Nurturing and developing a new crop of young creative writers through direct training, as well as improving the skills and techniques of teachers, remain the core objectives of the Writers In Schools & Education (W.I.S.E) suite of programmes facilitated by the Cultural Development Literary Arts Desk of the National Cultural Foundation (NCF) and generously supported by The Maria Holder Memorial Trust.
Cultural Officer for the literary arts Ayesha Gibson-Gill said the current WISE Junior camp, which forms part of the programmes, offers an introduction to creative writing and critical thinking as a skill set and a means of expression for children and teens. Complementing this is the W.I.S.E Teacher Training Workshop, which provides an in depth analysis on the reading, writing and improvement of poetry for teachers and direction on how to encourage and improve the short stories and essays of their students.
Workshops
Gibson-Gill added that the W.I.S.E programming has taken the form of in school writer s residencies and workshops, junior writers camps, weekend workshops and teacher training sessions. They all focus on the building blocks of writing and developing poetry prose (fiction and nonfiction) which may be presented on the page, stage, or even the screen, both locally and regionally.
The educators who successfully completed the recently concluded teacher training component met at the NCF to collect their certificates, presented by sponsor representative Ruchelle Roach, Chief Project Manager of The Maria Holder Memorial Trust.
the intermediate level workshop, with W.I.S.E Junior Camp which forms sessions. They all focus on the building Roach commenting that it was the highest part of the W.I.S.E suite of programmes, cohort to date since The Maria Holder Memorial Trust came on offered an introduction to creative and which board, with twenty three teachers.
Both Roach and Gibson-Gill expressed elation at the number of participants in re-allocation of the teacher training sessions to the Christmas holidays also afforded participants access to the W.I.S.E Junior Creative Writing Camp for their practicum during the workshop. These sessions were held under the tutelage of Samuel Soyer and Nailah Imoja who facilitated workshops on the teaching of poetry and short story/essay reading, presentation and writing respectively, for participants who teach from nursery to adult level students and a few parents too. (PR)