Challenge Accepted: Eighth Graders Writing Entire Novels in November

Shhhh! Authors at work!

The eighth-grade students at Somers Middle School (SMS) are crafting their own novels for National Novel Writing Month, a 30-day challenge that comes each November. Intended to immerse them in writing, the project has inspired a wide range of stories about ghosts, football players, a dystopian society and more.

Student Elizabeth Spano, whose novel Decisions in the Dark is about a girl who awakens from a coma, said the writing can be intimidating – until you dive into it.

“I start writing and I get ideas and it gets easier,” she said. “It gets better.”

Often called NaNoWriMo – or just NaNo – the project engages 100,000s writers and budding authors around the world to write their novels entirely within November.

"This experience provides students the opportunity to hone their writing skills while creating authentic stories that they want to tell," said SMS teacher Kirstin Reynolds, who leads the project with teacher Tricia Baldes.

Those stories include Forever Sixteen by Emily Martin, about a ghost and her best friend solving a mystery. Casey Johns is writing a story about a girl looking for her missing mother. Adrian Sinanaj is writing about a football player who hits a rough patch.

“He’s going to learn how to get over it and then he’s going to the championship and will win,” he said.

Students began by writing for 20 minutes, then using the number of words they produced to calculate their goal for the month, whether it was 5,000 words, 10,000 words or more. They will strive to write for 500 minutes combining time spent writing in class and at home. Halfway through the month – that’s now – they’ll check their progress and reevaluate their goals.

They’ll wrap up with awards ceremonies in their classrooms. Later, the classes will join for a celebration in the library where students will read excerpts of each other’s novels. They will be graded not on their word count but on how well they applied skills taught along the way, such as “showing versus telling,” use of strong verbs, figurative language and more.

"Part of our New York State Standards calls for narrative writing, and this unit gives students the freedom to set goals, choose from a variety of genres, and learn how to tell a story,” Baldes said. “We often remind students that the skills they are learning here should be applied as they write elsewhere.”

Student Leo Mundis, whose novel The Ghost of the Revolution is about a dystopian, post-feudal society descending into oligarchy, saw the benefits that can be reaped from the project.

“It stimulates them more than just reading or studying other books,” he said.