ALEXANDRIA, Ind. —
School is out, but amid the clutter of books and boxes lining the hallways and road crews paving the parking lot outside, learning took place at Alexandria High School this summer.
When school let out in May, a select group of Alexandria students arrived home to find invitations to come back to school.
According to Kayla Downey, 80 students were invited to take part in a two-week writing workshop at the school over the summer.
“There was a catch, though,” Downey, 16, noted. “Just 16 spots were available for each camp.”
The camp included eight high school and 15 intermediate school students.
The camp was Alexandria’s first attempt at a writing workshop and teacher consultants for the Indiana Writing Project served as camp instructors.
Ten Alexandria teachers have taken part in this program at Ball State, where they worked intensely for eight hours a day over a four-week period during their summer vacation.
The writing camp was made possible through a grant, and with the help of Ball State University.
Students were given free reign to write what inspired them, according to student participant Athena Holman.
While some chose to write shorter poems and essays, others worked on developing stories that they had been laboring over.
Though many mornings were sporadic, students helped each other peer edit stories, and made collaborative pieces. “Peer editing makes me feel like I’m really helping someone,” said Holman, 16.
“If you were to ask where we wrote, we wouldn’t be able to give you an exact location. To avoid stuffiness and heat, we changed rooms, and we even took a day to capture writing opportunities at the county fair,” Holman said.
Mini-lessons were based around different literary topics such as editing, punctuation, closings and imagery. Unlike a 50-minute class period during a school day, camp lasted three hours, which gave students the time needed to dedicate to their masterpieces, Holman wrote.
Intermediate students worked separately from their high school peers.
“I like to write realistic fiction stories, because I can make the characters do what I want,” 11-year-old Vicki Henkelman said.
Delany Ward, 10, liked learning the mini-lesson over sentence fluency, and Ariane Terry, 11, learned how to begin her stories.
When camp ended, family and friends were gathered to watch a presentation of what was accomplished at the workshop.
“I’m thankful that Vicki (Henkelman) had a chance to write because she loves to write. Every generation loves a good story,” Doug Henkelman, Vicki’s father, said after the camp.
Superintendent Alice Mehaffey was encouraged by the work.
“I was very impressed with how vivid the writing was. My hope is that all of the young writers that participated will step up and be strong writing leaders.”
Alexandria High School students Kayla Downey and Athena Holman worked as student reporters to compose this story for The Herald Bulletin.
Community
Related Photos
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Several high school and intermediate school students attended a writing workshop at Alexandria High School this summer. Submitted photo
Discussion
Young wordsmiths get schooled
Summer workshop focuses on writing in Alexandria
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