Summer 2008 Workshops at Writers & Books

Summer Write 2008

Write Where You Are

JY8-M0
Instructors: selected W&B Writers
Dates and rates to be determined with group leaders.
Ages: 7–15 (for schools, recreation programs, home-school groups, scouts, or other clubs)

Let’s approach writing as an amazing tool for exploring our view of the world and developing our minds. This program is designed to nurture and add to young writers’ strengths by guiding them through a variety of methods used by adult authors. In a basic creative writing program, participants will learn to work with various types of journal entries to support the writerly habits of noting interesting observations, using clear, vivid language, and thinking deeply. They will then develop a piece of writing and edit it for publication, performance, or both. Other specific programs in poetry, spoken word poetry. fiction, essay, and dramatic writing go into more detail about approaches, techniques, and how to strengthen through revision. The rich writing experiences offered will give you many tools to adapt for writing to your own purposes. Can be adapted to specific groups, goals, and needs.

SPRING

Grades 1–6

APRIL WRITING BREAK

(During April School Break, April 14–18, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.)

Spring is an inspiring time to write! Full-day classes will get out and about in the Neighborhood of the Arts and find inspiration all around them. Early drop off or late pick up can be arranged.

Magic Tree House Readers’ Club

WY8-R2
Monday–Friday, 9 a.m.–3 p.m. 
April 14 through 18
$164 W&B members / $175 general public •Limit: 12
Instructor: Marna Rossi
Grades 1–3

Take part in wonderful magical adventures from the Magic Tree House Series as Annie and Jack solve problems and help people as they travel through the world and through time. Like Annie and Jack, we will learn about the landscape, animals, and people in each environment we visit. We will read some of the stories and act out some of the scenes. Through a field trip, we will explore how we can learn about other times and places. You will illustrate stories through art activities, and, with a team, create your scenes and act them out for your friends and family. Pack a lunch each day.

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The Writing Journey

WY8-M6
Instructor: Sally Bittner Bonn
Monday–Friday, 9 a.m.–3 p.m.
April 14 through 18,
$164 W&B members / $175 general public •Limit: 12
Grades 4–6

Writers travel in many ways. We delve into our imaginations to create new characters and situations. We journey to new places for inspiration, through travel and through reading. By heightening our senses we experience what is familiar with new perspective, as if visiting for the first time. Writers travel inward to memories, traditions, a sense of self. We also journey to writers’ programs and retreats, free from the distractions of everyday life, so we can focus on our writing.

In this week-long workshop, we will travel in diverse ways: through writing from creative prompts, through visiting a neighboring art gallery, through reading great writers, and through gaining the new perspectives of a community of fellow writers. We will put together a book and a reading/performance of our own work for the last day. Thought you couldn’t travel this April break? Pack a lunch and think again!

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SUMMER

Shakespeare and I

JY8-D1
Instructor: Sally Bittner Bonn
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., June 23–27
$198 W&B members / $220 general public
Pre-Session: June 23–27
[All Day]
Ages: 9–13

Shakespeare isn’t so tough–and the rewards are great! In this class we will learn not only how to “speak Shakespeare,” but also how to use all of our other senses and talents to explore the world of the Bard. We’ll take an in-depth look at one of his plays, make an Elizabethan visit, do some acting and artwork, and take a look at theaters and costumes. Let’s cook up some chaos, incite some sibling rivalry, get serious about comedy, look lightly at tragedy, and create some conflict as we construct a performance of our own! If you’re interested in inviting the great language and insights of Shakespeare into your present life, then there will be something here for you!           

Upon the stage we shall seek

            To incite a rivalry resolved within the week.

            Tragedy or comedy? No matter how it ends,

            We shall become dramatic friends!

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Wordplay Explorer

JY8-M1
Instructor: Debbie Sullivan Murray
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., June 30–July 3
$159 W&B members / $175 general public

What could be more fun than words? Playing with them, finding new ones, rearranging them! Join us at Writers & Books on Rochester's ArtWalk and explore fun words while exploring our creative neighborhood. We will play word games like Hangman, Boggle, Scrabble, and Balderdash. We will poke around with Palindromes, spoon with Spoonerisms, run with Rebuses, wrestle with Word Searches, make our own Mad Libs, and jostle some Jokes and Riddles! We’ll rescue some endangered words and have fun discovering the history of words. Inspired by the words that make up our surroundings, we’ll leave our verbal art mark on the neighborhood with sidewalk chalk poems, gigantic magnetic poems, and mysterious messages stashed in strange places. Join us and become a Word Explorer!

