Young Authors Conference
Tue, 03/22/2016 - 9:37am
admin
By:
Nicole Riendeau
Northland Community and Technical College in Thief River Falls was the site for a Young Authors Conference for grades 5-8 on March 10, 2016. It was sponsored by the Northwest Service Cooperative. Ten RLCC Elementary students attended including fifth graders MiReya Gibbs, Shawna Majeres, Caleb Nymann, Marin Peterson, Molly Smith, and sixth graders Leah Peterson, Taya Morinville, Erin Sundquist, Zachery Cater, and Jed Duden.
Junior high students who participated were seventh graders Heather Longtin, Jeremy Kruchowski, Morgan Plante, Faith Hanson, and eighth graders Sidney Olson, Natalia Snegireff, Jayden Iverson, Garrett Qualley, and Brandie DeHate. They were accompanied by Mrs. Bobbi Aakhus and Mrs. Andrea Eskeli.
The YAC began with an opening session and each student attended three breakout sessions. Ryan Jacobson was the keynote speaker with his theme Writing Stories in a Three Ring Circus. The circus has it all, lion tamers, trapeze artists, elephants and clowns. He used a circus theme to introduce the main ingredients of a good story.
Jacobson just about became a teacher, and those who have attended his presentations think he should have been. He gets students excited about books. Even though he enjoyed reading and writing, he never thought he would become an author. He has presented at almost 1,000 schools and organizations and special events throughout Minnesota. He lives in Mora, Minnesota, with his wife Lora, sons Jonah and Lucas, and a dog named Boo.
A few of the breakout sessions included Scriptfrenzy which is for the playwright, actor, and anyone who likes to specialize in characters. Snap Chat Author Style is “a picture’s worth a thousand words.” Slip, Slide, and Skate where students listened to stories and then created their own tales with funny twists and details. Imagine Your Wildest Tale focused on using imagination to draw a picture of a unique character to help them discover a interestling secret world only they can write about.
In Writing a Movie Scene, they talked about what a screenplay looks like and what makes it a unique, modern and exciting form of writing. Creating Characters students had to write monologues and scenes inspired by interesting people. Design-A-Sarus showed participants how to draw a dinosaur to warm up the student’s artistic muscle. Spinning Gold from Straw helped them invite gratitude into their lives, “to explore how it shifts our neuroplastic brains, opens their creative channels, and transforms their writing.”
Students who attended learned a lot during the Young Author’s Conference. Many enjoyed the variety of breakout sessions they attended.