First in a series about conducting writing workshops. The second part will focus on short fiction, the third on poetry, the fourth on scriptwriting, and the fifth on workshopping or editing long fiction.
As a member of the executive board for an on-campus writing group called UT Writer’s Guild, I’m supervising weekly writing workshops for our in-town members this summer. I’ve noticed a few things that might be helpful to those who want to conduct writing workshops of their own.
1. Establish rules and/or guidelines early on
For a peer review workshop, rules about how to treat the other writers as well as guidelines on what to bring are usually pretty important. Usually, I set basic conduct rules at the beginning of each session:
- Treat other writers with respect – you can be firm, you have the right to dislike the work or to criticize, but you do not have the right to be verbally abusive.
- Read out loud if you like, but we won’t make you do anything you don’t want to – we’re all about comfort and peer support at Writer’s Guild.
However, some workshops – be it a general writing organization or a student writing organization – will likely also find it helpful to set guidelines about what to bring. Here are a few possibilities:
- Limit page or line count. If you know that you’ll have 25 people at your workshop, it’s not practical to allow everyone to bring in a 10-page work.
- Limit exactly what type of work. Maybe your group is a NaNo prep or support group. In that case, you don’t want scripts or poetry. Or maybe you personally know nothing about fiction – then you should run a poetry workshop. You don’t have to do everything, you know.
- Limit who brings what. I’ll go back to the 25-person example above: going through 25 short stories is never practical for a single workshop, even if it lasts for hours. Assign weekly rotations and let everyone know who can bring in work on which week. Added bonus: you can hand out the work the week before so people can read at home, leaving you more in-workshop time to discuss the piece.
Again, that’s just a sample, but seriously consider making a list of guidelines and rules for your group workshop. As I write this, I’m beginning to seriously consider writing down my rules.
2. Establish a meeting place and stick to it
Everyone’s had it happen to them: attend a meeting, make friends, love the group, decide to come back next week – only to discover the day’s changed, the time has changed, or the place has changed. Sucks, right?
When you’re deciding to do a weekly or bi-weekly workshop, choose a place, day, and time to go and make sure you stay there! If you MUST change it up – for example, if you get a new job or your class schedule changes – make sure everyone knows about the change.
It’s also best if you choose a public location instead of someone’s home unless everyone in the group is very close and friendly with one another. UTWG meets at a coffee shop near campus during the summer.
3. Recruit newcomers to the workshop
This is more or less a no-brainer for every organization, but don’t forget to recruit others to your workshop. Figure out how many people your group can handle each week, then try to reach that goal.
For example, we can comfortably workshop with 4 to 6 people or, if we have more than that, split into two groups so we can have more personal discussions. Usually, about 3 or 4 people attend, so we’re trying our hardest to let the other members know where and when we meet.
Incidentally, you can even use the workshops as a recruitment tool: letting others know that you’re having a workshop may entice them to come. Which brings us to our final point…
4. Network, network, network!
Anyone who wants to succeed as a writer or editor knows that networking is incredibly important, so don’t pass this opportunity up! Talk with other members of your group, get their phone numbers and e-mail addresses, and learn more about your local writing community.
Of course, you have to follow up on it. Check out their blog – many writers have blogs about something or another – and post comments to it. You may find interesting stuff you may want to recommend to your friends.
There are also other ways that networking can help you.
Social networking is an excellent tool for writers. Facebook has a Groups application that makes it easy to create, organize, and contact your workshop group. We post prompts, links, and meeting times in the group, which makes it easier to see who’s going and who’s not.
Conclusion
There are plenty of ways to create a writing workshop. While it’s good to have freedom in the group, it’s also good to have a little structure.
The most important part, however, is to grow as a writer and to help others in the workshop grow as writers, too. There are many ways to help your members do so, and the rest of the Workshopping series will help you help others. Keep checking back here for the next four parts of the series.
Do you attend workshops? What works best in your workshops?
Feliza Casano 