Turn your most wayward apprentices from scruffy-lookin’ nerf herders into Jedi Masters with this creative writing and illustration workshop. Creative writing workshop -- six sessions -- fiction EPISODE I I - T HE PROCESS BEGINS! Darth Vader illu stration by Vict o r in ink, charcoal a nd wat ercolou r Picking up this tale from where we left off, six boys who find writing challenging were chosen to join a creative writing workshop using Star Wars graphic novels as their inspiration. After having time to watch snippets of Episode IV and freely pore over various graphic novels, their enthusiasm for Star Wars had been well and truly tapped into. It was time to start the process of producing a piece of writing. My basic ethos with writing is not revolutionary. Guiding children through a detailed and immersive process rather than springing a writing assessment on them might seem like an obviously, preferable route. It is, however, surprising how seldom this approach is really f...

This week, ARTiculate is launching a weekly-ish bulletin from ARTiculate Education where I aim to push great ideas for creative literacy your way. Like a pygmy, crocodile plumber, the bulletin will be short, snappy and useful. I will point you towards books that are perfect for you and the classes you teach, some helpful planning ideas, videos, examples of work, details of new workshops I offer and so on that might give you great ideas for teaching effective, creative literacy. Heck, I might even chuck in the odd cat picture. If you teach primary school aged children already, are a student working in education or if you were cleaning the tables and signed up for this by accident, there will almost certainly be something in this for you to use now or in the future. To sign up, click here and send a blank email - I'll add you to the list.

Text analysis is key to helping less confident writers build a framework to hang their ideas on. I t is the solid foundation that supports the imaginative flourishes of a quality finished piece.   A good author is a good reader! Week 3 "I love books. I love that moment when you open one and sink into it, you can escape from the world into a story that's way more interesting than yours will ever be." Elizabeth Scott   Do we at ARTiculate have a catchy slogan? If we did, it would probably be the best slogan in the world. But, if I was going to adopt one here and now it might be: "Read. Then go for it!"  The importance of reading for an author is difficult to overstate. How can you write convincingly if you've never read a convincing book? Drawing on other people's ideas, being inspired by another's use of language, seeing how a text is structured - all essentials  for a budding writer. When you're working on a short, picture bo...