„Können wir nicht mal eine Kurzgeschichte auf Englisch schreiben?“ fragte mich ein Schüler meiner Englisch-Klasse. Dies war der Beginn eines der schönsten Projekte, die ich bisher als Lehrerin betreuen durfte. Nicht nur, weil die Idee von einem Schüler selbst kam. Sondern besonders auch deshalb, weil die Schüler und Schülerinnen völlige Freiheit bei der Wahl der Themen hatten und diese Freiheit zu einem bunten Strauß an Kurzgeschichten führte, der alle Genres der Literatur bedient – von Science Fiction, tagespolitischen und autobiographischen Texten über Horrorgeschichten und Love-Stories bis hin zu Krimis. Ein Schüler schrieb sogar eine gereimte Ballade über eine Schießerei in Los Angeles. Thematisch ließen sich die Schülerinnen und Schüler oft von aktuellen Ereignissen inspirieren – so spielte Trumps Wahlniederlage, die Waffengewalt in den USA, der Anschlag in Hanau und natürlich Corona eine große Rolle in einigen Geschichten. Aber die jungen Autorinnen und Autoren ließen auch persönliche Erfahrungen aus ihrem alltäglichen Leben als Teenager, wie beispielsweise Auseinandersetzungen mit Liebe und Sexualität, sowie

Erfahrungen von Peer Pressure, Freundschaft, Ausgrenzung und Einsamkeit in ihre Stories einfließen. Auf eigenen Wunsch teilte die Klasse ihre Geschichten anonym miteinander, so dass jede Geschichte unabhängig von persönlichen Gefühlen gegenüber dem oder der Schreibenden wertgeschätzt werden konnte. Und als Finale erhielt die gesamte Klasse eine eigene Ausgabe ihres Kurzgeschichten-Buchs mit allen ihren Erstlings-Werken – zum noch einmal Lesen, immer wieder Genießen und vielleicht Zurückerinnern, wenn der bzw. die eine oder andere später noch weitere Geschichten schreibt. Denn fast alle Schülerinnen und Schüler hatten große Freude an dem Projekt und ohne Ausnahme erschufen sie erstaunliche und bewundernswerte Werke auf hohem Niveau. Bei einer Reflexion über den Schreibprozess berichteten einige sogar davon, dass sie öfter kreativ schreiben wollten, auch wenn das Schreiben am Anfang gar nicht so einfach war:

• “The ideas made a lot of sense in my head but when I wrote them down they didn't. I thought I would write the story in a few days but on some days I couldn't think of anything that made sense in the storyline, so sometimes I didn't write anything in days” – Tina Dannenberg
• “In the beginning I had big problems with finding a topic, because a short story should teach you a lesson and you can't just write any story. Therefore, I looked for a few possible topics on the internet as food for thought. (…) When I had the topic and the situation, it was easy for me to turn it into a short story and to integrate a few exciting things.” – Mijamin Fiebelkorn
• “I didn’t really have a full concept of my story. I knew what I wanted to write about but most of the stuff I wrote spontaneously. I just went with the flow.” – Valerie Gebru
• “First I was thinking about the past. But then I thought about nowadays and found the idea to write abut corona.” – Marcel Hermert
• “In my opinion writing this short story was a really nice expierence. (…) Even though I had some trouble with finding the theme I really enjoyed writing my short story.” – Kristina Kapetanovic
• “Personally, I had a lot of fun writing my story and I didn’t really have any notable struggles (…). It even motivated me to start writing a few more.” – Yousef Khoder

• “Writing a short story was very new to me. I have never done this before, especially not in English. To find a topic to write about was very hard for me. (…) At some point I came into a little writing flow. It started to get easy. The ideas came at the same moment I was writing.” – Julia Knop
• “I think it was a good idea that everyone had to write a short story. So everybody could show their interests and their writing skills even if they don’t say much in class.” – Márton Korcsik
• “I liked that we could freely decide everything.” – Ksenija Paligorov
• “I really enjoyed the process of writing the short story especially because it wasn’t bound by any particularly hard to follow rules and you could just let your imagination run wild.” – Felix Krone
• “I am thankful for this experience and maybe this could be a new hobby of mine!” – Luis Novosel-Pejovski
• “Well… writing it was quite easy. I was lying in my bed and thought about what I could write about. So I came up with the idea.” – Niels Magdeburg
• “I did not really have any trouble writing my short story, I just came up with it on the spot.” – Jarno Malorzo
• “The first time I heard that we had to write a short story, I was very worried. (…) It was hard to choose a theme, but once I started writing I couldn’t stop. I was in a “writing flow”.” – Alexandra Meier
• “In my opinion it was difficult to find a good topic, because your short story can’t be too long, but it should still be interesting.” – Katharina Meier
• “For me it was actually easy to write the story. I think I wrote it one day before deadline. (…) I think it took me about 20 minutes to write down. The whole story was already in my head, I just had to write it down.” – Benjamin Örtlek

• “I really enjoyed writing that short story because we got the opportunity to be more creative and still were able to practice writing and learn many new things about short stories and how they are structured.” – Victoria Pleier
• “In my opinion it was quite difficult to come up with a topic for my story. Then, while playing the piano, I suddenly had an idea. All I needed were the right words.” – Noah Schledorn
• “I found the topic of my short story in a book that I have read a few years ago and liked.” – Marius Schöttler
• “It was nice to have a creative exercise to do instead of just doing normal tasks.” – Philipp Siegler
• “It was difficult to make the story exciting so the reader wants to read your story. (…) It was also hard to find the right words to describe the feelings you want to communicate.” – Tikana Tesfamichael
• “I had a lot of fun writing it. (…) Hopefully we can do more tasks like this in the future.” Moritz Thum

 

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Text: Janna Regenauer               Bildquellen: istockphoto.com