NaNoWriMo is difficult enough by itself. Once you add in the challenges of working around a very real schedule, the challenge increases exponentially. I started out with a four year losing streak during college and I thought that was hard. Then came full-time occupation and I learned my lesson. Last year was a near miss at 40k words, but it was also the first time I, as a teacher, started looking into the possibility of doing NaNoWriMo along with my students and that opened up a world of possibilities.
I guess I should back up a little. Just over a year ago I moved from my hometown all the way to South Korea to work as a teacher. It means I’m half a world away from my friends and writing buddies. As a foreign teacher here in South Korea, you either teach English at a hagwon (academy) or a normal school. Last year I was the former and NaNoWriMo couldn’t be fitted in. However, I was determined this year to push it through.
What enabled this was my changing jobs to an American style private school. As a homeroom teacher, I had a captive audience every day of thirteen 6th graders in whom I detected a wealth of creativity. So I consulted my supervisor and off I went on my long dreamt about NaNoWriMo adventure.
As a class we spent the last month planning and learning about plot, characters and what makes a book good or bad. They ran their calculations to find out how many words they needed to write each day and signed up on the Young Writer’s Program website. Most are sticking to the novels they planned, but a few are pulling a true NaNoWriMo classic: changing their novels at the last moment.
It’s been a joy to watch them discover the possibilities of NaNoWriMo and to see the bemused delight when they finally realized that, yes, this was their novel—their story to create. This wasn’t some lengthy book report on a book someone else had written. It was creating, not analyzing.
One student was a bit nervous about whether his story was a real novel or not. It’s a fanfiction melding of three different animes and is one of the most creative ideas. I look forward to seeing what he creates under the one rule I gave them: your MC (main character) must be original.
I allowed the students to keep their synopses to themselves for the most part, but a few days ago we created our bulletin board design for NaNoWriMo. Each student created a short description of their novel to tack onto the board next to their word count graphs. Some of these kids blew me away with how creative their designs were. They didn’t just write down the title, genre and other information required; they turned the paper into book poster illustrations. After that little exercise I could feel their excitement growing.
To keep the momentum going, I invited another NaNoWriMo writer to speak as a guest. (Yes, there is one other NaNoer at the school. In fact, I met him last year and that’s what led to my current job, but that’s a story for another time.) The kids loved his presentation and hands were constantly shooting up in the air for questions. I was so proud of them.
But now we are poised upon the start of NaNoWriMo. With Friday being a no-school day, they have been sent home with their first NaNoWriMo homework. Some are a little scared, some want to give up and some are reaching far beyond anything I ever expected of them.
I’m sure, even though this job has long hours and heaping piles of work to be done, that I will cross the finish line with my kids. With all of them. (Or else there will be no pizza party at the end!) I’ll be cheering them on the whole way, but I know all thirteen pairs of eyes are going to be watching me leading the way to 50k. It’s a scary thought, but we can do it together and we’re going to have fun!
Anna Mittower is a teacher living abroad for her second year in South Korea. She’s also a NaNoWriMo veteran who is hoping to win again with yet another sci-fi novel. She can be found online at her blog and on twitter here.
You don't write on the NaNoWriMo site and there's no need to ever put one word of your work up in public anywhere. There is a validation box to get your prize-winnings at the end, but it is instantly deleted, no one reads it, and they encourage you to encrypt your work since it's just about the word count, not the content. Now, if you post on forums, everything you put down, novel-related or not, is now out in the public world wide web for all to see. On the young writer's page, there are no forum options so young writers never need to get mixed up with what information is too much to share.
Your work is always yours, but if YOU choose to file share or post chapters online, that is YOUR choice.
Sorry if this sounds a bit dim but I can't see how contributors to NaNoWriMo are retaining the copyright in their work.
The website says, for example, 'You give the party (the “Account Holder”) who owns the domain name as hosted on the Service in which you post your Content (the “Hosted Area”) a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide, perpetual, irrevocable , fully-sublicensable license to publish and use your Content. In addition to the right to publish, you also grant the Account Holder under said license the following rights, without limitation: (i) the right to reproduce or copy or create derivative works thereof; (ii) the right to transfer, deliver, and sell the Content, which includes the distribution via computer and networks; (iii) the right to edit, modify, adapt, arrange, improve, correct, develop, translate, in all or in part; (iv) the right to update/upgrade by adding or removing; (v) the right to film, perform or post the Content in any media, and (vi) the right to use or incorporate all or any part of the Content in any products or services of the Account Holder (whether or not associated with the Service). Except as described in our Privacy Policy, neither the Company nor any Account Holder will be required to treat any Content as confidential. By posting Content you hereby waive any and all rights to be compensated by UserVoice or any Account Holder for such Content.
In order to operate and improve the Service, the Company needs the right to make certain uses of your Content as well. Therefore, when you post Content in any Hosted Area, you also agree to grant the Company an irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free, fully sublicenseable, non-exclusive license to copy, distribute, sell, publicly display, publicly perform and make derivative works of your Content on the Service and on services affiliated with the Service regardless of the form of media used or of whether such services now exist or are developed in the future.'
Apologies for the long quote, but how does this mean we keep our copyright in our work?
Can you explain please/