Do you want to be a great creative writer? You need three things: technical skills, imagination, and practice. You bring your imagination, and in this class, we'll work on the skills and practice!  I'm a big believer in the idea that an artist can have more freedom to break the rules once they've become a master of them first. I'm sure Jane Austen misplaced a couple commas or confused "then" and "than" once or twice before coming out with Pride and Prejudice!  The only way to become a great writer is to really learn your craft, and then practice, practice, practice.

In this ongoing class, we will devote the beginning of each class to learning and practicing a specific writing skill, or a key area of grammar. Next, we will use this skill (and others) in a creative writing task.  Based on a writing prompt given in each class, learners will have approximately 15 minutes of writing time. 

Once we're done, I strongly encourage (but do not require) learners to share the work they've done for constructive feedback. When learners share their work, I'm looking for ways to improve creativity, but I'm also focused on the grammar and precision within the sentences that deliver that creativity.

Often, the technical areas of grammar and sentence structure chosen for the beginning of lessons will be dictated by the needs I see in the learners writing, or by questions raised by the learners themselves.  Other times, I will be following a schedule of weeks as follows:  

Week 1: Parts of Speech - Adjectives & Nouns / Writing about Setting
Week 2: Commas / Character description
Week 3: Quotation Marks / Dialogue 
Week 4: Pronouns & Antecedents /  Point of View
Week 5: Parts of Speech - Adverbs / Character description
Week 6: Capitalization / World Building
Week 7: Similes & Metaphors / Writing with Imagery
Week 8: Active & Passive Voice / Dialogue

Week 9: Sentence Fragments / Interrupting script
Week 10: Run on Sentences / Guess the ending
Week 11: Comma 4 Rules / Story starters
Week 12:  Sentence Types - Simple & Compound / Word challenge story   
Week 13: Sentence Types - Complex & Compound Complex / Perspective writing
Week 14: Parallel Structure / Story starters
Week 15: Verb Tenses - Present, Past & Future / Time Travel
Week 16: Verb Tenses - Perfect Tense / Butterfly effect