Creative Lab: The Jump Start: Playful and Practical Strategies for Breathing Life into the Characters in Your Idling or Abandoned Novel-In-Progress with Phil Bildner

Phil Bildner is the New York Times bestselling author of numerous books for young people including the NCTE Charlotte Huck Award Honor-winning middle grade novel, A High Five for Glenn Burke, the Margaret Wise Brown Prize-winning picture book, Marvelous Cornelius, and the Texas Bluebonnet Award-winning picture book Shoeless Joe & Black Betsy. Phil is also the author of A Whole New Ballgame, Rookie of the Year, Tournament of Champions, and Most Valuable Players in the critically acclaimed middle grade Rip & Red series. His other picture books include Martina & Chrissie, Twenty-One Elephants, The Soccer Fence, and his latest is the biography, Glenn Burke, Game Changer. 

Phil Bildner presenting the Creative Lab: The Jump Start

This creative lab is packed with stories and both paired, team, and individual craft exercises!

The first exercise from author Laurel Snyder, "Pockets" - we're asked to make a bullet point list of what's in our pockets right now. (We do this on index cards.)

Then, we trade index cards with someone else-- and we're told to take two of the items they wrote down, and then we're using them as prompts, answering these two questions:

1) Why does this person/character have these items?

2) How can/will these items move the plot/story forward?

There are so many things you can learn about your characters (and YOU) by inventorying what's in someone's pockets--and why.

There's a real reason the person has those items, you can create an invented reason, and as a third option you can hybridize the two... Phil tells us "so much of writing is experimentation."

Folks around the room share different items that were in their pockets: mini tabasco bottles, rocks, a mailbox key, grains of sand, a candy wrapper, three different lip glosses... 

As Phil explains, you'll looking for that entry point, a connecting point to your own story.

The room is packed, everyone's engaged, and inspiration and insights are flowing...

Phil Bildner: Rocking Your Presentation—How to Wow Your Audience

Phil Bildner, one of the planet's most dynamic humans, has written a whole heap of picture books, including Marvelous Cornelius, Martina & Chrissie, Twenty-One Elephants, The Soccer Fence, and The Hallelujah flight. He also wrote the MG series Rip & Red, and co-created the NYT bestselling MG chapter book series Sluggers.

But that's not all.

A veteran visitor of schools, Phil in 2017 founded The Author Village, a booking service that features dozens of the industry's best authors and illustrators.

He talked to us today about rocking school visits.

He used to teach in New York's public schools and doesn't consider himself a former teacher, but a traveling teacher who brings messages of respect to groups of students all over. Here are just a few of the invaluable bits of advice he gave those of us looking to boost our school visit game.

1. The key to presentations is to get your audience's attention right away.

Look! It's a Philmoji!

"Know your audience or you will have no audience," he said. This means you have to speak their language—not yours.

Once he was in Mitch McConnell country, Kentucky. He wanted to get a feel for who the kids were and he asked them to describe themselves in five words—first choosing six, and then crossing out one.

This helped him set a tone. One of the words he used to describe himself was "queer," because he knew some of the audience members would never have heard an educator describe themselves that way. He was nervous about it. But every kid showed up the second day, and they wanted to know if he'd be back.

Another way to connect with an audience: tell a story. Make yourself human. Show your humor and heart.

If you're an illustrator or painter, DRAW. They will be mesmerized. If you play an instrument, play it. If you can writ poems, recite one. Basically, if you have a trick, bring it out.

2. Request a tech person: Don't be afraid to ask for the tech person's number. Ask for the kind of microphone you like. If you're bringing your own laptop, bring all the adapters and cords. If possible, use the school's equipment. You can't always count on sound or internet connectivity for your presentation. Have backups on the flash drive and the cloud. (The Logitech wireless Presenter R400 is reliable.)

3. Show the behind-the-scenes process. "Your mess is your message." He likes to show sketches and iterations for cover designs, because kids love seeing how an idea evolves and where inspiration comes from. It's also good to show them the kinds of revisions we do, likening the work of editors to the work of teachers.

A rough sketch and edited copy
from Martina & Chrissie by Phil Bildner

Phil Bildner: The ABCs of School Visits

Phil just before his breakout session

Phil Bildner is the author of numerous children’s picture books, including the Margaret Wise Brown Prize-winning Marvelous Cornelius, Martina & Chrissie, Twenty-One Elephants, The Soccer Fence, The Hallelujah Flight, and The Unforgettable Season. He is the author of the Rip & Red middle grade series and he is the co-creator of the New York Times best-selling middle grade chapter book serial, Sluggers. Phil spends much of the year visiting schools around the country conducting writing workshops and talking process with students.

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Phil was a middle school teacher for 11 years, and he says that "I look at my writing as the vehicle that lets me do school visits..." Now, "I look at myself as a traveling teacher."

It's a presentation packed (packed!) with tips, including:

"You have to bring it every day." Some kids will never meet another author, it's you. 

How do you get more school visits?

Ask the PTO person or volunteer, or librarian, or teacher, would you reach out to other schools in your district and invite a representative to come?

Five more tips:

1) You're always the gracious and humble guest.

2) Ask to use the faculty bathroom.

3) Make sure your agreement (note: don't call it a contract) with the school spells out that you're going to be with a representative of the sponsor at all times, that you're never alone with kids.

4) Share picture of yourself as kid and awkward teen. "They love that."

and

5) "Know your worth. Never do a free school visit."

Phil shares his advice on book orders (first thing to try: find a local independent bookstore), contracts (yes, you need one), money (get paid as an independent contractor), virtual visits (how to structure them), and so much more.

Final insight to share in this post:

"A school visit is an in-school field trip."