Yes, I said publish.

It is time to reboot the NaNoWriMo adventure.

At the end of November, we put our novels aside.

Most of us (the kids and me too) were not finished.

A handful kept writing.

Most of us (the kids and me too) did not.

But we are returning to this grand experiment.

I guess it would make sense to call this Part 2.

Students will finish their novels, revise them, and publish them.

I knew most hadn't finished, so we conducted are initial revisit last week.

Everyone had to reread their novels and answer some questions.

This allowed them to draw their own conclusions...

most of which were pretty negative.

A majority of students discovered/remembered that they hadn't ever finished.

A number were disappointed by the number of errors riddling their writing.

Some few were pleasantly surprised, though still not satisfied.

One or two begged for permission to start over.


Almost everyone wants to work more on their stories before we publish.

Yes, I said publish.

Amazing what realizing others will see their work does for motivation.

I had them create accounts on Storybird before we began.

This way, they got to see for themselves what publication will mean for them.

Storybird is perfect for this project for a few reasons.

First, kids get to see a huge number of completed and in progress stories on the site.

Second, they get to find and use artwork to accentuate their work.

Third, the site will allow me to turn this project into a fundraiser with almost no effort.

The timing worked out beautifully.

The same week students revisited their novels and I introduced Storybird, was also parent teacher conferences.

So I got to tell parents all about what we will be up to.

It is super exciting.

I love how invested students are becoming.

And it is a personal challenge too.

I never finished my novel.

I wrote about 35,000 words and I have a strong beginning and part of a middle.

But there is nothing that even hints toward the end yet.

Actually, I thought I lost about 10,000 words the other day.

The level of crazy that engendered surprised me.

Thankfully, I found it.

One of my goals this spring break was to write more.

I sort of did that--I wrote an outline and about 3,000 words.

It would be nice if that made me feel like I was any closer to the end.

But, nah.

I guess I should go do that instead of writing more blog posts...

My students and I have a long way to go.

We are also excited, nervous, overwhelmed, and motivated.

NaNoWriMo continues to be a good thing.