WRITING GRAPHIC NOVELS: How to make your story visual 

Graphic novels combine storytelling and visual art to create engaging, memorable narratives. In this workshop, students discover how stories can be told through images, dialogue, pacing, and composition. Using examples from graphic novels, they explore how characters express emotion, how settings shape a story, and how visual choices influence the reader’s experience.

Through simple storyboarding and quick sketches, students learn to organize ideas, develop characters, and think creatively about narrative structure. Whether they enjoy writing, drawing, or both, students will leave with new tools for visual storytelling and a deeper understanding of how words and images work together to bring stories to life.

Curriculum Links

Learning Themes Strand – Foundations of Language B2.2 – Identify how language, word choice, and literary devices communicate meaning and engage an audience. (Grades 5–8) B2 - Apply knowledge of vocabulary, language conventions, and literary elements to understand and create texts. (Grades 9-10) Strand – Composition: Expressing Ideas and Creating Texts D1.2 – Generate and develop ideas about given and chosen topics using various strategies and resources, including their own lived experiences. (Grades 5–8) D1 - Develop, organize, and express ideas to create texts for a variety of purposes and audiences. (Grades 9-10) Writing Overall Expectation – Generate, gather, and organize ideas and information to write for an intended purpose and audience. (Grades 11-12) Overall Expectation – Draft and revise writing using a variety of literary, informational, and graphic forms and stylistic elements appropriate for the purpose and audience. (Grades 11-12) Cross Curricular Connections Visual Arts Strand A – Creating and Presenting  Apply the creative process to produce a variety of artworks, using elements, principles, and techniques of visual arts to communicate feelings, ideas, and understandings. (Grades 5-8)  Apply the creative process to create a variety of art works, individually and/or collaboratively (Grades 9-12)  Strand B – Reflecting, Responding, and Analysing Apply the critical analysis process to communicate feelings, ideas, and understandings in response to a variety of art works and art experiences. (Grades 5-8)  Demonstrate an understanding of the critical analysis process by examining, interpreting, evaluating, and reflecting on various works. (Grades 9-12) 

Artist