Tuesday 27 January 2009

Writing Workshop at Vogrie Country Park

I facilitated a day workshop on nature writing today at Vogrie Country Park. It was aimed at people like countryside rangers and environmental education workers who could use writing in their work, but a couple of people were there out of personal interest. Twelve people there in total, which is a great number, enough to have proper discussions but not so many that it becomes unwieldy. We discussed reasons for writing about nature, how to use creative writing about nature in group work, then we had a guided walk round the beautiful park (thanks to Jo and Alan the countryside rangers for leading these walks). Then we all wrote something inspired by the walk, some people shared what they had written, others talked about how they felt about writing. Then we talked about how we could use writing in education work, with some people sharing specific activities they have used with groups. There was a lot of lively discussion throughout the day and plenty of cups of tea! It was great to see everyone enthused about creative writing and I also came away with a handful of haiku and some ideas for longer poems (one of the side benefits of tutoring I always find!).

9 comments:

Caroline Gill said...

Wish I could have joined in the fun!

RG said...

can we see a couple of the contributions? Sounded like a very worthwhile undertaking ...

GreenieJoy said...

Thats awesome you did that! I'm glad it went well! :)

GreenieJoy said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Devika Jyothi said...

Writing workshop --

I keep seeing in televion; their heated discussion, intellectual aura of the writers...

Never attended one-- it sounds fun here,

Your updates too are interesting...perhaps we could see some works here :)

wishes,
devika

abby - the geek girl said...

That's so exciting, I love nature writing... it's the hippie in me. Do you still teach regularly?

shadows and clouds said...

it sounds like your work is so fun and inspirational! lucky lady! country park and city farms...most lovely indeed :)

this is my patch said...

The very reason I want to continue keeping a garden/nature blog. I would very much like to improve my skills and in time become more creative with how I write, and learn a thing or two along the way. x

Christy Woolum said...

What an excellent theme for a writing workshop. I love nature writing.