Green Writing Competition in conjunction with Thomson Reuters

Welcome to the Calder High School Green Writing Competition 2017

Q: What is the Green Writing Competition? A: This is a competition run annually by Calder High school in conjunction with Thompson Reuters that encourages students to think about the environment and how we can help to make our community a better place. This year we have cash prizes again and are very lucky that the award winning author, Melvin Burgess, is coming in to school to present the prizes! This is a wonderful opportunity for you to meet him, talk to him about your work and maybe win a cash prize!

Prizes!!! FIRST PLACE £25 SECOND PLACE £15 THIRD PLACE £10.

RULES Produce a creative piece of writing in any form on the chosen topic for this year. No more than 500 words in length This year, the theme is: Positive actions and innovations to prevent local or global flooding

What can be done to make sure that we don’t have scenes like this in our local area again?

For your homework, you were asked to research positive solutions and innovations to prevent local or global flooding. Did you find any of these ideas? These are just a few strategies that can hopefully help to reduce flooding both locally and around the world. Introduce better flood warning systems Modify homes and businesses to help them withstand floods Construct buildings above flood levels Tackle climate change Increase spending on flood defences Protect wetlands and introduce plant trees strategically Restore rivers to their natural courses Introduce water storage areas Improve soil conditions Put up more flood barriers

During your English lessons this week, you will each create your own piece of creative writing to enter into the competition. You should already have done your research so be ready to start planning your writing today. In Lesson 1 (today) you should plan your ideas for your entry. In Lesson 2, you will create your entry. In Lesson 3, you will get peer assessment and feedback then have time to refine and improve your work. Authors draft and redraft all the time. This is a really important part of the writing process so use your GREEN pen improvement time well! In Lesson 4 you can celebrate your work by sharing ideas and presenting your work to the class. You will then hand your entries to your English teacher. We will then send the best entries to Thomson Reuters who will shortlist 5 entries. Good luck!

Planning your ideas It is up to you how you plan your ideas. You probably have lots of ideas now that you have done your research. How can you turn this into a fabulous entry to the Green Writing Competition that will possibly win you a prize?

Positive actions and innovations to prevent local or global flooding Would you like to write a short story on how somebody used positive actions and innovations to prevent local or global flooding? Is descriptive writing a better way for you to create your competition entry? Perhaps you would prefer to create a poem? A play? A script? The only rules are that you produce a creative piece of writing in any form on the chosen topic that is no more than 500 words in length. This year, the theme is: Positive actions and innovations to prevent local or global flooding

You could start to plan your ideas like this More needed + louder Flood sirens Climate change Positive actions and innovations to prevent local or global flooding Persuasive speech? Plant trees Raise awareness Have water storage areas You could start to plan your ideas like this

Or like this with words and images

This one is all words. Notice how it has SEVERAL central images (clouds) and the mapper has used arrows to show how the smaller topics are linked to the larger topic.

You can’t see the words on this example, but look at how many branches the mapper has managed to make, all coming out of three original topic branches.

This one makes excellent use of images as well as words This one makes excellent use of images as well as words. It looks a lot more ‘random’ than the others, but may work well as a planning tool for someone who enjoys drawing.

RULES Produce a creative piece of writing in any form on the chosen topic for this year. No more than 500 words in length This year, the theme is: Positive actions and innovations to prevent local or global flooding Good luck!