OHCA students do writing project

PARIS — The high school students of Oxford Hills Christian Academy and their English teacher, Michelle Wheeler, are participating in NaNoWriMo this month. NaNoWriMo, which stands for National Novel Writing Month, is a nationwide novel writing endeavor – “30 days and nights of literary abandon.”

Adult participants must attempt a 50,000 word goal, but the Young Writers Program allows students to set their own goals. Of the 21 participants, nine have set goals of 45,000 words or more!

They kicked off the beginning of NaNoWriMo with a party on November 1, culminating a month of preparation for how to write a novel. The participants have until midnight on November 30 to meet their word count goals.

They plan to return to their novels in January to begin the hard work of editing for publication. Right now, the students are spending all their class time typing furiously, working towards their daily word count goals and working their way through “The Hero’s Journey” of plot development.

The collective word count goal for the entire high school is 857,000 words in 30 days.