NEWS Right On for Write On! – The success of our first National Challenge seminar 30 Apr 09

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The National Challenge is a government-led initiative to improve standards in English, Maths and Science. Positively MAD was recently approached to create programmes that would help meet the outcomes of the National Challenge, and our Head of Training, Sander De Groot researched and created a seminar to do just that.

The new seminar, entitled Write On! focuses on writing and reading skills for English and is a multi-sensory and engaging opportunity for students to improve their abilities.

After a dress rehearsal in Colchester that went very well, Sander reflected upon feedback and made changes to make the course even better.  He then piloted the refined and improved workshop at Birches Head School in Stoke last Thursday.

Presenting to two groups of 25 students each, Sander showed ways to improve critical reading and writing, ways to plan for creative stories and offered simple tips for punctuation and spelling. The response for his sessions was remarkably encouraging.

“I have received great feedback,” says Sander. “The students really took to the ideas, and the Head of English came up afterwards to say how pleased she was with the workshop.”

The Year 11 students were shown ways to remember the techniques given, and had the opportunity to apply those techniques to a written text before evaluating their efforts. This approach allowed them to gain a deeper understanding of the ideas that were presented.

Write on! will now be marketed to schools around the country and teachers interested in the course can contact our Head Office for more details.