GW member José Lourenço and writer Anwesha Singbal held a workshop on the Act of Writing on 4th March 2017 for students of the Ravindra Kelekar Dnyanmandir school at Margao. Some notes on the session from José:
The secondary school students of Konkani Bhasha Mandal's RKD School are quite fluent in Konkani and English. A batch of 16 of them trooped in and took their seats, with notebooks in hand, eagerly waiting for the pearls of wisdom from my and Anwesha's distinguished mouths. Anwesha Singbal is a Sahitya Akademi award winner for youth literature. And I am a distinguished Goa Writers member!
I had brought along my notebooks containing my story and poem notes, handwritten manuscripts and a tattered old scrapbook of bits and pieces of paper with ideas for stories. I told of how I wrote stories in Konkani and then took my 'homework' to Damodar Mauzo for editing and grammar corrections. Mauzo is a founder GW member, always ready to help and critique new writers. So, I told the students, writing is a skill that has to be worked on, with help from mentors, just as they study under their schoolteachers. 
I then explained how the ideas for stories come from all around us, from our memories and even from our dreams. This was then illustrated through a few of my stories. "Stories need not be stereotyped imitations of the folktales of ancient times, and we need not mimic Enid Blyton or the Harry Potter stories", I said, urging them to be fresh and original in their writing. The children had written some poems and stories of their own, which were discussed. They had a lot of questions. One lad wanted to know how all these different languages developed in the first place. They were also quite well read in both English and Konkani literature for their age.
Anwesha told them of how her father Arun Singbal, a Konkani writer, kept diaries for most of his life, and how this habit helped him as a writer. She explained how she writes her poetry and where her ideas come from. Having worked as a journalist in a local daily, she also spoke of journalistic writing. The students were then asked to write a creative text or an opinion piece, which was discussed at a followup session.
- José Lourenço
This was one of a series of ten workshops held by Goa Writers' members, funded by the sales proceeds of the Inside Out anthology.