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Read Around the World

JY8-R1
Instructor: Sally Bittner Bonn
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 7–11
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Week 2: July 7–11
Ages: 6–8

Wish you could travel around the world? At Writers & Books, you can! Come listen to stories and poems from cultures near and far. We will celebrate our diversity while exploring literature. From the streets of Harlem, to the mountains of Japan, to the tombs of ancient Egypt, we will find the threads within stories that tie us all together. We will create our own “deerskin” stories, learn the art of origami, and put on a play as well as share other cultural projects. We will even create our own travel journals. Participants are encouraged to bring a story from their own background to share with the group.

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Page to Stage: Fun with Fables

JY8-D2
Instructor: Almeta Whitis
AFTERNOONS:1–4 p.m.,July 7–July 11
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 6–8

Using classic fables with morals, whether from Aesop, America, or China, we will put together performances that add our own creative touches. We will also enter into the spirit of fable creation and stir up some moral tales of our own, using familiar elements. We’ll perform our pieces on Friday at 3 p.m. for our friends and family.

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WWAB-AM: Our Own Radio Show

JY8-D3
Instructor: Annette Aguilar Ramos
TWO WEEKS, MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, weekdays July 7–18
$198 W&B members / $220 general public
[2 Weeks]
Ages: 8–12

Live radio was what people listened to for entertainment before television. CREATING a radio show is a BLAST! It involves developing characters, dialogue, and stories with sound effects. It’s composing jingles for advertising fun things. It’s music, poetry, and journalism all in one! This is a great opportunity for you to develop a variety of skills in writing, public speaking, and acting, as well as a fun way to use your imagination! Anyone who plays a musical instrument or loves to sing and is interested in writing, acting, and comedy is encouraged to attend. On the last day, at 11 a.m., we will perform and record our show before a live audience. Later, you’ll get a CD in the mail!

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The Art of the Picture Book: Let’s Draw and Write!

JY8-A1
Instructor: Ms. Debra Lewis
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 7–11
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 8–12

In a picture book the images are just as important as the words. Do you want to both write a story and illustrate it? Take this class and learn how picture books for children are made. After studying a few picture books, we will review the basics and write a story of our own. We will then identify the illustrations we want to accompany our story and work on them. In the end, we will have a work of art that we can both see and read.

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World Building

JY8-F0
Instructor: Greer Nelson
AFTERNOONS:1–4 p.m.,July 7–11
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 10–13

Every great story, movie, or role-playing game starts with a great world that springs from the experience and imagination of the author. In this class we will work together on

creating fully fleshed out worlds for our characters to inhabit. We will look at different elements such as geography and climate, dress, language, customs, levels of science and magic, and many others, in order to see how to make them work in harmony to create a fantastically believable world.

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My Life, My Words

JY8-N1
Instructor: Debbie Sullivan Murray
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 7–11
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 12–14

By now, you’ve seen a lot of what life has to offer—the good, the bad, the exciting, and the worrisome. Why not write about it before it flies out of your head and is gone forever? Write about all of your fun and funny friends, your favorite summer place, or your least favorite restaurant (and the time you found a gruesome insect in the potatoes). Your experiences can become essays, memoirs, or even the basis for fiction. Write about your worst vacation, favorite relative, scariest moment, proudest achievement, and earliest memory. Tell the story of your life—the story that’s yours and yours alone. Join us for a week of creativity and memory. We’ll prevent your original ideas from slipping into the outer atmosphere by collecting them in an anthology to go home.

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Young Poets

JY8-P1
Instructor: Sally Bittner Bonn
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., July 7–11
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 12–14

Poetry lurks everywhere: in the cracks of the sidewalk, in the sound of a whirring engine, in the recesses of our imaginations. This course will give you the opportunity to discover, record, and fine-tune your own poetry. We will spend the week observing the world with a poet’s eye and ear, playing with innovative writing exercises, and reading published works to inspire us. Each participant will create several new poems. An encouraging environment will be created to foster a great community of Young Poets. On the last day of class, we will have a showcase to share our works with family and friends.

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Scripting and Filming Poetry Videos

JY8-D4
Instructors: Reenah L. Golden and Bailey Johnson
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., July 7–11
$225 W&B members / $240 general public
[All Day]
Ages: Teen

Poems, like songs, make a great underlying basis for short films by supplying words that react well with images. Come prepared with poems of your own, or other poems you like (that are no longer under copyright or that you have the author’s permission to use), so that we can start right in on Monday, selecting the best poems to work from, brainstorming, and shaping our storyboards. We will then gather our images and record the poems. Finally, we will use editing software to weave our words and images more tightly. We may enter our final results in contests or try to get them shown locally.

