Chalk + Ink: Episode 77; Season Four Finale: Top Ten Writing Tips

Welcome back to Chalk + Ink: The Podcast for Teachers Who Write and Writers Who Teach. I’m your host Kate Narita, author of 100 Bugs! A Counting Book, former fourth-grade teacher, and future assistant principal.

Yes, you read that right. On June 14th, I ended my eleven-year career as a fourth-grade teacher, and I start my new job as an assistant principal in July. It was quite an adventure balancing teaching, 550 practicum hours, 18 credit hours, and 4 tasks for the state and podcasting this past school year. But with help from higher power, family, colleagues, and friends I managed to pull it off. 

Before I sleep for two weeks, I want to help jumpstart everyone’s writing with the top ten writing tips from this season’s guests. Summer is synonymous with adventure. Each tip in this episode celebrates the fact that unstructured time gives us the opportunity to try something new, meet new people, and/or explore new places or aspects of our craft that we’ve never tried before.

If you reach the end of this episode and you find yourself wanting more, here’s a cool fact. This is Chalk + Ink’s seventy-seventh episode. If you count the weekends, there are the same number of days of summer fun between the last and first day of school. So, if you want, you could enroll yourself in your own free mini MFA and listen to a different Chalk + Ink episode each day this summer. If you do that, be sure to let me know! 

Let’s get started with our summer adventure and dive into this season’s top ten tips.

Alright so you packed up your classroom and you came across your writing binder with all your writing activities and organizers that you asked your students to use. Why not try them yourself like Stacey Mozer? I mean why should the students get to have all the fun. 

Maybe you finished packing up long ago, you’re already in summer mode and you’ve had some time to reflect and you remember a question a student asked you and it turns out it just may unlock the answer you’ve been searching for to make that picture book manuscript just right. That's what happened to René Colato Laínez. 

Or maybe your students challenged you to write something like CK Malone’s students but you just didn’t have the time.  Well, now you have the time. So, start writing and get on with your adventure.

It’s time to get out of the classroom and head to the library and not just because of those overdue books. No matter where you are in your writing journey, your librarians can help you out. Stacey Mozer’s amazing librarians taught her about the writing industry.

Maybe your librarians haven’t participated in ALA award committees, no worries. You still want to develop a relationship with them because they’re awesome, they’re a font of knowledge and if you’re lucky like Hà Dinh, they’ll help you promote your book.

No matter where you go on your summer adventures, remember to write from a personal place. Veera Hiranandani and Ruth Behar talk about how the characters in their books reflect the broad range of people who have inhabited their lives. 

Meanwhile, Janelle Harper talks about how if you don’t see mirrors of yourself and your neighborhood in books, it’s up to you to create those mirrors.

So how do you write from a personal place? Mine your memory moments. Listen to Hà Dinh talk about how she worked hard to unveil layers of complex feelings in Where the Wildflowers Grow.

Maybe you feel like you don’t have more moments to mine. If that’s the case, look at the everyday objects around you and observe your loved ones. An idea just might appear right before your eyes. That’s what happened to Chloe Ito Ward.

Travel somewhere new. If you’re like Tina M. Cho or Jyoti Rajan Gopal, you may just meet someone new to write about. 

Or take a page out of MK Smith Despres' book and go on a writing retreat.

The truth is you don’t have to travel to go somewhere new. Sometimes, you just need to dive deep inside a book or deep inside your character to uncover novel places. H.M. Bouwman talks about tuning into her characters’ interiority while revising.

So, how do you know where to start? Listen to Kristy Acevedo talk about how she decides which scenes to write. 

Sometimes less is more. Jen Gennari cites two revision books she thinks all authors should have and then she talks about how she had to cut in order to dive deeper into her main character’s interiority.

Still feeling stuck? Take a walk outside to clear your mind. That’s what MK Smith Despres does.

​But don’t wait till you’re stuck to get outside. Listen to Susan Edwards Richmond explain how nature is a treasure hunt.

Maybe you have little kids at home, and you’re going to have less time to write in the summer than you did during the school year when your kids were in school. If that’s the case, remember to write in the nooks and crannies like Brooke Hartman and Andrew Hacket. Brooke uses the time for marketing.

Meanwhile, Andrew uses the time to peruse manuscripts to figure out why they’re not selling. This is a genius idea, and I can’t wait to try it.

Put copies of all your finished manuscripts in a bag and keep it in your car. That way whenever you have an extra ten minutes here or there, you might just find a solution you didn’t know you were looking for.

When Tom Bober and Gita Varadarajan take advantage of residencies and classes, they make sure to look for collaborative partners as well.

Listen to Tom Bober for tips about collaborating during the editing process.

Then, Gita Varadarajan talks about collaborating while creating.

So you’ve traveled, walked outside, read books, visited art museums, written in the nooks and crannies of the day, and you’re still stuck. What to do?

Do what Andrew Hacket does and celebrate others.

Be patient and remember Kristy Acevedo's observation that writing is like painting and requires multiple layers.

Finally, never forget CK Malone's wise words that you will succeed.

I’m signing off for the summer to focus on revising. I know this episode has me ready to write, and I hope it’s done the same for you, too. If it has, please be sure to share this episode with someone who could use it, and remember to write a review. If you want an amazing giveaway from one of these authors like a critique, classroom  visit, or a book. Leave a comment below.
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Thanks everyone! I'll be back at the end of August. Until then, take care. Bye.