I was exposed to 6 Piece Story Making (6PSM) during my Expressive Art Therapy course. It is used as a projective tool for assessment and therapy. But having used it in Corporate and other personality development workshops, I realized the immense potential of this tool in enhancing creative writing and storytelling skills in children as well as adults.
The structured directives helps participants to develop a new fictional story, first through images and then to recreate it in words. For beginners, writing a story all by themselves can be daunting and hence this method guides the participants step by step to tap their imagination, explore their own thoughts, develop the characters and structure the story into beginning, middle and end.
Materials Required:
A4 size paper
Pencil
Pen
Process:
The participants are asked to fold the A4 size paper into six boxes
They are given progressive instructions to develop a fictional story using only drawings.
1. Who is the main protagonist of your story? Need no necessarily be human, could be from fantasy, fictional or historical.
2. What are the main goals of the character?
3. What are the obstacles they encounter?
4. What are their strengths?
5. How does the protagonist achieve the goal?
6. How does the story end?
The participants are asked to share their story with the group without any interruption
The Facilitator asks open ended questions and encourages the participant to add further details to the character, setting ,climax etc.
Finally, the participants writes down the story in their own words.
Once the story is completely elaborated, the Felicitator and the participant can choose to explore the possible links between the story and the teller's real life situation.
6PSM is used based on the assumption that the conflicts, characters, views and themes explored in the story will communicate some meaning about the participants experience.
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