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Mother Goose to Dr. Seuss

JY8-P2
Instructor: Sally Bittner Bonn
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 14–18
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Week 3: July 14–18
Ages: 6–8

A weekful of wordplay! Understanding rhythm and playing with rhyme are great underlying skills for young readers and writers. During the week we will read many poems and stories, exploring the connection between sound and meaning. We will try our hand at writing our own verses, using rhyme and rhythm as a basis, and using existing nursery rhymes as inspiration. Like Seuss, we will create made-up words with zany meanings. This is the perfect class for the new but enthusiastic writer!

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Author-Illustrator Fan Club

JY8-A2
Instructor: Kevin SerWacki
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., July 14–18
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 6–8

We will read aloud and look at several examples of the wonderful picture books of some of our favorite author-illustrators. Each day will feature a different creator’s style and technique. Then, using our own imaginations, we will create picture book pages imitating their techniques with language, story, and pictures. On Friday, we will each go home with a small book that collects our tributes to these beloved author-illustrators. The teacher is an author-illustrator himself and will use his book, Doorknob and the Carnival of Bugs, for one of the activities.

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WWAB-AM: Our Own Radio Show

(2nd Week)
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 7–18
Note: Two weeks. See July 7–11, above.
Ages: 8–12

ASL: The Joys of American Sign Language

JY8-L1
Instructors: Wendy Low and Stacy Lawrence Hurwitz
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., July 14–18
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 8–12

American Sign Language offers you a way to understand and communicate with deaf friends and neighbors who make up a growing percentage of the Greater Rochester population. It also offers an exciting way to expand your thinking to include a three-dimensional, kinesthetic form of storytelling. This class, co-taught by a deaf signer and a hearing signer, will showcase children’s sign language games and the work of deaf poets and storytellers in a fun, interactive learning program. Children will learn a basic sentence structure and story structure, gain vocabulary, and express a piece of poetry or a children’s story in ASL in a final performance. The class creates a basis for understanding American Sign Language as separate from English.

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Writing Seriously Splendid Stories

JY8-F1
Instructor: Sonja Livingston
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 14–18
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 9–12

We all enjoy well-written stories—stories so amazing, moving, or creepy that we feel we are actually a part of them as we read. Someone had to write them…so how did they do it? Try your hand at capturing a reader’s imagination and interest. We’ll discuss basics of fiction: how to develop cool characters, create compelling situations, and “hook” readers, so that our stories are almost impossible to put down! We’ll examine good and bad examples to see what works, and why. And, we’ll give lots of time to crafting our own fiction. Each participant will develop a completed draft of a story or first chapter, and will go home with an anthology of pages from everyone’s best work!

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Your Fantastic Novel

JY8-F2
Instructor: Debra Eileen Lewis
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 14–18
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: Teen

Are you not satisfied with short stories, poetry, and non-fiction? If you would like to take a longer journey with characters of your own creation, this workshop is for you. Since getting started is sometimes the hardest part, we will brainstorm together. Once we get started, there will be no stopping us! You will investigate what elements make for compelling characters and situations in a first chapter, and incorporate what you learn. We will work through the tangles that your characters and plot create for you—learning how to keep the novel going, and even how to tie it together at the end! Whether you write fantasy, sci-fi, or realistic fiction, this is a chance to grow as a writer while creating a whole world of your own! You will also get to help shape a work-in-progress currently being written by your teacher and you will begin to create your own book for your peers. Whether you have a novel-in-progress, a short story to expand, or a fresh idea, this class is for you.

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Teen Poets

JY8-P3
Instructor: Sally Bittner Bonn
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., July 14–18
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: Teen

 “If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry."

—Emily Dickinson

This is a fun course for serious poetry lovers! We will really pack it in, reading and writing many styles of poems. Discover what you love in published poets and work at making those qualities come alive in your own work. We’ll play with the sounds of poetry as well as the white space on the page. We’ll create rich images and metaphors. At the end of the week you will go home with a great collection of poems by published writers as well as a stack of your own new work and pieces from your classmates. Our goal is to have the tops of our heads taken off as many times as possible during the week!

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Writing the College Admissions Essay

JY8-B1
Instructor: David Pascal
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 14–18
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: High School

Learn to write impressive essays for admission applications, the kind that wow admissions officers by what you say and how you say it, and that advertise you: creative, curious, intelligent, hard-working, and involved. Bring your questions about college applications and any specific essay questions from schools where you want to apply. We will practice with the real thing.

