November 26, 2009


MEDIA RELEASE
Senses and poetry used to teach writing techniques
 
“A writer must have sense, must have a sense of him or herself and must be in tune with the senses.”  
 
Monologist Deborah Jean-Baptiste Samuel made this inspiring statement today to student attendees at a Creative Writing Workshop, held by the National Secretariat for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting 2009 and the Royal Commonwealth Society (RCS) at the International Financial Centre, Port of Spain.
 
Ten under-14 students and ten students between 14 to 18 years old surpassed over 200 entrants to vie for top prizes in the 2009 Trinidad and Tobago Commonwealth Essay Competition: ‘What Trinidad and Tobago Can Teach the World.’ The workshops formed part of the reward for these young essayists. However, a grand prize winner will be selected from each age group. The under-14 top entrant wins a laptop computer from Digi-Data Systems, and the 14 to 18 age group winner will be flown to London, along with a parent or guardian, to attend the Commonwealth Observance Day at Westminster Abbey.
 
Columnist, fiction writer and education specialist Debbie Jacob led the 14 to 18 year old entrants’ workshop, where the students learned how poetic devices could help them become better writers. After an analytical discussion on the effects of global warming, where the articulate entrants showed that they were well-informed on the issue, Jacob stressed to the all-girls group that using visual images are best to convey the seriousness of the issue to their readers. She encouraged them to use poetic devices like metaphor, simile and symbolism.
 
Eventually, the group paired off and got down to the business of writing the draft of a poem, while Jacob walked around offering advice and encouraging comments.  



Entrants exchanged their first draft, and gave each other helpful advice. The group then worked on their final draft which was critiqued during an open discussion.
 
“They’re in pairs to get the whole concept of working together like the Commonwealth works together to highlight issues and make the future better,” Jacob said.
 
Meanwhile, Deborah Jean-Baptiste Samuel held her co-ed group of under-14 students enthralled with her usual dramatic style and a rapid fire series of writing exercises. Founder of the Oratory Foundation, an organisation that teaches children writing and oratory skills, Jean-Baptiste Samuel started the group off with an exercise to discover a sense of self and opinion. The students then focused on writing about a storm; they sketched an interpretative picture and furiously wrote a list of descriptive words before Jean-Baptiste Samuel allowed them to write a creative essay on the topic.
 
“Lightning is flashing, dogs are barking, people are screaming, water is rolling: how is the writer going to capture that?” she asked the group. Jean-Baptiste Samuel also read stimulating excerpts for the students, like this passage from Shakespeare’s King Lear: “Blow winds and crack your cheeks, blow!”
 
But that wasn’t the end for the under-14 group; they wrote another three pieces for Jean-Baptiste Samuel, including a poem and two additional creative essays based on a photo and on the topic ‘A Terrible Flood.’
 
Jean-Baptiste Samuel advised them that “When you’re a writer, you write with conviction, you write with authority, fearlessly. That is the only way to write.”



                                CHOGM-TT 33-2009