This summer, I worked with a small group of homeschool kids in a weekly writing class. We explored fiction writing including story elements and the hero’s journey. The goal was to develop a protagonist and antagonist, outline a story line including setting, characters, plot, and problem and resolution. The students then learned about the “hero’s journey”, a narrative that dominates most fiction, and structured their tale around that format. Each student chose one part of their story to stretch out using sensory details to make it more interesting. The writers were of all different abilities and had varying experience with fiction writing. Each student was immensely proud of his story! The following is written by Lucas.
Doggon
by Lucas
Doggon is a happy dog. He has normal dog hobbies like chasing squirrels and eating treats. You know, normal dog stuff. Overall, Doggon is a good boy, which is a good thing because his biggest fear is being called a “bad boy”. But then he heard on the news that someone named Kat was turning everyone into kittens. Why would Kat do this?? Because she wanted to be the Supreme Ruler of the World.
As soon as Doggon heard this horrific news he tried to ignore it, but then when his owner Joe came home he said Doggon could do it. Doggon refused but then he thought that if he didn’t it might mean no more Joe! So then he ran through his doggy door filled with courage and began looking for this Kat hideout. After hours of seeing what felt like the same exact buildings and the same exact pavement, his paws were hurting more than ever. He was tired. He held the urge to raid a corner store. Then he finally found some useful information. Also, some delicious dog food but that’s for another story! Kat lived on Nowhere Street in the basement of her grandmother’s house. Interestingly, this was only one street over from Doggon’s house.
Doggon saw SO much smoke and gas. Then he attempted to go into Kat’s hideout head first, hoping that charging in would be enough of a surprise to work. Sadly, within the first few seconds, Doggon was kicked out by the guards Kat had stationed around her headquarters.
But Doggon was not a goner yet! He was thinking for hours that night and came up with a plan. First, he would sneak in past the guards by going in through a backyard window which, surprisingly, was open. Then he found the key to Kat’s hideout in the basement and burst through the door.
Now he stood face to face with Kat’s cat and fought as hard as he could and not surprisingly, lost.
But he was not done yet. He trained for days and finally brought up the hope to try again.
He snuck in once again and fought and fought as hard as he could. Somehow the training paid off. So Doggon headed home about 20 minutes later. Joe came home. Doggon was a hero!
3 Years later
Doggon was so popular, he had fans across the globe in New York, Tokyo, and Seattle. It was amazing! But there were some downsides. About two and a bit years ago Doggon defeated Kat. She was pretty tough, but he handled it. But after everything changed, Kat’s grandma just so happened to see Doggon just beat her granddaughter so she got pretty mad. She called Kat’s dad and he just so happens to be guardian of space so Doggon had to beat him now, which was not easy. Somehow Doggon found Kat’s father’s wife and she was mean too so now it was two gods vs one dog. Things weren’t in Doggon’s favor but somehow he remembered that for his 5th birthday, Joe had given him a laser pointer. I think you know what’s next. He used it and made them fly into the sun.
:)THE END:)
Or is it??