laugh quite a lot too! Please note: Most of my books are for KS2, but I have written a number of KS1 levelled readers for a couple of different educational publishers. One has been published as part of the Oxford Reading Tree, and there are many others which have not yet been released due to Covid 19 delays. Below is a menu from which you can select the activities you want, but please feel free to leave it to me to choose if you’d prefer.

For Key Stage 2

Q&A session - can be anything from 10 minutes to an hour, depending on the cohort and your plans for the day: I start most of my sessions with a Q&A session as I feel this is a really important part of an author visit. This also works well as a 20-30 minute assembly, freeing up class session time. *Please note: The session times for the activities below do not include the Q&A session. All timings are approximate and may change depending on the cohort. Free writing - 40* minutes: This begins with a discussion and activities to inspire and generate creative ideas for stories, leading to a short but intense free- writing activity in which the children produce a ‘written daydream’. This will not be a finished and polished story, but will contain story ideas and themes which they would be able to expand upon later. This is a tried- and-tested method of getting even the most reluctant writers writing enthusiastically and not wanting to stop. It also equips more able and enthusiastic writers with the skills to generate, develop and explore ideas in their writing. Planning a whole story: 1 hour (or longer)*: We look at the structure of a popular story, and plan a story together as a class (which may sound crazy, but is actually great fun!). I then tell them the story, fleshing out the ideas by adding description and detail, just as I would if writing it myself. If a longer time slot is available, the children can then write their own version of the story - many will be itching to do so! Describing a scene, especially a moment of intense drama - 1 hour*: This can be done in a number of different ways, depending on class sizes and space available. The focus is on describing a single moment in as much interesting detail as possible. Working in pairs, children will produce descriptive sentences, and then team up with other pairs to create whole paragraphs of description. Dungeons and Dragons style 'Choose Your Own Adventure' games (upper KS2 only) - different session-lengths available (works best as a whole day workshop): 1 hour session*: I will play a complete Dungeons and Dragons style adventure game with the whole class to model how the game works and to get them excited about making their own. There will not be time for them to make their own in a 1 hour session, but I can leave resources to help them do so after my visit; 2 hour session*: As above, then the children will begin to plan and create their own adventure games, mapping them on paper and writing descriptions of each location; More than 2 hours: As above, but spending more time delving into descriptive writing techniques, adding puzzles and tasks into their games, and giving the children time to play their games with friends. This can also lead on to longer pieces of individual, independent writing based on their in-game adventures. The longer the session, the more of these features can be included. A whole day is ideal! Follow-up: A host of writing and drama activities can spring from this session, so you may wish to follow it up yourself after my visit. Writing limericks - 1 hour*: Referring to my book of limericks ‘There Was An Old Fellow From Skye’, I will teach children how to write their own limericks. I will provide support material to help them get started. Children will write their own limericks, initially working from a scaffold, and then from scratch.

For Key Stage 1

Plan and write a picture book story - 1 hour: I’ll read them a picture book of my choosing (not one I’ve written), and take them through the process of designing their own characters and creating a story in the form of a picture book. Story-reading - 20 minutes: I read them an age- appropriate story which has an interesting message about story creation. IMPORTANT! Please note: Choosing activities: You are welcome to choose which activities you want me to do, but please don’t feel you have to. Many schools prefer to leave that decision to me. Group sizes and length of sessions: I can work with groups of any size but a single class works best. Sometimes though, it might be worth merging two classes to enable a longer sessions. Timings: Timings provided above are rough guides. I will fit the activities to whatever session-length you can provide. Please remember to factor in a Q&A session: The timings shown above do not include this. Before my visit: 1) Please send this draft letter home to parents; it tells them that I am coming in and that the children will be able to buy one of my books and have it signed. Please insert the correct date and any other details you’d like it to contain. Feel free to insert it into a school newsletter. (NB: Occasionally, schools have good reason not to tell parents about buying a book; perhaps parents have been asked for money for several other things recently. If that applies to you, I do understand, but please let me know ahead of time. Please keep in mind that book sales are in important part of my income, and they help me keep my costs down.) 2) Feel free to discuss with me any requirements or requests for the day. 3) Please provide me with a timetable of the classes I will be visiting, and when I will be selling books. After my visit: 1) I will leave with you an evaluation form in a reply- paid envelope. I’d be really grateful if you would complete it and pop it in the post. 2) Word-of-mouth recommendations are really important for me. If you feel the day was valuable, please tell colleagues in other schools! 3) If you’d like to buy any of my books for the school, please just let me know. I will give you 20% discount. To find out more or book a visit, please email me at contact@antonywootten.co.uk.