Three Ideas

1.  You need to find yourself
2. You need to use your time well while you are in high school
3. Learn from what happens

They Say, I Say 2

They Say, I Say

            Adults might say that teens have all the time in the world to do what they want or to become the person that they want. That teens are these crazy beasts that do whatever they want, whenever they want, just because they can. They see this new generation of people as kids who are lazy and just sit around getting drunk and/or high on the weekends and then they do nothing during the week except skip class. There is a huge gap between this newer generation and the last one, and an even bigger gap between the one before that. The millennials are seen as childish and greedy and kids that get handed anything that they ask for. Isn’t that expected though?

            Angela Avery, a licensed professional in counseling for marriage and family and a trained therapist, states some interesting things that give insight on why teens act the way they do. She has a great metaphor for this all. “Would you work a highly demanding, fast-paced job Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., take a small break, then work another job that requires intense focus both mentally and physically from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m.? Let’s say the pay sucked. Advancement was dependent on performance, and your coworkers were sometimes enemies. In addition, you had only 20 minutes to eat lunch in a loud, chaotic environment. Sound appealing? I didn’t think so. But yet we ask our children to do it. Welcome to high school 2015” (8 Ways Parents Can Help Teens with Academic Overwhelm). What this does is compare a regular high school student to that of an adult that has to work two jobs. What it shows is that teens these days have no time for themselves. Between having to be at school for 6-7 hours a day, not including if a student has any curricular activities, then having to go to a part time job so that they have money for the college that they so desperately need to go to in order to better their future, they have no time to discover who they really are or to enjoy life as a teen. Then on top of all of that stress, there is homework that they need to worry about. It’s no wonder that teens these days are depressed.

            I say that I can see where both of these things come from. Yes, this generation is very different from the previous ones, but what can you expect? No one works for anything anymore. It is just given to them without having to put any work forth. Yes, there is a lot on teen’s plates with everything that goes on in their lives. Teens think that they can’t figure out what they want to be or who they want to be, but I think that is a false statement. Through all this struggle and criticism from others is where you find yourself. You think you don’t have enough time? It’s how you react to that that makes you who you are and defines you. You think that taking the easy way out is the best way? That is also a defining factor. You find yourself in what you do that the struggles you endure. It’s no wonder why older generations see us the way they do.

4/17

This weekend I decided that it was best for my project to start a mentorship with someone. That someone is the mother of my dear friend James, Terra Tolly. Terra is an up and coming author, something that I will hopefully be one day. I had James set it up for me since it was the most convenient way (hence the lack of proof).  I decided on wanting Mrs. Tolly to do it because she is just starting her writing career. I felt that that was one way that I could connect with her and that maybe she could see things from my point of view. What I was surprised about was how fast she accepted being a mentor for me and how willing she was to do so. This mentorship will hopefully push me into the next part of my project, getting into the writing. I can’t wait to hear what advice Mrs. Tolly will have for me and can’t wait to learn more about being an up and coming author.

(Will post conversation between me and Mrs. Tolly when we  officially meet.)

3/23

As of right now my 20 time is my first attempt at starting a novel. I at first thought that I was going to be able to finish it, but with the research that I conducted, I found out that I would basically have to drop out of school in order to finish it before the school year is up. So, that was out of the question. I had to change it to getting the first couple of steps done in the process to making the novel. I did this because each step takes a while and I'm just getting to the character development step which will take up a lot of time. What I am changing it to is being able to get through the character development, the prologue and maybe two or three chapters. I know that this is a huge step down from what I wanted to do, but as of right now, it's really the only logical thing that I can do.

One Pager

People might say that teenagers can’t make a quality piece of writing.  That they don’t have the maturity to stay on one topic long enough to make a novel that is something worth reading.  A lot goes into making a novel. Time, which it seems that teenagers have none of.  Commitment, which teens seem to lack because they can’t even stay in an activity long enough to see it though.  Effort, kids these days can’t even keep good grades let along write 300+ pages on one topic.  Desire and creativity, which also isn’t promising considering the most creative teens get is how to hold their phone in bed to keep it from falling on their faces.  From the things that society thinks about this newest generation of teens, all of these are not traits that we as a collective group do not have, therefore, cannot make a good piece of writing, let alone a novel.  Well, there are ways that these people can be proven wrong.

            Writing takes more than just creativity, it takes structure.  “Good fiction doesn’t just happen, it is designed,” States Randy Ingermanson, a theoretical physicist and award winning author of six novels.  He has come up with a method that he calls “the Snowflake Metaphor.”  What this means is you start out small, but as you add and add, your story will start to take shape, just like a snowflake.  He came up with this method while he was still an architect designer.  He said that writing a novel was no different. You have to start with a good base to build on, and as you add more structure, you can start to focus on the little details.  This whole method that he uses is a process of 10 steps. In each one, he focuses on a major part in writing a novel.  Each step is important, if you skip one, you might just leave out a major part of your story.  He also highlights the fact that each step takes time, some of them, he states, might take weeks to do.  The first step alone, creating a one sentence summary of the novel, should take about an hour to do.  All of this has been said to help out new writers with creating their first novel.

            I think that what Ingermanson has done with this snowflake method is pure genius.   I myself have been struggling with getting my first novel up and running.  I had the creativity, I had the desire, but what I didn’t have was structure.  I didn’t know how to start.  I thought that all you had to do was start writing and a story will magically flow out your fingertips.  In short, I was wrong.  Before I found this, I came up with the notion that if you were to start planning out a novel, you had to start with the character development.  I found out that it was a step in Ingermanson method, but it was the third step. I found out that you have to first make a summary of your story.  Knowing what your story is about and how it starts and ends will help you with the development of your characters.  Also, if I wouldn’t have found this method, I wouldn’t have found out how much time it takes to plan out and write a novel.  When people say that teenagers don’t have enough time to write a novel, they are right.  I assume for this reason alone; you don’t see many teenagers putting out any award winning books.  If I am to write my novel, the hardest thing for me to do is find the time to do it. I have a method I can use for structure, I have the desire to finally write my first novel, I have the idea and the creativity for it. All I need is time.

Week 3 2/23

Questions

What are different ways to start writing a novel?


How to properly do a character development


How to keep a plotline going


What makes a story worth reading?
How did others get so good at writing books?

Checking in

Brandon:

I'm glad you are choosing something about which you are passionate. I think you'll find that generating "good" writing is hard no matter whether it is a short story or a developed novel although one may be more time consuming than the other.

Some things to consider:
-who can be a good mentor or reference for you?
-how will you stay organized (start with the end? develop a short story into a novel? go for it and see how it develops?)
-who is someone who might be able to give you solid advice as you move into editing?

Can't wait to see what you come up with!

Week 2 2/10

Week 1 2/2

Proposal:

What I would like to do for my 20-Time Project is to write my first novel. People have said that I should try a novella instead since it wouldn't be as hard or as long. I have decided against it because I want to strive for the thing that I have been putting off for too long. I think that I could be able to change my goal as well. It was originally to have a complete novel and to be in the process of or have it published, or to turn it into something like Kennedy's Plain Brown Wrapper. I have decided to change it to having it at least 50% finished by the end of the semester.  That way I would have it on the way to being finished and if I was at that point at the end of the year, I would still be motivated to do it and not just push it off.