My script has been completed, and I am ready to share it. The two characters in my script are an average girl named Maren and a mysterious girl named Vincent (Vincie for short). Yes, it’s a boy’s name, but I like the name Vincent. So her name is Vincent. Maren is really just average; there is nothing special or notable about her. Vincie is a tall, professional looking girl who seems a bit scary at first, but by the end of my script, you’ll realize that she’s not as scary as she seems. On with my script!

1. Int. School Hallway. Morning

Maren walks slowly to her English class and passes a girl in a black pencil skirt, dark blue shirt (that is tucked in to the skirt) and black-rimmed glasses. She glances towards the mysterious girl, and the mysterious girl snaps her gaze towards her. This scares the Maren, and she looks down to the floor and walks quickly towards her English class.

2. Int. Class. Morning

Maren finds herself wondering about the mysterious girl all through English class. The bell rings and she is lost in thought. She only realizes that the class is over a few minutes after everyone is gone.

3. Int. Hallway. Noon

Maren bumps into the mysterious dark girl as she is walking down the crowded hall.

MAREN

(widens eyes)Oh, I’m so sorry!

MYSTERIOUS GIRL

(glares at Maren for a second and then drops her angry expression) It’s okay.

MAREN

(looks past girl to her class) Okay…well, I have to get to class. Bye!

MYSTERIOUS GIRL

(smiles lightly)

4. Ext. Sidewalk. Afternoon

Maren is walking home next to a somewhat busy street when suddenly, she sees the mysterious girl walking the same way she is, just behind her. She slows her pace to let the girl catch up to her, feeling the need to apologize for earlier again.

MYSTERIOUS GIRL

Oh, hello. It’s you again.

MAREN

(Looks down) H-hi. Um…sorry about bumping into you earlier. I hope I didn’t do any harm-

MYSTERIOUS GIRL

It’s fine. You didn’t do any harm.

MAREN AND MYSTERIOUS GIRL

(long awkward silence)

MYSTERIOUS GIRL

What’s your name?

MAREN

Huh?

MYSTERIOUS GIRL

(looks a bit annoyed) Your name?

MAREN

(looks a bit alarmed) Oh, uh, Maren. And you would be…?

MYSTERIOUS GIRL

Vincent. Vince for short.

Maren

Isn’t that a guys name?

VINCENT

I prefer to think it’s gender neutral.

MAREN

(is approaching her house) Okay then. Well I’m at my street, so I better go. See ya!

VINCENT

Goodbye…can you wait a second?

MAREN

(Turns back around) Yeah?

VINCENT

C-can we talk again later? At school?

MAREN

Looks Surprised Sure!…I actually to have to go now. Talk to you later Vince! (turns around again and starts walking towards her house)

VINCENT

(Smiles and watches Maren walk home for a bit, then turns around and starts walking towards her house)

In my creative writing class, I had to write a script for a scene that I made up. Before I could write this script, though, I had to create a storyboard for it. I decided it would just be easier to draw this storyboard instead of create it online, so I did just that. I drew my storyboard in pen. My two characters are sloppily drawn stick figures…I could’ve actually drawn them out, but that would take too long and honestly seems like to much effort to put into a simple storyboard. The two characters are Maren and a mysterious girl named Vincent. They are in school most of the time, and then briefly walking outside.

We (8th grade creative writing students) had to complete a series of work packets for our creative writing class. We are also required to share those packets via blog post. What I have chosen to share is my “Creating Conflict” packet, which gives tips on creating conflict and has the student (in this case, yours truly) answer questions based on their stories conflict. Below you will find images of said packet, which I have completed (Also, please try to ignore my small message to my friend Cameron on the side of the second page. I was going to erase it but I forgot…and then it got copied).

After we (my creative writing class) finished writing our rough drafts of our short stories, we shared them in a roundtable, meaning we all sat in a circle and read each of our stories aloud. After our stories had been read aloud, the classmates that hadn’t read the story gave feedback on the story of the student who read their story. This was helpful and also somewhat confidence-boosting.

