Local Creative Writing Classes
Whether I'm teaching in your home or in a public space, my "Author-in-the-Making" classes are sure to spark your budding author's creativity. These writing workshops offer students the opportunity to engage and work with a published author and expose them to the process working authors use to create and imagine original stories.
Workshops are run in small groups so that students have the opportunity for one-on-one feedback and direction as well as the ability to brainstorm and peer edit with each other. Over the course of the workshop, we will focus on a writing exercises, such as such as incorporating weather, emotion or mood into a story. Some classes are broken up into two parts: looking at real life examples from acclaimed, published authors and then practicing a skill through exercises. Other sessions focus entirely on working on a given piece.
Why is Creative Writing So Important?
Creative writing helps students grow and develop academically and personally. Storytelling enables young writers to develop empathy, as they think about their characters' lives, and the events that shape those characters.
Creative writing enhances problem solving skills. Developing a logical plot requires imagining, evaluating and piecing together actions, consequences and outcomes.
Creative writing offers writers a safe place to work through personal issues and challenges. Research shows that the very act of personal writing is beneficial to well being.
Creative writing encourages the development of voice, which is critical to all writing forms, whether writing a persuasive essay or a college application writing sample.
Why Me?
In addition to publishing three books, I have led writing workshops in public and independent schools for elementary- and middle-school children. In addition to publishing three books, I have worked at the Highlights Foundation, as an assistant teacher, with an award-winning editor and former publisher from Penguin Books USA.