Advanced Writer's Class

Welcome to the Project's Advanced Writer's Class, a curriculum geared to enhance creative writing courses offered in honors level high school and above. We hope students and teachers alike take advantage of this curriculum to help explain the concepts of writing as an art form and to assist in its creation, as well as to mentor emerging talent. The course was designed to encompass one semester. Teachers who use this course or supplement their own can request the Instructors version. Students may take this course as part of their school curriculum or on their own. Our editors are available for questions throughout the process and can be contacted through their email in the right margin.

All course material is available in PDF format for download. Click on the lesson or exercise to open the file.

Introduction to Creative Writing, a brief overview of what creative writing means and entails.

Lesson One: Picking your Forte, a discussion on the different forms of creative writing.

Lesson Two: Choosing your Audience, a discussion on writing toward a specific readership.
   Exercise One: Choosing your Audience 

Lesson Three: Business or Passion, a discussion on what motivates a writer and critiques.
  Exercise Two: Business or Passion

Lesson Four: The Beauty of Poetry, a must-read dissertation on concepts carried over into all
  types of creative writing.
  Exercise Three: The Beauty of Poetry, Word Gender
  Exercise Four: The Beauty of Poetry, Harmony
  Exercise Five: The Beauty of Poetry, Resonance
   Exercise Six: The Beauty of Poetry, Word Compatibility
  Exercise Seven: The Beauty of Poetry, Word Frequency
  Exercise Eight: The Beauty of Poetry, Compilation

Lesson Five: Having Your Say, a discussion on how play and screenwriting helps in visualization
  and writing dialogue.
  Exercise Nine: Having Your Say, Script Writing
  Exercise Ten: Having Your Say, Scene Writing

Lesson Six: In Every Bit of Literature an explanation of how research into facts and experiences
  can support the credibility of creative writing.
  Exercise Eleven: In Every Bit of Literature, Resource Material
  Exercise Twelve: In Every Bit of Literature, Technical Research
  Exercise Thirteen: In Every Bit of Literature, Subject Appropriateness
  Exercise Fourteen: In Every Bit of Literature, Work Appropriate
  Exercise Fifteen: In Every Bit of Literature, Composition

Lesson Seven: Short Takes, a summarization on the short story
  Exercise Sixteen Short Takes, Story Outline
  Exercise Seventeen Short Takes, Condensing Verbiage
  Exercise Eighteen Short Takes, Short Story

Lesson Eight: A Novel Idea, a brief description of the novel and introduction of the following
  lessons dedicated to novel writing.

Lesson Nine: Building Character, a key element in creating a novel of artistic literary quality based
  on character development.
  Exercise Nineteen: Building Character, Character Outline
  Exercise Twenty: Building Character, Impromptu Scenario

Lesson Ten: Plotting Your Course, the second key element in creating a novel, concentrating on
  plot development.

Lesson Eleven: Point of View, a critical element of novel writing based on perspective.
  Exercise Twenty-one: Point of View

Lesson Twelve: Show and Tell, editors' preference for story-showing.
  Exercise Twenty-two: Show and Tell

Lesson Thirteen: Acting It Out, using the active voice versus the passive voice.
  Exercise Twenty-three: Acting it Out
  Exercise Twenty-four: Acting it Out, Rewrite

Lesson Fourteen: Purple Prose, evaluating the quality of words as they apply to creative writing.
  Exercise Twenty-five: Purple Prose, Replacing the "ly"
  Exercise Twenty-six: Purple Prose, Unnecessary Verbiage
  Exercise Twenty-seven: Purple Prose, Versatility