School Visits

I've visited over 50 schools since Taken by Storm's debut and am always eager to meet more students. I'll never forget the professional writers who shared their craft with me as a teenager. I love giving back. I understand a school's budgetary limits and often donate my services to schools with limited PTA support. I've developed programming for students from kindergarten through advanced high school classes. I can easily adapt from special needs students to college-bound seniors. Ninth graders don't scare me. I love getting up-close-and-personal with students in hands-on classroom workshops but am comfortable in an auditorium, too. I have a MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Vermont College of Fine Arts and a BA in English from Brigham Young University. Contact me to schedule a visit.

Newsflash: I'm working on new middle grade projects and am on the prowl for 4th-6th grade classes to get feedback from. I will include a free poetry or writing workshop with the visit. Skype or in person!

For High Schools and Junior Highs

Free Skype Visits for Classes and Book Clubs

I'm always happy to speak with classes or clubs online about writing or any of my novels. Informal Q&A works best.

Taken by Storm is one of the few novels available that features an authentic Mormon teen unmarred by an author's prejudice or ignorance. Leesie presents a Mormon point-of-view, and Michael provides a contrasting view of someone with no religious background.

If you'd like to purchase paperback copies for your classroom, please contact me, and I can arrange a discount through Penguin or Amazon. (I plan to hold a classroom set giveaway on my Cayman Summer Blog in conjunction with NCTE, October 2012.)

If your students are using ebooks, they can download Taken by Storm for $0.99 during special promotions or less with a coupon. I can provide a free sample ebook for your review.

I'm happy to answer your students' questions via email or Skype visit. Contact me.

Bones Blood and Flesh: A Conversation

Your words--
Why do they define me?
Why do I believe you?
Your face,
Your lips, and your fingers--
Don't spill them on me.
I'm bones blood and flesh
Not clay to be pounded,
And scorched in the fire
That seethes in the hate you feel.
I bleed when you wound me
Just like the pretty girls do.
(p. 6, Sing me to Sleep)

I don't hold a psych degree or counseling certificate, but I am an expert on getting teens to pour their guts onto the page. This conversation involves everyone--the bullied, bullies, and bystanders. I read a brutal bullying scene from my award-winning YA novel, Sing me to Sleep, get students to free-write their own experiences, and encourage them to share. I spill my own high school harassment that I fictionalized in Taken by Storm. In my novel, I added a big difference: a hero. I challenge students to be the hero in their school, today. Moving. Unforgettable. Your students like you've never seen them before.

Suitable for auditorium or classroom sized groups. In classrooms, I can teach how to transform the free writes into free verse poetry, a fictional scene, or memoir essay.

Write What you Know (High School and Junior High)

In this high energy, interactive presentation, we explore your students' own high school or junior high as the setting for my next novel. I choose an “ultimate teen heroine” and “the guy” to star in it. Lots of laughs, some time to reflect, and students get excited about writing as they experience how a story develops. I share loads of tips and professional techniques. I can include a "get them talking" free write or free verse poetry writing exercises.

My presentation introduces my novels, but teachers do not need to have the students read them beforehand. There is nothing religious or steamy or in any way controversial in my presentation. It is about writing and the artistic process, and I am sensitive and adaptable to different audiences.

Workshops For Grades K-6

Croak! Croak! (k-3)

I share how a chance sound I heard on a river boat in Thailand (slide show optional for younger groups) became a funny rhyming poem, "Croak! Croak!"

Basic poetry and story concepts are explained and modeled.

The fun really gets going when I pass out my rhythm instrument collection from around the world so everybody can keep the beat while we chant the finished poem. An optional couplet writing challenge gives students a chance to create and share a simple poem inspired by their own environment.

What's the Opposite of Chewbacca? (4-6)

If time allows and the group is small enough, we warm up with "Croak, Croak," to get creative juices running and a feel for rhythm. Then I introduce the concept of Opposite Poems, rhyming couplets that explore an opposite. (See Paul Janeczko’s How to Write Poetry.) We brainstorm opposites and choose one idea to develop together--as a group--into an opposite poem that will be posted on my opposite poem blog. I leave them with a challenge to illustrate the poem we've created and write their own opposite poems. With younger groups, we can move onto this under my direction if a second hour is desired.

With older students, I ask them what the opposite of rhyme is? I share a free verse poem inspired by a sound. The students free write about a sound they remember and then learn how to shape that into a free verse poem. This can also be a stand alone workshop focusing the whole hour on free verse.

What Students and Teachers are Saying:

Here’s a sample from some of the students from around the country I’ve met. I wish I could post them all!

I enjoyed learning the different ways to cure writer’s block and free write. Today I tried free writing when I woke up and found that I had lots of ideas floating around upstairs. --Nik

Your method of formulating ideas for books has already helped me improve my own stories.--Kristen

I would be glad to help if you ever need a teen’s perspective! --Jesse

You made me want to sit down and start writing again.--Kefau

You really inspired me to follow my dreams, and if you work hard enough you can make them happen.--Katherine

It is refreshing to know that it wasn’t easy for you because living in a world where people are always successful makes it hard to fail.
--Ellis

I liked how you involved us and let us add in!--Hannah

I really liked how you wanted to know what we think and what our lives are like. --Jessica

Because of you I remember how to ask the questions ‘what if?’ and ‘what happens next?’--Billie

You taught me a lot about authors. I thought they just sat down and typed.--Cody

I learned that it takes many failures to succeed and many revisions for perfection.--Whitney

I loved that you told us that every mark on our paper is a gift from our teacher. It really helped me see what my teachers want me to know, instead of being upset.--Ashley

I learned a lot about writing, especially how to use emotion and feeling.--Marissa

I learned that to really write an excellent story, you must revise, revise, revise. --Drake

I write a lot, and I revise a lot, and find that my writing isn’t very good. You taught me that it’s completely normal to feel like that.
--Victoria

Our AVID students, along with the administrators, were so grateful for your visit last semester. . . . Thank you for your enthusiasm and commitment to touching lives and inspiring young minds!!! --Jamie Fioramonti-Wilson, AVID Elective Educator, Highland High School, Gilbert, AZ

Your presentation was the perfect blend of inspiration, knowledge, and application. I appreciate your kindness and generosity. Best wishes as you . . . pull in lots of praise and appreciation from your first two successes! --Olinda Martin, Mead High School, Spokane, Washington

What a great gift you gave us by coming to Mead and speaking to our kids. This is so rare. . . It was wonderful to have our kids hear from the “real world” of writing. --Dori Robertson, Mead High School, Spokane, Washington

Thanks for visiting my creative writing class. The kids had a ball. . . They had [TAKEN BY STORM] back ordered . . . so that it was never on the shelf. They were very excited to have the chance to read a novel by an author they had actually met. Thanks again for a memorable experience. --Dominique Replogle, Creative Writing Teacher, Orem High School, Orem, Utah

Thank you for coming into my classes to discuss the writing process. The kids are still talking about it today and hope you will come back again! --Alison Brown, English Teacher, Fremont Junior High School, Mesa, Arizona

Angela Morrison's presentation to our class was inspiring. She gave a clear view of what an author goes through to develop a germ of an idea into a full-blown novel, and most importantly, she conveyed the excitement of mastery over the written word. Too often students see books and their authors as coming from another realm. Angela was able to show them that the process of writing is the product of mere mortals. She convinced them that they all have something to say and that the mechanics of writing are secondary to the ideas. It was a breakthrough experience for many of my students. --Laura Reid, English Department Chair, McNary High School, Keizer, OR