Final draft of my story:

Eleanor watched the blade cut through the green icing, then the sweet yellow cake. She lifted the knife up with her spell, and placed it beside the cake on the oak coffee table. She then directed her finger at the cake slice and lifted her finger upwards. The slice rose with her finger. Eleanor pointed towards her now open mouth, and a bit of the cake went in. She took a bite, the cake moving back from her mouth to hover in the air. “Delicious…” she whispered, and continued to eat the rest of the cake slice. Now that she chewed the piece more thoroughly, it tasted a bit off. Her eyes glanced down at the now incomplete green-iced cake, at the black cursive letters scrolled on the surface with black icing. “Happy 17^th birthday, Eleanor!” said the letters. She smiled a sad, pointy toothed grin. If only somebody else were here to say those words to her. But who would want to be here, with her? Here, in her sad little run-down cottage filled with bottled animal parts, strange plants, and creepy insects. Here, with her cauldron and twisted broom, complete with a lumpy dirt floor. And her, with her green, warty skin and her long nose. She glanced out her single window into her front yard, if you could even call it that. It was really just a clearing of dead grass. As she gazed out her window, she started to feel something. It started as a tingling sensation, which turned into convulsing shivers up and down her spine. It felt as if a million pins were pricking her skin, over and over again. Eleanor ran to the bathroom, her green feet kicking up dirt, and lifted her trembling gaze to her reflection in the mirror. “What?!” Some of her warts had disappeared, and continued to disappear, melting away into her skin. Not only that, but her green complexion was starting to fade, fast, into a pinkish-white color. A sharp pain shot through her nose. The flesh on the tip started to dissolve, melt away almost, until Eleanor’s nose was significantly shorter, and rounder, than before. She screamed. Upon opening her mouth, she had discovered that her teeth were no longer sharp points. Instead, they were most like small white rectangles, the only mildly sharp ones being her canines. All of the sudden, as quickly as the tinging, uncomfortable feeling came, it was gone. Eleanor gawked at her new appearance. She looked like one of those things that sometimes came trudging through her forest, chatting up an annoying storm. One of those things that marveled at her house, only to scream and run away when she showed her face. One of those pink, fleshy things… a human?!

Introduction
Today in creative writing, we had to write three short stories based off the prompts we were given in the form of vines. Here are my stories, along with the vine-prompts used to write them. They are not complete because we had to quickly write one after another.

Vine #1
Every day, going on is getting increasingly difficult. With his family, friends, and, well, everyone gone, he has no reason to go on. He actually has a reason not to go on. His stomach growls, his body aches. Several times he has tried to kill himself, no one of those times being successful. He gave up on suicide a long time ago. Now he just walks, on and on, across crumbling bridges, through acid puddles and bloodied corpses.

Vine #2

Ten Free Things I am Thankful for:

• I guess I am thankful for my parents love, which came free to me when I was born.
• I am thankful for my friends, who make me happy and give me someone to talk to.
• I am thankful for Soundcloud, a website where I can get free (and probably pirated) music off the internet.

Vine #3
The Aurora lights mystify me. Their flashing green and pink colors remind me of a fruit, but which fruit I cannot remember. Did it taste good? Saliva floods my mouth. Yes, it must have been delicious. Suddenly, a sharp pain shoots up through my body. I let out a scream and my knees buckle underneath me. THUMP.

Introduction
In my creative writing class, we were required to come up with an idea for a “new” story, a story that had never been heard before. For the story, we had to come up with a story arc, which is a sort of graph that measures the mood of your story as it progresses. We also had to create a plot diagram.

Plot Diagram
I started by completing the plot diagram. Since I did not want to build a blank plot diagram, I found a template online. Here is what the template looks like completed, which is my plot diagram. (zoom in to see text)

Explanation
Eleanor is a teenage witch, just turning seventeen. She lives in a small cottage inside a pine forest, and she hates humans. Eleanor is quietly celebrating her seventeenth birthday, alone, when suddenly she starts to feel strange. Fast forward, she turns into a human, which is the climax of the story. Soon after, she walks into the forest and discovers a group of teens not much younger than her, and talks with them. She is happy that they actually talked with her, not running away and screaming “witch!” The story ends with Eleanor realizing that maybe being a human is not so bad.