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Word on the Street

JY8-N2
Instructor: Reenah L. Golden
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., July 21–25
$198 W&B members / $220 general public
Week 4: July 21–July 25
[All day]
Ages: 8–12

There’s a reason why Clark Kent, Lois Lane, and Peter Parker work for newspapers: it’s where the action is! Our news team will scour the streets to uncover “the scoop” and cover recent events in the Neighborhood of the Arts and in popular culture. We will read and critique articles and photographs from popular magazines, entertainment TV shows, City Newspaper, and the Democrat and Chronicle brought in by the instructor and participants. We will then decide which feature stories, personal profiles, and arts, music, dance, book, and restaurant reviews we want to write and photograph. At the end of the summer, our articles will come out in an exciting newsletter for distribution in shops and cafés along ArtWalk.

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The Storyteller’s Apprentice: Creating Picture Books and Performing for Children

JY8-M3
Instructors: S. Renée Conley and Kevin SerWacki
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., July 21–25
$198 W&B members / $220 general public
[All day]
Ages: 9–13

You like that special warmth that comes from faces in rapt attention to your voice. Perhaps you plan to baby-sit or work with children in the future and want to learn more about engaging techniques for reading and storytelling that encourage them to grow up to be readers. Perhaps you see yourself as a future public speaker, swaying crowds with your voice, or as a beloved author of children’s books. You are a great candidate for the Storytelling Apprenticeship! We will focus on the skills of an oral storyteller and on your own ideas for a book. You will then apply your skills at Asbury Daycare Center, where you will read and tell stories to children and small groups. You will choose at least one story to develop into a special dramatic delivery. You’ll also create your own short book to share. On Friday afternoon at 3 p.m., along with the daycare children, invited family and friends will get to see your work.

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Bringing Your Poem to Life

JY8-P4
Instructor: Sally Bittner Bonn
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., July 21–25
$198 W&B members / $220 general public
[All day]
Ages: 10-13

You know you like to write poems, but you wonder what to do with them when you’re finished. We will explore just how to bring your poems to life! If you’d like, you may bring already written poems to work with. We will begin with engaging and inspiring writing exercises to get our creativity flowing. We will soak up some inspiration from the Neighborhood of the Arts, including a trip to Visual Studies Workshop to see examples of artists’ books. Then we will work on presentation. Explore turning a poem into an artwork suitable for framing, making books and broadsides, and reading/performing your poem out loud for an audience. We will present our work on Friday at an “art opening and performance.”

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Through My Eyes: Memoir Writing for Teens

JY8-N3
Instructor: Sonja Livingston
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., July 21–25
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: Teen

We’ll learn to write about what we know best: Our own lives! We all have stories to tell! No matter how old you are, where you come from, or where you hope to go, your take on the world is unique and worthwhile. Readers are hungry to read about real-life characters and experiences. In this interactive workshop, we’ll breathe extra life into our personal stories by borrowing from the rich language of poetry and the snap and pizzazz of good fiction. Participants will respond to writing exercises and share their work in a supportive environment. We’ll also have a guest writer and plenty of opportunity to explore and find inspiration in the Neighborhood of the Arts. Bring some pocket money on Tuesday to go to Starry Nites Café and write outside while drinking something fancy!

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¡Bienvenidos! Fun with Spanish

JY8-L2
Instructor: Henry Padron:
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 28–August 1
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Week 5: July 28–August 1
Ages: 6–8

There is no passport required for this week’s Spanish language and culture adventure. This is a beginner level, no-experience-needed class, with a focus on fun immersion. We will learn Spanish greetings, colors, numbers, and more. Food, music, indigenous folktales, crafts, and games abound as we experience Mexico and other Latin-American cultures. A party complete with a piñata rounds out the week. Children also take home a mini-dictionary.

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A Guide to Sprites, Goblins, and Other Magical Folk

JY8-F3
Instructor: Angela Cannon
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 28–August 1
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 8–12

Spiderwick is not the only recorder of Fantastical Notes and Observations. Through guided imagery and visits to extraordinary local gardens, we will create our own notebooks of magical beings. Our books can include character sketches, interesting happenings in magical realms, and meanings associated with fantastic “appearances.” Learn and write all you can about goblins, familiars, fairies, pookas, and other magic folk and animals.

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My Name in Print: Creating An Anthology

JY8-A3
Instructor: Sally Bittner Bonn
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., July 28–August 1
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 8–12

Write, write, write! We will spend the first part of the course producing poems, stories, journal entries, and creative essays through imaginative writing prompts. Participants will be encouraged to try all genres, but to focus on the one(s) they feel most passionately about. Toward the end of the week we will work as a team to create our very own anthology. Participants will learn to make the most of their writing by sharpening their editing and revising skills. Then, we will make all the decisions necessary to create a book of our own. What will it look like? How will it be organized? In the end, each participant will receive a copy of the book they helped create.

