College of Pension Actuaries

Do you really want to be a writer? If so! Stick with us we tell you about Creative Writing Tips that guide you along the way.

1. Get Ready To Be A Writer: First thing to get ready to be a writer, you need to have your writing resource, find a comfort writing place and zone, improved writing habit and reading habit. A real writer does not need too much equipment; you just need to have only pens, pencils, paper or your Macbook, laptop or Tablet. Next, find a place that makes you creative imagination expands. It could be your bedroom or wherever you like. If you like music along the way, just play it!

2. Create Your Writing Styles and Ideas: A good writer reads as much as s/he can. By doing so, it will help you discover your writing style. Writing style is your unique skill; it is how you talk to your readers. Then you need to explore the ideas. Where can you find ideas? Just at everything around you! There are billions of ideas you will find.

3. Create Characters: A creative writer knows how to create characters. Each character must be unique and make readers care about. To create good characters, you can look at your friends, anyone around or animal and nature.

4. Decide Your Story’s Viewpoint: Before you start your story, you need to decide whether you want to tell your readers about everything related to your characters at once or you want to reveal it stage by stage. That’s your call!

5. Get Ready To Write: When you feel you are ready to write, start a few paragraphs. It is a good way to keep your story flow. But do not though it all at once!

If you will be working with adult learners of English, start by assessing their needs. Many English as a Second Language students know what they want to learn. At the beginning their needs will most likely be “survival” phrases (i.e. Where is the bathroom? How much does it cost? Traffic sign reading.). Then they will need basic functional English for filling out job applications, getting medical care, and signing their child up for school.

Ask your students to identify what they want to learn by using any of the following methods or a combination of them.

1. Have the students look through their textbook or picture dictionary and place Post It Notes on five pages with the information they think is most important.
2. Have students check off things they want to learn on a pictorial list depicting different activities (grocery shopping, reading a note from school, filling out a driver’s license application, job applications, etc).
3. Show students a pictorial strip illustrating three reasons why Antonio wants to learn English; then brainstorm with the class and substitute their reasons for learning English.

This gives the students a voice in their instruction and makes the content relevant to their lives. It also gives you a chance to evaluate what skills your students have already and what they need to strengthen.

Once you know what your students hope to achieve, use the principles of adult learning. Adults are problem solvers, self-directed, and disciplined. They already know how to think and they know how to learn new things. They will want to know why something needs to be learned and that it is applicable to their life.

Reading is a culture that most people find hard to adopt, especially with the busy lifestyles that leave very little room for leisure activities. However, if you really want to become a good writer in any field, reading must become your companion in life. Try to read other people’s works, especially well-known writers in your field of writing, and set this as a personal goal. For instance, you could make it your goal to read at least one book every month, and then find a way of monitoring yourself to ensure you are actually doing it. Remember that starting a new habit is never easy, so talk to a friend or family member to ask you every once in a while whether you are doing this.

You may want to ask, how does reading help my writing? Well, here’s how:

(a) Improves your stock of vocabulary and richness of expression: Although the use of big words in writing other than for academic purposes is not usually encouraged (simple language tends to be more favorable for the average reader), knowing a few additional words and how to use them may just provide that extra punch to your writing. The idea is not really to borrow other people’s expressions, but to open your eyes to new possibilities and more creativity.

(b) Inspiration: One man’s verse could be another man’s chapter or paragraph. Some of the best poems I have written were inspired by reading the works of other poets. Don’t ever be deceived that your writing talent is the best; there are other writers out there who have the very gems you are looking for to beautify your own writing. Sometimes a poem can be the inspiration for a short story, or a short story can inspire the script for a film. Inspiration is a valuable asset that every writer needs to have, especially in creative writing.