Every Tuesday in April, Raether Library Assistant Becci Marzonie hosted 32 Middle and Upper School students for Camp NaNoWriMo. Participants could be found sipping hot cocoa, sharing character development Pinterest boards, and debating whether Vlad or Kage was the best villain name for their story.
NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month. This month-long event originally started back in 1999 as a challenge among a group of friends to write a 50,000-word first draft of a novel. This might be a daunting task for some or a happily accepted challenge for others. (Fun fact: without NaNoWriMo, we may not have books such as Water for Elephants, WOOL or Fangirl!) Now, NaNoWriMo happens twice a year, in November and April. November is a time to write like crazy with that 50,000 word goal in mind. April is a time to loosen up a bit with Camp NaNoWriMo, which invites participants to work on any creative project they choose, not just a novel. At Colorado Academy, the curious, creative, and adventurous students don’t seem at all intimidated by the NaNoWriMo challenges—they dive in head first!
This April, students could have chosen from an endless number of creative projects; however, the majority of the 23 Middle School and nine Upper School student participants chose to dedicate their Camp NaNoWriMo time to the craft of writing. Working on individual or collaborative pieces, students bonded through the common challenge presented by Camp NaNoWriMo—to be creative. Eleventh Grader Adie Williams finished a 24-hour Play Project during the first day of Camp NaNoWriMo. Seventh Graders Layne Ballenger and Kate Freeman collaborated on a Girl Power Fantasy novel. Eleventh Grader Helen Blake wrote steadily for a REDI Lab novel project. A Sixth Grade team of four students, Kobe Glesser, Leela Fergeson, Sophie Cox, and Peter Hedstrom, teamed up on what is sure to be an epic dystopian novel!
We would be remiss if we did not mention one of CA’s Seniors, Jordan Davidson. Jordan’s enthusiasm for writing is contagious, and she has inspired many other students to participate in NaNoWriMo over the last few years. In her time with NaNoWriMo, Jordan has written approximately 200,000 words for several novels in many genres: dystopian, urban fantasy, epic fantasy, middle grade and young adult fantasy, and to top it off, supernatural murder mystery. CA’s NaNoWriMo group will truly miss Jordan, and we all look forward to reading some of her bestsellers in the near future!
Tune in next November to see what CA’s Middle and Upper School students are writing for NaNoWriMo.