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Writers & Cooks: Menus for Every Meal

JY8-C1
Instructor: Paul Jonasse
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., July 28–August 1
$159 W&B members / $175 general public
Ages: 9–12

Cook up a storm and put together your own cookbook in this busy, creative, and tasty workshop for budding young cooks and writers. Taught by a chef who is also an English teacher, this workshop will take place in a teaching kitchen. Participants will work from a full day’s menu—breakfast through evening snack—cooking, eating, and discussing dishes for one meal for each day. They will annotate and illustrate the recipes (including their own creative variations), and do a bit of taste-bud-tickling creative writing. Note:New Recipes!

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Writers & Cooks: Around the World

JY8-C2
Instructor: Paul Jonasse
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 28–August 1
$159 W&B members / $175 general public
Ages: 9–13

Travel the world and write your own cookbook in this busy, creative, and tasty workshop for budding young cooks and writers. Taught by a chef who is also an English teacher, this workshop will take place in a teaching kitchen. Participants will journey through five cuisines—cooking, eating, and discussing. They will annotate and illustrate the recipes (including their own creative variations), and do some taste-bud-tickling creative writing. Note:New Recipes!

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My Word: Poetry and Scenes for the Stage

JY8-D5
Instructor: Robert Ricks
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 28–August 1
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 12–14

You already write poetry or fiction. Now you want to know what it’s like to write for an actual performance production. Whether you tend to write poetry, comedy, realistic drama or fascinating flights of fantasy there is room on the stage for your vision! Robert Ricks is a writer and producer/director with a flair for drama coaching that allows you to get your meaning across with both voice and gesture. At the end of the workshop, we’ll perform our own pieces or choose actors from among us to let our characters speak from the stage for an audience.

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Getting Started in Story: The Fiction Writer's Toolbox

JY8-F4
Instructor: Angela Cannon
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., July 28–August 1
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 12–14

You are an avid reader of stories and novels and have tried your hand at writing fiction. Now you want guidance in becoming more productive and skillful as a writer. Together, we will examine and imitate what our favorite authors do to hook us into stories and characters. We’ll look at techniques for finding ideas and for developing and finishing what we start. No matter whether you write fantasy or realism, whether you’re learning more about your inner storyteller, or just starting out, come and get creative.

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Writing the “Young Adult” Novel

JY8-F5
Instructor: Robert Ricks
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, July 28–August 1
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: Teen

Have you ever felt that you could just scream from all the angst of adolescence? Well, here is your chance. We will survey great works of YA Fiction, such as The Catcher in the Rye and The Outsiders, to learn where YA literature came from and newer works to see where it is going. You will share what you find compelling about your favorite YA novels. Most importantly, you will craft a YA story of your own. Whether you have a novel-in-progress, a short story to expand, or a fresh idea, this class is for you. You can plumb the emotional depths and nuances you see going on in teen life through a vivid character. You can use your witty pen to skewer the ridiculous behavior of adults and other teens who make life miserable. You might go on to win the Printz Award for YA!

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Writing the Heart of Life: Poetry and Prose

JY8-M4
Instructor: M.J. Iuppa
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., July 28–August 1
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: Teen

Most poems and all personal essays start with the “I” of the beholder. Most writers start in their teens when they are both keenly observant and deeply aware of their own reactions to life. We will investigate how you, the human observer, feeler, and thinker at the heart of life, can report from the knife-edge of experience in ways that will inform and move your fellows. We will look to examples from young poets, writers, and lyricists who have opened eyes and minds over the ages. We will learn how to use sense imagery, precise words, and sound effects to make our writing more vivid.

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Where’s Walden?

JY8-G1A
Instructors: Edgar Brown, Angela Cannon, D.J. Kitzel, Sally Bittner Bonn, and Wendy Low
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., August 4–8 If meeting the class at the Gell Center.
$198 W&B members / $220 general public
Week 6: August 4–8
[All Day]
Ages: 8–12

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or

ALL DAY: 8 a.m.–5 p.m., August 4–8 If attending from 740 University Avenue.
$280 W&B members / $305 general public
JY8-G1B

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Note: Held at the Gell Center of the Finger Lakes. A bus will run from 740 University Avenue in Rochester, leaving promptly at 8:10 a.m. and returning at 5:00 p.m. There will be some additional activities on the bus.

Summertime, sunshine, green rolling hills, wildlife, and you! Spend a week communing with nature and with the writer within you at our retreat in the Bristol Hills. Hike with professional writers and naturalists along the Finger Lakes Trail, and observe the natural environment around you. We will participate in nature art activities, both ancient and modern. Then we will write stories, dramatic monologues, and poems probing the past, present, and future of the landscape, plants, and animals before us. We will publish our own small anthology. Please dress to hike, and pack a bag lunch each day. An optional evening campfire circle and sleepover will be held on Thursday. Offered in collaboration with the South Bristol Cultural Center.

