how to

My 12 year old daughter, a diligent writer as well as being over 600 drawings into an animated cartoon she's putting together in iMovie, recently showed me this bit of writing advice she devised for herself. I found it to be so compact and thorough that I wanted to share it.

1. Figure out what you like. Write about what you like most.

2. Think up the setting.

3. Get the main characters. Your story would be especially interesting with a hero or two, and a villain.

4. Remember three things: Beginning, Middle, and End.

5. Imagine your story. Relate it to something important to you in your life. It could be the fact that you don’t fit in. Have the main character someone who is special and is left out because of this.

6. Eat some pie.

7. Begin to write the basic summary. This will help you get ideas.

8. When finished, begin putting the meat on the bones. (a.k.a: START WRITING!!!!)

9. Put in a lot of details.

10. When you’re done, you can ANIMATE IT!!