A Pirate's Guide t' th' Grammar of Story

A Creative Writing Curriculum

In this independently used, consumable workbook, an interactive, fun-loving pirate story teaches students the basic elements of a story.


Product Details:

Credentials: Written by a story designer with over a decade of experience training creative story professionals. 
Engaging: Not boring or dry but captivating—students want to do the work. 
Educational: While fun, the material is not fluff. This is a serious curriculum that teaches the fundamental building blocks—the grammar—of a story. It builds creativity, improves imagination, and develops the storytelling skills that are of increasing value in today's world. 
Progressive Exercises: The exercises are designed to lead a student, step-by-step, to an understanding of each topic. Students learn by doing. 
Teacher Friendly: This simple to facilitate curriculum was designed for students to work through independently, at their own pace. The teacher's role is to oversee the process, to encourage and support, and most of all to listen to the creativity that comes out of their students.
Course of Study: Flexible. Can be used as a single semester or year long course. Most use this as a stand alone elective, for others it complements a non-fiction writing course. Satisfies several Common Core requirements. 
Age: 11 and up can use this workbook independently. Age 8-11 may require additional parent or teacher support.
Results: The lessons and exercises will build your student’s confidence to tell stories of their own.



Introducing A NEW Creative Writing Curriculum

The homeschooling community has a big need for an independently used creative writing curriculum. A Pirate's Guide t' th' Grammar of Story, written by a professional story designer, is a practical and engaging resource written for Junior High and High School students.

Many students are eager to tell stories, but lack instruction. Many parents don’t teach creative writing because they don’t know where to begin. This consumable workbook was designed to be easy to use and does not require anything of the parent except to simply encourage their children's creativity.

Workbook author Chris Hansen has over a decade of story designing experience, training filmmakers and novelists. He took the material he uses with professionals and simplified it for students. But, as someone who works with creative people, he could not produce something dry and boring. So he crafted a story of pirates, talking monkeys, and magical jelly beans which is layered into the exercises in order to keep students engaged and provide an interactive model of the lessons.

The material has been well tested, not only by professionals, but by homeschoolers themselves. The curriculum was taught and revised repeatedly over two years in homeschool co-op classes and individual homes. The final version was published in the spring of 2016.

The response we’ve had from the kids who have worked through it has been enthusiastic. We knew we had a treasure when students didn’t want English class to end!