Outdoor Writer

JY8-G2A
Ages: Teen
Instructors: Edgar Brown, Angela Cannon, D.J. Kitzel, Sally Bittner Bonn, and Wendy Low
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., August 4–8 If meeting the class at Gell Center.
$198 W&B members / $220 general public

Please Call to Register

or

ALL DAY: 8 a.m.–5 p.m., August 4–8 If attending from 740 University Avenue.
$280 W&B members / $305 general public
JY8-G2B

Please Call to Register

Note: Held at the Gell Center of the Finger Lakes. A bus will run from 740 University Avenue in Rochester, leaving promptly at 8:10 a.m. and returning at 5:00 p.m. There will be some additional activities on the bus.

Summertime, sunshine, green rolling hills, wildlife, and you! Spend a week stalking the natural world! Commune with nature and with the writer within you at our retreat in the Bristol Hills. Hike with professional writers and naturalists along the Finger Lakes Trail, and note the natural environment around you. We will participate in nature art activities, both ancient and modern. Then we will write stories, dramatic monologues, and poems probing the past, present, and future of the landscape and ecosystem before us. We will publish our own small anthology. Please dress to hike, and pack a bag lunch each day. An optional evening campfire circle and sleepover will be held on Thursday. Offered in collaboration with the South Bristol Cultural Center.

Write Who You Are: Teen Women

JY8-N4
Instructor: Karen vanMeenen
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, August 4–8
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
High School

Teen women have unique experiences, problems, feelings, dreams, and hopes. In this safe circle, we will explore these personal and cultural issues through poetry, personal essays, sharing life stories, and writing from journal prompts. Participants will be given the opportunity to write from the heart and share who they are and what they experience with a supportive group of other young women. We will also read and discuss selections from insightful books, including Ophelia Speaks: Adolescent Girls Write About Their Search for Self, The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty Are Used Against Women,Odd Girl Out, and Women Who Run With the Wolves.

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Travel Writing/Journal Keeping

JY8-N5
Instructor: Karen vanMeenen
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., August 4–8
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: Teen

Are you a traveler? Do you spend summers at camp, on the road with your family, at your grandmother’s cottage, or exploring the neighborhood? Would you like to document what you see, think, and feel on your adventures by writing in a journal and taking photographs? Join us as we experiment with the best ways to keep a written and visual record of our summer forays. We will read travel writing from around the world and learn the easiest ways of writing about experiences in the moment, keeping things organized, and eventually combining them into a book of life experience that will come in handy, both as a store of personal memories and as base material for writing and other arts. This course is appropriate for any teen with an interest in writing and a tendency to observe the world around them, whether in Penfield or Peru.

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Olden Days of Wizards, Knights and Daring Damsels

JY8-R2
Instructor: Marna Rossi
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, August 11–15
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Week 7: August 11–15
Ages: 6–8

Travel to magical times of enchantment! Enjoy stories of wizards and dragons, bold princesses and daring knights. Learn about the marvels of the middle ages. Through games and crafts, find out about how kids lived and had fun in castle times. Visit a museum to learn about the magic of story. Through the power of your imagination and words, create medieval adventures and act them out as skits.

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Storywriting!

JY8-F6
Instructor: Debbie Sullivan Murray
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., August 11–15
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 6–8

Have a story stuck in your head that you can't get out on the page? Do exciting adventures occur in your daydreams? Do you like to tell your friends all the fun things that have happened to you? Learn to organize your story using a helpful tool called a storyboard. Storyboards help you tell the story in pictures first, then worry about the words later. We will explore our stories, create a storyboard, and then move our stories to a finished book. You will walk away from this class with a book of your own that has been through the whole writing process! Turn your creative brains on and come tell us a story!

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Picture This: Writing and Photography

JY8-A4
Instructors: Lisa Johnson and Wendy Low
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., August 11–15
$208 W&B members / $225 general public
Ages: 8–12

Note: Eastman House members receive W&B member price.

They say, “A picture is worth a thousand words,” and Rochester hosts the home of a picture giant: George Eastman. If you love to photograph and write poetry or short stories, then join us! We’ll spend a week exploring the George Eastman House, gardens, photo galleries, and permanent museum collection as inspiration for our creative writing (as well as trying picture-making methods from pinhole cameras to Photoshop). Participants will create photographic narratives with their cameras. Our pens will capture the words that help to tell the photographic story. A final presentation featuring participants’ photographic and written expressions will be displayed at a last day “art opening” exhibition. If you have your own digital camera, you may wish to bring it.

