Writing Workshop To Awaken the Senses

I’m glad to say that he writing workshop express is still chugging along, but it’ll be going at a gentler pace this week. I’ll be taking older people on a journey through the senses this Wednesday at Ardkeen Library in Waterford City. It’s a two-hour workshop being run as part of Positive Ageing Week. During the workshop, we’ll do activities to tap into the senses, which can open the door to powerful memories. People will discover that these memories can be turned into powerful stories, which act as a record of their lives.

Telling Life Stories

First, we’ll awaken the sense of touch. People will tell the life stories of unusual objects, some beautiful, some quirky. They’ll pick up the object, examine it, and let their minds wander, as they think of how it came into being, and what adventures it had before it came to this library. Participants will then feast their eyes on some beautiful pictures of places around the world and use those to trigger memories of wonderful holidays or days out that they’ve had.

A Feast for the Senses

I’ve written before on this blog that the orange is a demanding fruit. They work all of your senses, so they form a great foundation for writing activities. People will eat an orange and describe the experience, how it looked, felt, tasted, smelt and sounded. Then they will share a food related memory, which could centre on oranges themselves, or on a meal that was memorable for the right or wrong reasons.

Oranges tap into all five of your senses – great for writing.

The Power of Sound

Sound can be an overlooked sense, so as we come to the end of the workshop, we’ll tune into the things that make up the soundtrack of our lives. Participants will write down their five favourite sounds, and one that grates on them. I’ll then play a piece of music and people will come up with five words to describe it. They’ll then describe a memory based on a favourite piece of music.

What do you do to awaken your senses in your writing? If you teach creative writing, do you do any exercises with your workshop groups based on the senses?

What I Hope for My Creative Writing Participants

Tonight, I’ll be manning a table at an enrolment night for people who want to do night classes at Colaiste Chathail Naofa, the further education college in Dungarvan in south-east Ireland. I’m giving an eight-week creative writing course as part of their night class programme, and after the success of the class I gave there last year, I’m looking forward to getting stuck in again.

The college where I’ll be giving my workshop. Taken from the Colaiste Chathail Naofa website.

Each of the participants who sign up will have their own hopes for what the class will offer them, and contrary to popular opinion, these don’t always include getting published. But here are my three hopes for the participants, if I’m lucky enough to get the numbers for a class.

1.      That they’ll learn how stories are put together

Each class will cover a different aspect of storytelling. As well as the core techniques like character, setting and plot, participants will learn how to tell a story from a particular point of view, how to use the senses to create vivid description and how a story’s theme can influence its structure. Some people are bookworms and enjoy seeing how their favourite writers put together books. Others will use the techniques to add depth to the stories they’re writing.

2.      That they’ll write their own stories

This course is aimed at people who have never written before. It’s important that a course has a solid outcome, a tangible result of their efforts. In this case, I hope the outcome will be a complete story, created by the participants. As the weeks unfold, I hope they’ll grow in confidence and that they’ll achieve that outcome. Some people come in with an idea already and some find that the course activities trigger an idea.

3. That they’ll realise they have something special to say

This is the true power of creative writing. It helps people to see that they have their own unique voice, and that they have a story to tell which other people will want to hear. Exploring that story and bringing it to life gives people a real sense of satisfaction and confidence. Even if they never look at the story they wrote again, or write another word, the participants will have the satisfaction of knowing they told their own story, and that it was heard.

What reason did you have for going to creative writing classes? Were your hopes realised? If you give creative writing classes, what hopes do you have for your participants?  

 

 This course is aimed at people who have never written before. It’s important that a course has a solid outcome, a tangible result of their efforts. In this case, I hope the outcome will be a complete story, created by the participants. As the weeks unfold, I hope they’ll grow in confidence and that they’ll achieve that outcome. Some people come in with an idea already and some find that the course activities trigger an idea.

3.      That they realise they have something valuable to say

This is the true power of creative writing. It helps people to see that they have their own unique voice, and that they have a story to tell which other people will want to hear. Exploring that story and bringing it to life gives people a real sense of satisfaction and confidence. Even if they never look at the story they wrote again, or write another word, the participants will have the satisfaction of knowing they told their own story, and that it was heard.

Why did you start going to creative writing classes? Were your hopes realised? If you give creative writing classes, what hopes do you have for your participants?  

 

Three Ingredients of Blogging Success

Workshop season is rolling along, and I’m enjoying all the hustle and bustle. The next stop on the workshop express train is Dungarvan, where I’ll be delivering a content creation workshop for small businesses. The workshop will equip people with the tools to put together their own blogs and social media posts. During the workshop, which will take place on Tuesday 20 September at Dungarvan Enterprise Centre, participants will come up with a plan for their blog and social media posts. They’ll also have a chance to draft up their first posts.

