Sunday 21 July 2019 workshops were held in the Vale and Downland Museum in Wantage and were led by the poet in residence, Elaine Baker. The sessions were free to young people from ages 10 to 25. No previous experience was required. There were three workshops during the day for different age groups: 10-13, 14-18 and 18-25.
The Museum team provided some hand-picked artefacts from the Museum archive for the young people to consider and research (including a multimedia resource). They were encouraged to explore the space in their own time during the workshop to discover something that appealed to them to write about.
Each group were given guidance over a selection of approaches and ways of writing about an object or theme. Notes were given on a handout. At regular intervals the participants were encouraged to share a little of what they had been writing or to discuss which approach they had tried. The workshops were 2 hours long so the emphasis was very much on experimenting with ways of writing. All participants wrote draft poems and were encouraged to go away and edit them towards completion. The work they created was original and exciting.