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Photo Meets Word

JY8-A5
Instructors: Karen vanMeenen
ALL DAY: 9 a.m.–4 p.m., August 11–15
$158 W&B members / $175 general public
Ages: Teen

Note: Eastman House members receive W&B member price.

If you love both word and visual art, then consider combining photography and creative writing to deepen your artful expressions and increase their impact. We’ll roam the George Eastman House, gardens, photo galleries, and permanent museum collection collecting our thoughts and images. We’ll experiment in our writing and photography, using Surrealist and Dadaist techniques, the oldest pinhole camera technologies, and the latest digital technology to create collages, poetry postcards, and other forms that combine text and image. A final presentation featuring participants’ photographic and written expressions will be displayed at a last day “art opening” exhibition. If you have your own digital camera, you may wish to bring it.

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Teen Writers’ Circle

JY8-M5
Instructor: M.J. Iuppa
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., August 11–15
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: Teen

Whether you write poetry or prose, here is your chance to share new ideas and experiment to deepen your understanding of how your writing works and what makes it powerful. Share your work for appreciation and helpful comments. Open yourself up to what your peers around the country and in the room are writing, and try new forms and techniques. No previous experience is required and all types of writing are respected.

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Advanced Fiction

JY8-F7
Instructor: Steven Huff
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, August 11–15
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
High School

Do you feel that your writing is ready for the “real world”? This workshop will help you, an aspiring writer, to polish your work, improve your style, and analyze your technique. Learn revision skills that the pros know: choosing the best point of view, helping readers engage their senses in imagining your story, increasing reader interest through controlling when you reveal information, paring away elements that are not supporting your main impression, etc. We will look at editing as well: how to avoid cliché, what and when to cut, “show, don’t tell,” and how to take advantage of the English language’s vast stock of words. We will work together to become better writers, revisers, and editors.

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A Circus of Words

JY8-L3
Instructor: S. Renée Conley
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, August 18–22
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Week 8: August 18–22
Ages: 6–8

Mad Libs, Instant Storyline, Poetry Tickets, Hangman, Charades, Pictionary, Metaphor, Dictionary, Rhyming: We will use great word and story games to pump up our language skills. Each day we will each adopt a new word and find ways to use it throughout our day. Some games expand vocabulary, some help us classify words, some help us understand story structure, spelling, and sound to become better readers—and some help us tame words, string them together, and make them do circus tricks! We will each collect new words for our own word bank. Most of all, we’ll have fun with words—our friends for life!

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Magic Tree House Readers’ Club

JY8-R3
Instructor: Marna Rossi
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., August 18–22
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 6–8

Take part in wonderful magical adventures from the Magic Tree House Series. Join Annie and Jack as they solve problems, help people, and travel through the world and through time. Like Annie and Jack, we will learn about the animals and people in each environment we visit. We will read some of the stories and act out some of the scenes. Through trips to libraries, archives, and museums, we will explore how we can learn about animals, landscapes, and peoples in other times and places. You will illustrate stories through art activities, and, with a team, create your scenes and act them out for your friends and family. You and your friends and family will also have a chance to join with classmates at a Magic Tree House Picnic in the amazing Classroom in the Trees (at the Gell Center of the Finger Lakes).

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Writing Fiction: Let’s Get Started

JY8-F8
Instructor: Debra Eileen Lewis
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, August 18–22
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 8–11

You have tons of story ideas swimming around in your head just waiting to be brought to the page. Well, it’s time to get started! In this class we will explore the basics of writing fiction and begin the process of bringing those ideas to life. Through character development, sensory descriptions, and an awareness of the basics of plot, any simple idea can be turned into a full-fledged story! It’s part magic, but it still takes work. Let’s do it together.

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Fiction Writing Skills

JY8-F9
Instructor: Nancy Kress
MORNINGS: 9a.m.–Noon, August 18–22
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 11–13

Learn how to make your stories grab your readers and hold on! We will look at four tasks that are central to successfully writing fiction: creating characters, describing scenes, crafting dialogue, and spinning plots. Reading excerpts of good fiction will help us see good ways to fulfill these tasks. We will also examine examples of unclear or unexciting writing and how they can be revised. As you build your understanding of how fiction works, you will also practice your fiction writing skills, creating stories to share with your classmates. The teacher is a highly successful novelist and short story writer who is also a popular teacher and a respected columnist on fiction writing. She formerly taught fourth grade, ninth grade, and college.

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For A Song

JY8-P5
Instructor: Doug Waterman
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., August 18–22
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 8–12

Anything can be a song! A book you love, or a day you hate. Strong feelings are the number one ingredient you need to turn everyday life into your own song. In this workshop, we’ll sharpen our songwriters’ tools and explore techniques to help us find our own song. In the end, you will have an opportunity to perform for one another and our invited guests. Musicians are very welcome, but musical training is not a must. Robert Burns couldn’t carry a tune, and he’s one of the greatest lyricists in history! We’ll share our new songs with invited guests at a performance on Friday.