Story Arc
Next is my story arc, which I created in google docs using the line tool and the scribble tool. Here is an image of it:

Explanation
Eleanor’s mood starts at a bit above average when she is quietly celebrating her birthday. Her mood then plummets into near misery as she begins to change- into a human, that is. She is momentarily nearly miserable. Her mood gradually ascends as she talks to people (which she likes) and realizes that being human may not be so bad. The story ends with Eleanor being happy because she has friends now, unlike when she was a witch.

This is a short story, or description, of the time I met a cat on a fence.

The warm spring breeze blew my hair into my face as I walked, annoying me. My sandals made their usual flip-flopping noise each time I took a step, echoing through the neighborhood. The trees, grass, bushes, and pretty much all the plants around me made my eyes water and my throat itch. Oh yeah, this was the perfect day for a walk. I mumbled a bit angrily to myself when suddenly, a small black figure caught my eye, perched on a fence in front of an apple tree. A cat? Yay! I love cats! My feet turned towards the fence, and I walked towards the fence and the cat. The cat meowed as I approached, tilting its head in curiosity. “Hello!” I said cheerfully. “How are you this fine day?” The cat merely stared back at me, not even meowing in response. “Okay then, can I pet you?” A gentle scraping sound began. The cat was rubbing its cheek on the fence post. I could not decide if it was marking its territory defensively or asking to be scratched on the cheek. “…Do you want to be pet?” I asked hesitantly, reaching my fingers towards the cats head to stroke it. The cat pulled back. “Maybe you want to get to know me first?” My fingers reached towards its nose, stopping about a centimeter short of its muzzle. It sniffed my fingers hesitantly, stopping and pulling back again. “So…can I pet you?” I asked again, reaching my finger towards its small black head. The cat did not react, just stayed still. “Okay then?” Growling. Was the cat angry? It had let me pet it so far? I backed away from the cat and it’s fence. “Sorry to bother you… I’ll be going now.” As I began walking up the sidewalk away from the hill, I saw a person walking the opposite direction. She was a middle aged lady, not much older than my mother, walking her small, tan, curly-haired dog. Had she heard me talking to the cat? What did she think? I turned my head down to look at the grey, boring pavement, and mumbled a quiet “hello” as she passed, just to be polite. She greeted me back, and we were on our way.

Overview
In my creative writing class, we are creating videos with adults speaking and children’s voices coming out when they speak. For the project, we were required to collaborate with first graders to write a script for what the adults in the video would be saying.

Experience
This was an interesting (and annoying) experience, as the first grader’s language was rudimentary and sometimes did not make sense. However, as weird as the words they spoke sounded, we typed them into our scripts, unedited.

Working with our Groups

Before this, though, our groups had to work together to come up with the scripts actions, what the characters would be doing. This took 2-3 days. It was  difficult, yet sort of fun, because some of the things that the characters do are funny.

Script

Car Script

Voices: One girl, one boy

Character descriptions:  Kerry: bossy, sassy, and stupid, not good with maps.

                                      John: demanding, bossy, has a large ego (driving)

Props: Cellphone and map

Kerry (female) – Mrs. Butson

John (male) – Mr. Miller

Situation:

John and Kerry are going on a vacation in a foreign country for a week. When they arrived they are extremely tired from their plane ride and they are trying to find their hotel, to do so they rented a car. Kerry is trying to get a signal from her phone.

Kerry [impatient and tired]: I am really tired, let’s just go to our hotel. [holding her cell phone outside of the window to get reception, but not successful]

John [tired]: All right…all right [Kids make driving sound effect] (In a bossy voice)So, look where we are headed right now

Kerry: “I threw my cellphone already outside [holding cellphone outside the window]”

John: “stop throwing out to find a signal”

Kerry: (John ignores Kerry and shaking his head)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

2. Kerry is trying to find something that will help her find her hotel on her cellphone…she is frustrated

KERRY [annoyed]

I don’t know how to use these stuffs and they don’t have any battery”(throws out the window)

John [angry]

(John is tired) “why would you throw all the stuffs away. Why would you just throw it away instead of just put it in the car?”

