Do you have a teen who loves to read and write? Do you believe he has the potential to become a writer? If you’re looking for a productive activity for your kid this summer season, sign him up for “The Write Stuff: A Writing Lab for Teens”.

In this half-day workshop, the Founders of Writer’s Block Philippines will share different writing techniques and help your child discover his writer’s voice. While Talecraft creator, Ria Lu, will discuss the basics of fiction writing, character design, and story creation.

What is Talecraft?

Talecraft is a story-creation card game designed to help writers break out of mental block and create stories with genres and characters that are outside of what they usually like to create. There are three types of cards in Talecraft: the Genre cards, the Archetype cards, and the Key cards. Players need to pick cards from each type and create a story based on what they've picked. For more information about the game, please visit http://talecraft.komikasi.com.

Who can attend the event?

Ideally, participants should be teenagers between the ages of 13 to 18 years who generally have an interest in writing and want to hone their skills, especially in the following topics:

fiction writing
feature writing
journaling

How much is the registration fee?

There is a PhP3,000 fee per participant, which covers the course fee, Talecraft cards, and workshop kit. We’ll take care of the substance, but you take care of your sustenance, that okay?

How can I reserve a seat?

Simply sign up through our online registration form (https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1xbSMCEiOR3C5pjJEXbIgRkABzGjQtlv5gol5aR4OiRE/viewform) to signify your interest and we’ll email you the details on how to confirm a slot.

How can I pay for the workshop?

You may settle the workshop fee by making a deposit to our bank account. Details as follows:

Bank: BPI 

Account name: Writer’s Block Training Services 

Account number: Savings account 1759 0377 11

If you have the BPI app on your phone, you can also pay via bank transfer without having to enroll our account in your Bills Payment Roster. Simply click on the option, “Transfer to Anyone”.

You may also pay via Paypal, which has a payment feature in our website.

NOTE: Once you’ve settled the fee, please email us your complete name, contact details, and a copy of the deposit slip/screen cap of transaction so we can confirm your slot.

Is there a deadline for signing up?

There is no deadline but please note that we will close the registration once all the slots have been filled up. Walk-in participants will only be accommodated if there are still available slots.

Also, it’s best to sign up and confirm a slot way before the event so we can prepare your handouts and certificates.

Who is hosting the event?

It will be conducted by Writer’s Block Philippines, a duo of editors and communicators who have collectively had more than 20 years of experience in freelance lifestyle and corporate writing.

Ana P. Santos: reproductive health rights and women’s issues

Ana has had over 12 years experience in advertising and marketing communications. She left her post as Assistant Vice President of a financial institution five years ago to pursue a career as a freelance writer.

As an independent journalist and foreign correspondent covering sexual health rights and women’s issues, Ana has received media grants from Newsbreak, Probe Media Foundation and the Philippine Press Institute to cover population and development issues.

In 2014, she was named the 2014 Persephone Miel Fellow by Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting to do a series of stories on migrant mothers entitled, “Who Takes Care of Nanny’s Children?”. She has just finished reporting for her second Pulitzer Center grant entitled, “HIV in the Philippines: State of Emergency”.

Ana has regular columns in Rappler and Working Mom while some of her full-length features have been published in the Washington Post and The Atlantic.

Nikka Sarthou-Lainez: lifestyle / travel

Nikka has over 10 years of experience in writing for various online and print publications, as well as developing content for corporate clients. She is currently a full-time freelance editor/writer handling independent projects and corporate accounts.

In 2012, she was chosen as one of the five Asian representatives for Moleskine’s Modern Nomads and was included in its exhibition of travel writers’ kits where some of her travel paraphernalia were shown on display. She was the only featured travel writer from the Philippines, the others were from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, and Malaysia.

Her feature pieces have appeared in local publications like asianTraveler, Travelife, Spark, Celebrity Mom, Business World, Highlife, Metro, Metro Society, ClicktheCity.com, Spot.ph, Herword.com, Homegrown.ph, GMA News Online, Rappler and WayToGo.She has also been published in Filipino publications abroad such as Filipino Star News in Michigan, Hawaii Filipino Chronicle, and Dubai-based magazine Illustrado.

She is currently a Contributing Editor in Smile, the in-flight magazine of Cebu Pacific Air.

Guest speaker: Ria Lu, Creator of Talecraft

Ria Lu is the President/CEO of Komikasi Games and Entertainment, Inc., the development company responsible for some of the award-winning Advergames in the country. Ria graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science at the De La Salle University, Manila; and has taken up Computer Graphics for Games at the Tokyo Technical College. She is also currently the immediate Past-President of the Soroptimist International Club Parañaque, a socio-civic organization advocating the betterment of the lives of women and girls; and she is also a board member of the Game Developers’ Association of the Philippines. Ria is also the creator of the Talecraft and Flirt card games.

Who do I contact for more information about the workshop?

You can call us through this number (0917) 397.9927 or email [email protected]. You can also check out our website: www.writersblockphilippines.com.

Outline

Speaker/s

Ana P. Santos: reproductive health rights and women’s issues

Ana has regular columns in Rappler and Working Mom while some of her full-length features have been published in the Washington Post and The Atlantic.

Nikka Sarthou-Lainez: lifestyle / travel

She is currently a Contributing Editor in Smile, the in-flight magazine of Cebu Pacific Air.

Guest speaker: Ria Lu, Creator of Talecraft

Reviews

Be the first to write a review about this course.

Write a Review

Our story started in 2009, when writers–Ana P. Santos and Nikka Sarthou-Lainez–met at a professional blogging and Internet marketing class and realized that freelance writers had many unique needs that the current landscape was not able to address.

Where do we go to find clients? How do we deal with pricing and competition? Pitching and editors? How can we build a sustainable career as a creative entrepreneur?

While school had taught us the basics of looking for story ideas, drafting news and features, and dealing with the technical realities of our craft, there were many things that we had learned only along the way–things that we felt other writers also needed to know about if they were going to pursue writing as a career.

Our passions and purpose

It is from this desire to share our knowledge and further professionalize the standards of our craft that Writer’s Block Philippines was born.

At Writer’s Block Philippines, we are passionate about words, and even more passionate about the idea that we could make a life (not just a living) doing what we love most.

Nikka had long left the corporate world to combine her two loves–travel and writing; Ana left a lucrative career in banking–foregoing the vice presidency and the designated parking space–to pursue her passion for reporting on women and gender issues and sexual health rights. ...

View Complete Profile

Creative Writing