Freaking out about creative (1 Viewer)

[cbaldilocks]

I get massively mixed feedback.

I have 3 English teachers (adv, ext 1, ext 2) who all have completely different feedback. My advanced teacher tells me that I don't write a short story, I write an small section of a novel. My extension teacher says it doesn't need to have a full storyline as long as it conveys belonging, and my ext 2 teacher says don't do anything that's even slightly cliché, the markers are bored out of their minds.

Do they really expect 17-18 year olds to suddenly have these brand new original stories that have never been done before. What is everyone else basing theirs on?

(don't give it away of course just conceptually, as in are you doing it on immigration or adoption or something..)

Welcome to my HSC eve freakout

 

[Crobat]

I get massively mixed feedback.

I have 3 English teachers (adv, ext 1, ext 2) who all have completely different feedback. My advanced teacher tells me that I don't write a short story, I write an small section of a novel. My extension teacher says it doesn't need to have a full storyline as long as it conveys belonging, and my ext 2 teacher says don't do anything that's even slightly cliché, the markers are bored out of their minds.

Do they really expect 17-18 year olds to suddenly have these brand new original stories that have never been done before. What is everyone else basing theirs on?

(don't give it away of course just conceptually, as in are you doing it on immigration or adoption or something..)

Welcome to my HSC eve freakout

Firstly none of those things are mixed feedback - your advanced teacher and extension 1 teacher are saying more or less the same thing and your extension 2 teacher is expanding on that by telling you how to get a good mark.

And no. All they expect is for you to not write a cliché and shallow "I don't fit in at school", "I love my best friend's girlfriend", "I moved suburbs and have no friends", etc, etc story. Plenty of students are capable of doing this.

I based mine in the year like 2050 when the human race had figured out a way of achieving immortality by transferring their consciousness to holographic bodies and lost the ability to physically touch one another. The narrator was Death, who had lost his purpose.

Conceptually, the easiest way to avoid cliché is to not do something that involves a new experience which at first is shit for the protagonist and then after some time it gets better - that's exactly what EVERYONE does and it's something that you see a lot of.

It's better to do something where the belonging is a subtle concept and isn't blatantly about someone who doesn't fit in or doesn't have the love of their life or something like that. I'm pretty sure I did a guide about this and I touched on how to write a good belonging creative (I think, can't remember because I did so long ago). You might find some more advice in there.

 

[cbaldilocks]

Firstly none of those things are mixed feedback - your advanced teacher and extension 1 teacher are saying more or less the same thing and your extension 2 teacher is expanding on that by telling you how to get a good mark.

And no. All they expect is for you to not write a cliché and shallow "I don't fit in at school", "I love my best friend's girlfriend", "I moved suburbs and have no friends", etc, etc story. Plenty of students are capable of doing this.

I based mine in the year like 2050 when the human race had figured out a way of achieving immortality by transferring their consciousness to holographic bodies and lost the ability to physically touch one another. The narrator was Death, who had lost his purpose.

Conceptually, the easiest way to avoid cliché is to not do something that involves a new experience which at first is shit for the protagonist and then after some time it gets better - that's exactly what EVERYONE does and it's something that you see a lot of.

It's better to do something where the belonging is a subtle concept and isn't blatantly about someone who doesn't fit in or doesn't have the love of their life or something like that. I'm pretty sure I did a guide about this and I touched on how to write a good belonging creative (I think, can't remember because I did so long ago). You might find some more advice in there.

That is an awesome story line. I would read that book.

Yeah most of the kids at my school have got the typical bullying/abuse/immigration storylines going on. And I have struggled far more with an original idea for belonging than I have with my Extension creative.

I'll have a look for this guide. Thanks!

 

[ClaudzSquiggle]

I based mine in the year like 2050 when the human race had figured out a way of achieving immortality by transferring their consciousness to holographic bodies and lost the ability to physically touch one another. The narrator was Death, who had lost his purpose.

Huh. I was told not to do sci-fi or romance. Instead, we were told we could write about things such as family conflict and such, as long as we did it with humour and pathos. My story is a refugee story, but it has a fairly unusual writing style which makes it more unique.

I did English coaching briefly, and my tutor told me not to over-think the creative as belonging has been done for five years. Every concept is done to death.

 

[ClaudzSquiggle]

Oh, and avoid teenage angst like the plague.

 

[Crobat]

Huh. I was told not to do sci-fi or romance. Instead, we were told we could write about things such as family conflict and such, as long as we did it with humour and pathos. My story is a refugee story, but it has a fairly unusual writing style which makes it more unique.

I did English coaching briefly, and my tutor told me not to over-think the creative as belonging has been done for five years. Every concept is done to death.

Generally if the focus of your story is still on Belonging and the other features of the genre doesn't detract from this it should be more or less fine. The only genre I'd rule out is romance since it never goes anywhere except that one predictable place.

 

[ClaudzSquiggle]

Generally if the focus of your story is still on Belonging and the other features of the genre doesn't detract from this it should be more or less fine. The only genre I'd rule out is romance since it never goes anywhere except that one predictable place.

Well, I'm not going to contradict you because i know you've already done amazingly in English

 

[BLIT2014]

Factory

 

[Rhinoz8142]

"how about an individual not actually knowing his roots, like he has no knowledge where he came from. But when he dose, he dosent feel comfortable and cannot make connection to this place, thus saying he dosent belong. "

This is an idea on how my creative gonna be like. I understand it a bit cliche but it comes my actual experience which will help me in creating the piece.

 

[Sambam429]

You can always flip the question and talk about not belonging?

 

[cbaldilocks]

You can always flip the question and talk about not belonging?

I think a lot of people end up going with not belonging. To be honest I probably will, we are supposed to be showing a change in sense of belonging in a sense anyway. So its either from belonging to alienation, or from alienation to belonging.

 

[Chocolatebubble]

Oh, and avoid teenage angst like the plague.

YOU, MAKE ME FEEL LIKE GIVING UP
TEEN-AGE ANGST, LINKIN PARK TURNS ME ON

im sorry.

Back on topic, I think belonging and not belonging goes hand in hand. You can always write both, and I don't mean the whole "hur dur back in my OLD town i had tons of frens" but maybe write from the perspective of the typical 'excluder' you know? So instead of immigrants, you write as the racist hick

 

[ClaudzSquiggle]

YOU, MAKE ME FEEL LIKE GIVING UP
TEEN-AGE ANGST, LINKIN PARK TURNS ME ON

DAMMIT MAN, random bullish*t teenage angst is what I do when I'm not HSCing! Can't let it infiltrate every aspect of my life!

Back on topic,

I think the problem with alienation is that it may restrict your options when writing. What if you get a happy quote or picture for your stimulus?

 

[cbaldilocks]

DAMMIT MAN, random bullish*t teenage angst is what I do when I'm not HSCing! Can't let it infiltrate every aspect of my life!

Back on topic,

I think the problem with alienation is that it may restrict your options when writing. What if you get a happy quote or picture for your stimulus?

I myself harness the powers of teenage angst. I can make a picture of anything seem sad. It's my only talent.

 

[Chocolatebubble]

I think the problem with alienation is that it may restrict your options when writing. What if you get a happy quote or picture for your stimulus?

happy hicks and sad migrants

make it ironic