Kerry

(Finds map in the car and looks happy)  

(Kerry is holding the map upside down, but do not show it in filming until John figures it out)

Okay I found map! Now we’ll go left, [wait 3 seconds] and now it says to go right, [wait 3 seconds] oh and now left. Go, go, go, go straight.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kerry and John get worried and start arguing about where to go.

Kerry[sassy]: (Has map)You should go to the right.

John[bossy]: No we should go to the left.

Kerry [thinks she’s right]: Follow my way because I have the map.

John: stops the car [sound effect breaks]

John: [facepalm] You should flip it over.

Kerry: [Smiles] Oh yeah…(flips over map) then go left  

~END~

In creative writing, we are creating videos with adults speaking and children’s voices coming out when they speak. The first step of the process is coming up with ideas, which we came up with individually and then further developed in our class groups. Once the students in the group had shared their ideas, the group chose three to post on an online bulletin board.

Ideas
One Idea:
Main Character: 36 year old  Man
Character 2: 35 year old woman
Setting: In a car
Situation: lost and trying to figure out the way home and fighting on which way to go.
Theme: Frustration
Another Idea:
Main Character: 40 year old mom, childish, mischievous
Character 2: A 7 year old kid, caring, smart, very mature, mature voice
Setting: Dining room table
Situation/Conflict/Problem: The mom is playing with her food and the kid is trying to stop her.
Theme (Abstract Noun): immaturity
 Last idea:
Main Character: Dumb or cluless middle aged man
Character 2: Old and sophisticated business manager
Setting: Cubical or an office building
Situation/Conflict/Problem: The man is confused as to why he is getting fired but the business man makes it quite clear   (why he is getting fired is obvious)
Theme (Abstract Noun): Tolerance

First, each member of our group shared our ideas with the rest of the group. Then we decided which three we liked best. After that, we modified the three ideas to try to make them the best ideas we could share. Finally, three members of our group typed up our ideas on Padlet, an online bulletin board, and presented them in front of the class. 

Okay… so I have a role of duct tape, two tennis rackets, a wiffle ball, a stack of cups, a bag of balloons, and a spool of string. What do I do with those? Well, you could just hit the wiffle ball back and forth with the tennis rackets, but that would be boring. Plus that’s not four items. Oh right, I do need four items. I’m stalling. Okay, the four items I will use: The tennis rackets, the spool of string, the wiffle ball (I really feel like it should be spelled whiffle… ah whatever), and the stack of cups. This is going to be absolutely ridiculous.

Setup

First, cut off a 3.5 foot long piece of string (why 3.5, I don’t really know) and loop it through two of the holes in the wiffle ball. Tie the string so the wiffle ball is attached to the string. Then take the other end of the piece of string and loop it through on of the…uh… square shaped holes (?) and tie it so the racket is now attached to the string a well. Now, set your contraption down and stack your cups in a pyramid formation. Once you’re done setting up your cups, retrieve your contraption. Move so you are directly in front of the cups. Step back about four feet. Your goal is to knock down all the cups.

Instructions

But how do you go about doing this? Well, there is a round object to hit the cups with. That would be the wiffle ball. How to you get it to knock down the cups from four feet away? Thrust your arm in front of you. Make sure you do not let the tennis racket escape from your hand. It could bite you. Or just fall on the floor. Anyway, thrusting your arm in front of you will cause the wiffle ball to thrust forward as well. Don’t be afraid! It will not fly off into the distance! Clever you has attached it to the string, which is also attached to the tennis racket, which should be secured in your hand. And if you’re lucky, the ball will collide with a cup, or several, causing either part or all of your cup pyramid to collapse. Good job! If the pyramid is totally destroyed, you have “won” the game. This is meant to be a simple game, so it does not include points. The game ends when you “win”. It is a single player game. The only rule is you cannot stack your cups in a formation other than a pyramid. You can play indoors or outdoors, but you many break something or someone if you play indoors. Hopefully these instructions were detailed enough for you. I’m sorry if you still don’t understand this game. Honestly I wouldn’t want to play this game either.