Creative Writing Residency: Personal Tales of Change and Growth (Grades 7-12)

 

As young adults mature, they constantly learn from their families, peers, educational institutions and community that shape their values and opinions. This program teaches students through writing to reflect on their experiences in a positive light. It also encourages them as writers not to be limited by the actual facts, but to use their creative imagination in order to explore who they are and who they can be.

 

Motoko will give students step-by-step guidance in this journey for self-discovery. Through storytelling games and improvisation, students will mine their memories for experiences that changed their SPARK, an acronym for Skills, Perception, Attitude, Relationship, and Knowledge. Each student chooses one experience to focus on, being mindful of what a reader may learn from it. They are encouraged to be creative, and embellish and dramatize through writing. Their goal is to transcend the facts to get to the ‘truth’. In other words, the lessons of the story must be illuminated and clarified by the author’s choices.

 

The residency may culminate in a classroom anthology and/or a Parents’ Night.

 

(Click here for a sample story.)

Motoko Dworkin

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 413-253-1664

motoko@folktales.net