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The Call of the Wild: Through the Eyes of Wolves and Dogs

JY8-M6
Instructor: Amy Martin
AFTERNOON: 1–4 p.m., August 18–22
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 9–12

Much fiction writing and reading helps us see the world through other people’s eyes. Here is a chance to see through the eyes of wolves. We will read both scientific research and fiction that try to get inside the minds, senses, and social lives of these species, so familiar to men throughout our history, whether feared, reviled, or loved. We will compare ourselves with our canine neighbors and see how they can teach us much about ourselves and yet remain mysterious and apart. We will do sense experiments that allow us to get a better feel for their perspectives. And we will create believable canine characters and write them into realistic or fantastic situations. One day will be spent at Seneca Park and the Zoo, exploring and taking notes on behavior and habitat.

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Keep it Real: Poetic and Dramatic Monologues and Scenes for Teens

JY8-D6
Instructor: Robert Ricks
ALL DAY:9 a.m.–4 p.m.,August 18–22
$198 W&B members / $220 general public
Ages: Teen

Do you ever wish people would listen to what you have to say? Come learn how to create believable characters based on yourself, teens you know, or your ability to empathize imaginatively with teens you don’t know. Tell the world what it’s like to be on the front edge of adolescence. We’ll read monologues (dramatic speeches) and scenes for teens (including those written by other young people) before writing our own. We’ll take risks while we learn about acting, characterization, and voice. At the end of the workshop, we’ll perform our own pieces or choose actors from among us to let our characters speak from the stage for an audience.

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Editing

JY8-B2
Instructor: Mary Anne Donovan
AFTERNOONS:1–3:30 p.m.,August 18–22
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: Teen

Editing is not just about where you put your commas so that the writing is “correct”! It is also about how you cut excess verbiage, order the phrasing, and adjust your word choice so that the writing is powerful! Come learn the secrets of professional writers. If you are already a good writer and editor, this short course in the formal basics may allow you to find paying work in college editing papers for fellow students.

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Fun with Fairytales

JY8-M7
Instructor: Doug Waterman
AFTERNOONS: 1–4 p.m., August 25–29
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Week 9: August 25–29
Ages: 8–12

We all know the story of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Or maybe we just think we do. Come make up your own bumps and twists to turn traditional fairytales on their heads. We’ll use songs, writing, storytelling, and acting to help us explore and reinvent old favorite stories. Family and friends are invited to our final session, where we’ll share what we’ve created.

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Write On!

JY8-M8

Instructor: Wendy Low
MORNINGS: 9 a.m.–Noon, August 25–29
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
Ages: 8–13

You know you love to write. It’s the end of the summer and school is starting. Here’s a class that will help you keep writing throughout the year! Learn to finish the stories and poems you start and to keep a journal of observations and ideas. Look at famous people’s creative journals and learn new uses for your own journal. End the summer with a writing extravaganza! Take home the inspiration and techniques to keep you going!

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SummerWrite Publishing Crew

JY8-B3
Instructor: Donna Marbach
Afternoons: 12:30–4 p.m., August 25–29
plus 3 Wednesdays, September 3, 10, & 17, 6:30-8 p.m.
$129 W&B members / $149 general public
High School

Literary anthology editing involves several layers of work: selecting the pieces, making sure they are copy-edited adequately and error-free, choosing an order for the work, choosing design elements such as fonts, book size, paper, layout, cover design, etc. We will work from selections submitted by SummerWrite participants throughout the summer. We will name the anthology and decide everything about the look, which will appear both in print and on line. As editors, we also get to compose an introduction, and if we like, some feature articles such as book reviews or profiles of writer/teachers who work in the program. We will investigate and compare costs at printers, and learn to work against deadlines. This workshop is for self-starters who want to be on the inside of a publishing venture.

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Teen Slam Team

JY8-P6
Instructor: Reenah L. Golden
AFTERNOONS:1–4 p.m.,August 25–29
$99 W&B members / $110 general public
High School

Slam poetry is poetry spoken and performed in a variety of crowd-pleasing formats. Participants will study the art of the spoken word and “slam” through a series of pieces shared by the instructor and video excerpts from professional slam poets from the famous Nuyorican Café and Def Poetry Slam. During the course of the workshop, each poet will develop his or her own original piece or personal adaptation of an existing text using the group’s feedback and encouragement, and perform together as a “team.” Our slam team will then take it on the road in the fall and perform at other venues! Whether you were born to slam or just want to put more life into your presentation skills, we will be on your team!

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