From working with businesses in the past, I’ve come to realise that before they ever write a blog post, three ingredients need to be in place. These ingredients will make it a lot easier for businesses to succeed with their blogs in the long term. During the workshop, I will be helping participants put those ingredients in place, so they’ll be motivated to succeed with their blogs.  

Ingredients of successful content creation

1.      Know Why You’re Blogging

Don’t blog because your web designer told you it was a good idea, or because other businesses are doing it. Define for yourself why you feel it’s important for you to blog. If you’re passionate about your business, blogging gives you a chance to share that passion with a wider audience. If you value your customer relationships, blogging gives you a chance to deepen those relationships by talking to customers directly. And if reputation is important to you, blogging will help you build your brand and establish yourself as a trusted source of information for your customers.

2.      Be Willing to Invest Time

The great thing for small business owners is that blogging and social media are free to use. But you will still need to invest your time, and this can be in short supply for small business owners. You need to sit down and think about how much time you have available for your blog, how frequently you want to post and how long you want the posts to be. If you set a defined period of time aside each week for your blog, you’re more likely to keep blogging. If you really don’t have time, find someone in your business or your family circle who does.

3.      Trust You’re the Expert

Another stumbling block to blogging success is confidence. You may feel you’ve nothing to say, or that you’re out of practise with writing. But you own the business. Nobody knows the business better than you, so no-one else is better qualified to blog about it than you. If the thought of writing intimidates you, keep it simple. Just write about the day-to-day happenings of your business and write as you speak. If you’re really stuck for words, base your blog posts on pictures. People love pictures, and they make your posts more visible.

What are your secrets of business blogging success? Why do you blog? And how do you find time for it in your busy day?

Teenage Writing Workshop in Waterford Library

It’s workshop season again, and to celebrate that, I’m resurrecting this blog. The first workshop on the horizon is for teenagers at Waterford Central Library. I was asked to do it as part of a programme of children’s events to celebrate Culture Night on 16 September. I had approached the library about doing workshops for younger children and adults, and those will come to pass, but first, they’ve asked me to help teenagers put a story together in 90 minutes.

Pic from http://www.librarybuildings.info. Waterford Central Library

 

The prospect makes me gulp slightly. Trying to reach teenagers through their hormonal fog can be a bit of a challenge. The workshop is on a Friday, straight after school, when they’re probably a bit tired and fed up with being told what to do by adults all week long. Luckily, I have access to a teenager, and to get an insight into what might hold their attention, I put him on the spot and asked him straight out. He suggested that teenagers like near-future stories where the world is almost the same, but not quite.

I had been considering the possibility of devising a near-future dystopian story, so it was good to have my instincts confirmed. I also know that superhero stories are always a winner, especially with younger people. So I am devising a story set in a near-future world which is recognisable, but something vital is missing that needs to be retrieved. The teenagers will create an unlikely superhero tasked with retrieving that missing ingredient, invent the world where the action happens and decide how their hero will succeed in their mission.

After warm-ups to get rid of the post-school cobwebs, it will be time to get down to business, with activities to come up with the character, setting and plot for the story.

What If: I sense that teenagers are more driven by plot than character when they read, so we’ll start with the plot. Many great stories start with the question “what if?” I will give the teenagers three what-if scenarios, related to the upcoming story, and they will come up with three things they would do in each circumstance. For example: what if you were transported to another time?

Character Sketch: I will give the teenagers a picture of a “geeky” superhero and they will write a profile of the character they see in the picture. They will fill in the profile under various headings, such as name, age and family background. The most important heading is “Secret Power,” in which the teenagers will identify the superhero power that will help the character succeed in their task.

Report from the Future: Characters need a world to inhabit, and the teenagers will imagine they have been transported into the future world where their story will be set. They send back a report about this world, describing what they see and experience. I will guide them towards describing a world where everything looks nearly the same, but there is something missing, something that is needed to make the world a better place.

Story Spine: When the teenagers have done the activities, they will use the information they have gathered to fill in a story spine. A story spine provides a structure for a story. It consists of a series of sentences with blank spaces. The writer fills in those spaces to decide what will be included in the story. You could say it’s the bones of a story. If time allows, the participants will add flesh to those bones and write a full-length story.

By the end of the workshop, the teenagers will have created their very own story. And if I play my cards right and grab their interest, I will be rewarded by their humour, their inventiveness and their imagination.

Do you facilitate creative writing workshops for teenagers, or write books for teenagers? What do you do to hold their attention?