SCHOOLS PROGRAMME IN THE SOUTHERN PROVINCE
 
As the Festival itself approaches school-going age, we have turned our attention to developing a programme of work in schools in the area around Galle, working closely with the charity Adopt SriLanka, who have sustained relationships with schools and the education authorities in the Southern Province.  Through the year leading up to the Festival we have run a series of workshops for both students and teachers of 25 schools, focused specifically on promoting creative reading and writing.  This is of course a subject close to the Festival’s own heart, as is the importance of making our Festival lastingly useful to the present and future writers of Sri Lanka.

Reading Days

In July 2009 we took teams of writers, performers, teachers and a few university students to read to schoolchildren stories from around the world to which they might not ordinarily have access, and to discuss with them the variety of ways in which they might themselves choose to write stories.  The programme was adapted and stories carefully selected for a students from both rural and urban schools, ranging from Grades 3 - 11.
 
Drama and Storytelling Workshops
 
Also in July, a workshop was run for teachers, at both primary and secondary level, demonstrating simple ways to use drama and storytelling in teaching language.  This workshop was born of teachers’ own requests for simple techniques they could use in teaching English to their students.
 
Creative Writing Workshops

Since the Festival’s inception Adopt SriLanka has run a creative writing competition in schools, in association with each Galle Literary Festival.  This year we offered creative writing workshops to all entrants to the competition, from 25 national and provincial schools – aimed at supporting these young writers to write original stories from their own experience rather than what they expected the judges to want.  The competition was judged by the Festival and the winners will receive books and tickets to the schools day of the Festival.
 
A follow-up workshop was run for these students’ teachers, demonstrating the exercises we had used and discussing the ideas we hoped were conveyed through them.

Dedicated schools day at the Festival
 
For the first time the Festival will run a day of activities for schools at the start of the Festival, for 100 students from the schools above.  The programme, developed with their interests and language levels in mind, will include a historical scavenger hunt through the Fort and sessions with visiting writers. We hope that this will be an inspiring and unusual opportunity for schoolchildren to truly have an international literary festival come to their region and address their interests.
 

We would like to extend our warmest thanks to the staff of Adopt SriLanka for their hard work in setting up these sessions and to all of our readers and workshop leaders who gave generously of their time to see this project through.  We hope to see our outreach programme grow further