Quilt Story

Yesterday I spent the morning in one of the fifth grade classes at YG's school, helping the class create a round-robin story about a quilt they're making together. Last year's "quilt story" was about an magic sewing machine which enchanted an old man into making a magic quilt, which then took him on a world tour. This year they decided it would be a horror story. The classroom is set up by tables, with four kids per table; over the course of the morning I met with each table and helped them create a paragraph of the story. The teacher wanted us to emphasize "figurative language"--metaphors, similes, hyperbole--but I tediously focus on logic and a plot-line, which is not easy under these circumstances. A lot of the kids wanted to insert stuff from movies and TV (and were a little surprised when I called them on it: "Then the girl says, 'I will vanquish you!'" one girl dictated. "Whoa. We're not writing Charmed here," I said. "You watch Charmed??!!" Busted, kid). My job was really to make the story flow from one group's paragraph to the next, and to try to get them to think in terms of the consequences of the plot. In the first paragraph we met "a cute couple who were thirteen," and rejoice in the names Ryan and Jasmine. His friends hate her; her friends hate him. Jasmine falls under the spell of a magic soul-sucking quilt which transports her to another dimension. Ryan has to rescue her, which he does, with a pair of antique golden scissors. There's a secondary evil store clerk, and at the end Ryan and Jasmine's friends come to appreciate their buddy's pash, and they all pair off and live happily ever after.

The final story will be put up on a poster next to the quilt, on display at the Book Fair in May. They all seemed very pleased with the final project.