What was it?
A creative writing project for Blind and visually impaired writers run in partnership with the Pocklington Centre Balham with support from Wandsworth Council and the Link Up project of the London Development Agency. Workshops were led by Lois Keith.
We designed the project to be as accessible as possible using scribes and readers as support workers for the group and assistive technology such as screen readers and text magnifiers. Lois Keith an experienced disabled writer adjusted her facilitation style so we spent more time working in spoken voice during the workshops.
Why did we do it?
- Many visually impaired people have limited confidence in their abilities as writers due to the visual and inaccessible nature of reading and writing
- We wanted to hear these ‘different voices.’ The writing of visually impaired people who have limited access to reading and writing.
- The project would help us to meet our service level agreement with Wandsworth Council.
What was the result?
- Visually impaired writers developing their creative imagination and voice as a writer.
- Visually impaired writers with increased confidence and pleasure in writing.
- Each writer with a portfolio of original work.
- Experimenting with writing in different forms, for example: poetry, prose, script and autobiographical writing.
- Increased critical skills of different approaches to writing and use of some of the techniques used by other writers in their own work.
- Social interaction in offering constructive criticism on the work of others and developing skills in editing their own writing.
- Participated in a public spoken and social presentation of work to an invited audience at the Pocklington Centre.
Lois Keith
Lois Keith is a published writer of fiction and non fiction and her work has been translated into many languages. Her anthology of writing by disabled women, Mustn’t Grumble won the MIND book of the year award. Her most recent novel is Out of Place, the story of a disabled child who escapes war torn Vienna in the 1930s. Lois has many years of experience in running creative writing workshops for disabled and non disabled people. Her current work includes teaching writing at Birkbeck College, University of London and developing Equality and Diversity provision at The Conservatoire for Dance and Drama.