Writing workshops: how to read magazines — and write for them
September 22, 2017If it’s Friday, then it’s a magazine masterclass in Chester. I ran the first in a series of new-style workshops today, hosted by Meltdown, in which we got to grips with some of the thorny issues of making it as a magazine journalist. Such as, you ask? Well, try signposting, pitching editors and, the thorniest … Read more
Tortoise Magazine writing workshop at the Good Life Experience
September 21, 2017A phone call out the blue. It was the nice people from Tortoise, Chester’s independent magazine. They had a stand at the Good Life Experience, the annual festival of, well, good life, taking over Hawarden for a weekend each September. And they were thinking of running some writing workshops to encourage visitors to react to … Read more
A travel-writing masterclass at HiOA university, Oslo
September 15, 2017To Oslo then — thanks to an Erasmus exchange with a British university. After a week in the Norwegian capital, I learnt that photojournalism is alive and well in Scandinavia, you can buy a pint for less than £10 and knitting is actively encouraged in the front row of Nordic lecture theatres. But, most of … Read more
Reporting for BBC School Report Day at Queens Park High School, Chester
March 11, 2016BBC School Report marked its tenth anniversary this week. The initiative from BBC News helps 11 to 16-year-old students develop their journalistic skills. I joined a group of wannabe hacks at Queens Park High School, Chester, to brainstorm ideas for print- and video-journalism reports. Check out some of the work from the day here. More … Read more
KS2 writing workshop for Overleigh St Mary’s Primary School, Chester
December 11, 2015Just time to fit in another workshop for schools before Christmas. It was, in fact, a return trip to Overleigh St Marys Primary School in Chester to run another media writing workshop for Key Stage 2 (KS2). The focus this year was news (factual writing) vs. blogs (persuasive writing) and we based our stories around … Read more
IVC writing workshop — How to write a magazine feature
November 2, 2015Workshop news. I ran a taster session for the Chester IVC group last night [pictured above]. It was based around writing features for magazines and hosted by the Cross Keys pub in their upstairs room, plus fuelled by one of their Sunday roasts. We developed some great story ideas on the night from travel to … Read more
A media taster session for the West Cheshire and North Wales Chamber of Commerce
July 17, 2015I ran a taster session for my media-medira writing workshops with Tracy North of Outwrite PR. It was a lunch event for the West Cheshire and Noth Wales Chamber of Commerce (WCNW Chamber) and the theme was how to get your story across. There was a great response from people on the day with … Read more
JULY MEDIA WRITING WORKSHOP WARM-UP EXERCISES: Fab features
July 1, 2015The last workshop in the current series is looming. This is round three in the triumvirate of summer writing workshops, taking place Thursday, July 16, 7-9pm at the CHIC co-working hub in Chester. The topic for this session is writing fab features, followed by individual tuition — bring some work-in-progress writing for the latter, or we can review your … Read more
Homework: Media writing workshop June
June 13, 2015Thanks to everyone who attended yesterday’s workshop at CHIC Chester [pictured above]. There was some great debate about how to pitch (please see links below) and some thought-provoking discussion about the problems we all face when approaching commissioning editors. There’s a short Vimeo from the session here: Now for the homework before our next session in July. … Read more